trump impeachment watch thread

[Winehole23]

oopsie!

[RandomGuy]

New filing suggests Mark Meadows under investigation for campaign finance violations

Former Trump chief in jeopardy: Watchdog group filed complaint against Meadows in October

Mark Meadows shows legal expenses that experts say indicate it is "highly likely" the North Carolina Republican is under scrutiny for campaign finance violations.

a Salon report that detailed a series of apparent violations of the prohibition on using campaign funds for personal expenses.

Those payments covered gourmet cupcakes, grocery store purchases, a cell phone bill, posh meals and lodging at Donald Trump's Washington hotel, according to filings with the FEC.

Meadows' campaign also spent thousands of dollars on "printed materials" at an upscale Washington-area custom jeweler on the day he left Congress for the White House.

(The jewelry retailer has said it sells nothing that could be categorized that way.)

https://www.salon.com/2021/02/03/new...ce-violations/

I am shocked, shocked I say, that anyone willing to work for Trump may have been a teensy bit ethically challenged.

[RandomGuy]

You’re still operating from the paradigm that having real elections is a given. The whole point of the Trump phenomenon is that the Republican base figured out the only way to hold onto white supremacy was to get rid of elections. You need to neutralize the credible fascist leaders. Trump. Hawley. Cotton. DeSantis. Gaetz.

Not sure I would put Gaetz on any list that includes "credible".

"possible", yes. Gaetz is purely the kind of venal asshat that populated the Nazi party higher-ups, and shockingly so.

[boutons_deux]

‘Icing on the clown car cake!’:

Internet eggs on Matt Gaetz after he offers to resign to defend Trump in senate trial



offered to resign his House seat (video below) so he can defend disgraced former president Donald Trump during his Senate impeachment trial for inciting the deadly January 6 insurrection.

“I would leave my House seat, I would leave my home," Gaetz told former Trump advisor Steve Bannon.

He called it "the greatest priority in my life."

https://www.rawstory.com/matt-gaetz-2650278973

[boutons_deux]

Trump-loving prophet says

God will personally blow

the lid off voter fraud and

restore Trump as POTUS



self-described "prophetess" Kat Kerr

on Sunday spoke at the One Accord Christian Fellowship Church in Orlando, Florida,

and told them that Trump was still the president

despite the fact that President Joe Biden had been inaugurated and is now living in the White House.

"At this moment in time, in reality, in legality, Donald J. Trump is our president right now," Kerr said during her sermon.

"He won. Heaven knows it and they're celebrating his win."

Kerr went on to claim that Biden's inauguration triggered the start of a divine intervention that would eventually cast Biden out of power.

"This is what happened on Jan. 20, 2021," she said.

"There was a scroll open in Heaven.

The scroll's name is called 'Justice.'

Things

began to be sent down to this Earth at an accelerated rate...

Something

that will become a move of God

that will touch this whole Earth,

and will make

things

very visible for ."

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-loving-prophet

[Spurs Homer]

Trump invited to testify under oath and speak his “truth”


pussy declined and ran back to his basement at moscow-a-lago

[Ef-man]

Trump invited to testify under oath and speak his “truth”


pussy declined and ran back to his basement at moscow-a-lago

If he is innocent and has nothing to hide, why is he refusing to testify?

Derptacular, you up to defend your hero. Step up.

[Spurs Homer]

If he is innocent and has nothing to hide, why is he refusing to testify?

Derptacular, you up to defend your hero. Step up.

SOMETHING RE-INAUGURATION Q SAVIOR SOMEOTHER REASONS!

[boutons_deux]

the Confederacy

Lady G warns she'll “call in the FBI” if one witness is questioned in Trump impeachment trial

Lady G issues a threat to protect Trump,

warns that calling witnesses would “open up Pandora's Box”


https://www.salon.com/2021/02/02/lin...achment-trial/

[Winehole23]

Trump observes the Sabbath at sundown on Friday and also on Saturday. Sort of a super-sabbath.

[Trainwreck2100]

If he is innocent and has nothing to hide, why is he refusing to testify?

Derptacular, you up to defend your hero. Step up.

ty logic, if you're innocent keep your mouth shut

[Ef-man]

ty logic, if you're innocent keep your mouth shut

'If you're innocent, why are you taking the 5th?': Trump's comments about pleading the 5th could come back to bite him.

President Donald Trump last year slammed Hillary Clinton staffers who requested immunity or invoked their Fifth Amendment rights in response to requests to testify about the former secretary of state's private email server.

"If you are not guilty of a crime, what do you need immunity for?" Trump said at a campaign rally in Florida in September.

"The mob takes the Fifth Amendment," Trump said at a campaign event in Iowa later that month. "If you're innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?"

That was then.

https://www.businessinsider.com/trum...nn-2017-5?op=1

[boutons_deux]

PAC pressures GOP senators to convict Trump in upcoming impeachment trial

Senate Republicans are struggling to maintain a united front heading into the second impeachment trial of former President Trump.

Some say they'll wait to hear the evidence before deciding to convict,

while others remain firmly against the trial.

Republican Accountability Project chairman Bill Kristol joined CBSN to discuss the future of the GOP,

including how to handle members who remain staunch Trump supporters.

https://www.cbsnews.com/video/pac-pressures-gop-senators-to-convict-trump-in-upcoming-impeachment-trial/

One of the few times Kristol, Sarah Palin's promoter, has been right about anything

[boutons_deux]

[boutons_deux]

There's one argument for Trump's impeachment that will solidify public support against the former president

Tribe, who has tried three-dozen cases before the U.S. Supreme Court explained that

the case being made against Trump for inciting insurrection was a case of treason.

