The Justice Department Monday criticized former President Trump for “attempts to sanitize his conduct” leading up to the Jan. 6 Capitol riots, urging a judge to reject several motions to dismiss the case and disentangle Trump from the storming of the building.
The four filings, together more than 100 pages, respond to a series of pretrial motions filed by the Trump team last month asking the judge to toss the former president’s 2020 election case on a number of grounds, ranging from arguments the charges step on his First Amendment rights and that his speech simply amounted to raising concerns about the election to claims he is facing a “vindictive prosecution.”
Prosecutors forcefully defended their indictment while accusing Trump of “perpetrating an unprecedented campaign of deceit.”
He’s not really being tried for his association with the storming of the building, he wasn’t there and he used enough weasel words in his speech to have legal plausible deniability.
He’s on trial for being part of the fake electors scheme and all the other illegal attempts to overturn a free and fair election. Which is way worse.
He’s not really being tried for his association with the storming of the building,
Yeah, but that doesn’t mean his lawyers are competent enough to make a reasonable argument that doesn’t invent grievances where there are none.
And even if they wanted to file some motion that might work, Trump might stop them because he wants them to file “election interference/First Amendment Violation/Witch Hunt” motions instead. And Donald is the one signing the theoretical checks (which should be arriving in 2 weeks if the lawyers weren’t smart enough to get paid up front).
Trump’s legal strategy is to delay any consequences until January 2025, be sworn in as President, and then not only pardon himself, but arrest anyone who dared to charge him with crimes.
The part that gives me the most hope in all this is he can’t pardon himself out of the NY fraud case or the Georgia interference case. The former is a state civil case and the latter is a state criminal case.
And vis a vis his dream of arresting his opponents, I imagine that even if he guts the entire White House and installs only cronies, he’ll still face opposition across the other branches of government and the various state governments that would inevitably need to be involved.
Oh, definitely. I don’t want to test that, though. Better for him to not get anywhere near the White House ever again.
His lawyers know they don’t have a case, so they’re using a tried and true strategy of annoying the judge into making a mistake that they can appeal on.
Don’t worry, it’s close to an election year, so it’s election interference or something, can’t do anything about his behavior.
Respectfully, I disagree. He can file all the dismissal motions he wants (that’s his right, and that’s pretty much his main and only tactic), but the same motions with almost the same reasons have been rejected in every other case. Additionally, except for Cannon, every other judge has understood the novel and grave nature of these cases.
He’s not getting out of them just because he’s a presidential candidate.
Did I really need to put an /s on the end of that comment?
With the number of genuinely cynical people (judiciary isn’t exactly doing its best to bolster public faith), yes.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The four filings, together more than 100 pages, respond to a series of pretrial motions filed by the Trump team last month asking the judge to toss the former president’s 2020 election case on a number of grounds, ranging from arguments the charges step on his First Amendment rights and that his speech simply amounted to raising concerns about the election to claims he is facing a “vindictive prosecution.”
No other president has engaged in conspiracy and obstruction to overturn valid election results and illegitimately retain power,” prosecutors on special counsel Jack Smith’s team wrote.
The brief fires back at claims that echo many of Trump’s social media attacks criticizing the unfairness of the indictment against him and accusing prosecutors of launching their case based on animus.
In another brief, prosecutors fight an attempt by Trump’s legal team to strike from the indictment allegations related to Jan. 6 because he has not faced charges directly connected to the riot itself.
Prosecutors spent ample time discussing Trump’s role in forwarding false claims about the election being stolen, something they noted came even after a series of trusted advisers told him otherwise and were knowingly used in a plot to block the transfer of power.
“The indictment alleges not ‘lobbying’ but instead a concerted effort to target knowingly false and fraudulent claims at government officials, and then seeking to exploit actions by a violent and chaotic mob, in order to defeat the certification proceeding,” prosecutors wrote.
The original article contains 614 words, the summary contains 240 words. Saved 61%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
Is “Unprecedented Campaign of Deceit” too long to be a band name?
If not, dibs
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He can try whatever he wants, his and his cronies incitement of the mob he sent to the capitol (and promised to march with) is on video and undeniable.