"As to the proof, it is absolutely compelling and when

the nation watches in chilling detail how the president exulted in the mob

that crushed and killed cops and

threatened to take the life of the vice president and threatened to assassinate the Speaker of the House,"

"I think that the country's opinion will solidify against the president of the United States --

at least the guy that was president

when he violated his oath and he committed what amounts to treason,"

"And I use that word carefully, because

he was waging war against the United States,

what Article III [of the Cons ution] defines as treason.,"

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-impeachment-trial-2650408205

[boutons_deux]

Trump’s false claim that impeachment violates the First Amendment, explained

No, Trump does not have a cons utional right to lie with impunity.

The brief’s primary arguments are cons utional.

It claims that the Cons ution does not permit an impeachment proceeding against a former official.

And the brief also argues that Trump is immune from impeachment because the actions which led to that impeachment are protected by the First Amendment.

The Cons ution provides that “Judgment in Cases of Impeachment shall not extend further than to removal from Office, and disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office.”

So, with Trump out of office, the only question in his second impeachment trial is whether he should be permanently disqualified from certain federal jobs.

Connick v. Myers (1983), “the State’s interests as an employer in regulating the speech of its employees ‘differ significantly from those it possesses in connection with regulation of the speech of the citizenry in general.’”

the government’s power to discipline employees (or former employees) for aberrant speech is not absolute, it is broad enough to allow Trump to be disqualified from office.

The second reason Trump cannot invoke the First Amendment is that many of the statements he made, which allegedly incited the January 6 attack on the Capitol, are lies.

New York Times v. Sullivan(1964), the First Amendment does not protect individuals from defamation suits if they make a false claim “with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.”

, some of Trump’s statements — such as a January 6 speech where he told his supporters to

“fight like ” and that “you’ll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength and you have to be strong” —

may cons ute incitement to imminent illegal action, which is not protected by the Cons ution.

the Cons ution offers very little protection to senior officials in political jobs.

Branti v. Finkel (1980), “if an employee’s private political beliefs would interfere with the discharge of his public duties, his First Amendment rights may be required to yield to the State’s vital interest in maintaining governmental effectiveness and efficiency.”

Trump’s private political belief that he, and not the lawful winner of the 2020 presidential election, should be president must “yield to the State’s vital interest in maintaining governmental effectiveness and efficiency.”Lies enjoy little, if any, protection under the First Amendment.

Pickering involved a public school teacher, not an elected official, but it provides additional support for the view that government employees do not have a First Amendment right to lie.

the Court held that “absent proof of false statements knowingly or recklessly made by him, a teacher’s exercise of his right to speak on issues of public importance may not furnish the basis for his dismissal from public employment.”

a government employee’s First Amendment rights — regardless of whether that employee is elected — do not include a right to knowingly make false statements, or to make statements with reckless disregard as to whether they are true or not.

So when Trump riled up his supporters by falsely claiming that the 2020 election was stolen from him, he was not protected by the First Amendment.

Brandenburg v. Ohio (1969), the Supreme Court held that

“the cons utional guarantees of free speech and free press do not permit a State to forbid or proscribe advocacy of the use of force or of law violation except

where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.”

If such advocacy is made with the intent to incite “imminent lawless action,” and if such action is likely to result from a person’s speech, then that speech is not protected by the First Amendment.

Brandenburg sets a high bar for incitement prosecutions.

But Trump’s statements immediately before the January 6 putsch were so egregious that they may overcome this high bar. In a speech that he gave right before his supporters attacked the Capitol,

Harvard law professor Einer Elhauge argues that these statements cons ute cons utionally unprotected incitement, even under Brandenburg:

given the fact that the government has broad authority to make human resources decisions under the First Amendment,

Congress may conclude that Trump’s statements were so beyond the pale

that he should be disqualified from holding high federal office in the future.

https://www.vox.com/22272734/trump-impeachment-first--lies-incitement-brandenburg-new-york-times-sullivan-bondamendment

All the legal BS sufficient to convict Trump will be ignored by the

Repugs who are, with the oligarchy, strategizing to turn America into a one-party authoritarian state controlled by the oligarchy,

so the current Cons ution, which they also strategizing with an Article V Convention to annul and replace, is to be ignored.

[boutons_deux]

[boutons_deux]

Trump’s Lawyers Call for Dismissal of Trial on the Ground That They Will Never Collect Fees

Trump’s lead attorneys, David Schoen and Bruce Castor, said that

they had a “moment of lucidity” when they realized that their chances of Trump ever paying them were nil.

https://www.newyorker.com/humor/boro...r-collect-fees

[boutons_deux]

Democrats to reveal evidence against Trump that ‘nobody has seen before’ during his trial

[ChumpDumper]

Democrats to reveal evidence against Trump that ‘nobody has seen before’ during his trial

Sounds like something Trump would say tbh.

[boutons_deux]

Marjorie Taylor Greene unleashes new big lie and says

Capitol rioters weren't really Trump supporters

https://www.rawstory.com/marjorie-ta...ne-2650414417/

[boutons_deux]

[Winehole23]

BLM/Antifa stooges, obviously

[boutons_deux]

Trump’s lawyers say he was immediately ‘horrified’ by the Capitol attack. Here’s what his allies and aides said really happened that day. The description by Trump’s defense attorneys in advance of his Senate impeachment trial conflicts with the timeline of events on Jan. 6 and the accounts of people around him that day.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/polit...874_story.html

[ChumpDumper]

Jonathan Swan's "How it Happened" podcast about the election aftermath is pretty succinct and good. Just getting to Jan. 6.