NY lawmakers propose law to prevent Trump from avoiding prosecution

How can you, on the one hand, say criminal law applies to everyone then on the other hand say it should not apply to POTUS?

 

the president has no immunity from NY prosecution while in office. Bring the charges of you got them.

 

Just because you say so, does not count. The law would only apply to one person at a time Therefore, Unconstitutional. My final word on the matter!!!!!

 

Show me a law that only applies to one person. The law does not allow for special treatment. Which this law would have done. The President of the United States is entitled to the same Due Process of Law as any other citizen of the United States. If that Due Process includes Statute of Limitations, then so be it.

 

I didn't say that. I said a president shouldn't be subject to prosecution when in office.

 

That is how it is right now.

Because it isn't a law regulating the powers of the president in general. It is targeting a single man with a law. That is unconstitutional.

 

I tell ya what.. If Vance indicts Trump before January, then this attempted law can go away.... Until then, it's best to be move forward and be prepared

SNIP
The Vance investigative team is believed to already possess much of the documentation needed to support an indictment and with the addition of evidence gathered through the execution of the Mazars USA subpoena, viable defenses will likely have been cut off. Moreover, the Manhattan DA is not bound by the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) opinion which prevents federal indictment of a sitting president. Nor is he constrained by Department of Justice (DOJ) norms prohibiting indictments of political candidates less than 60 days prior to an election.

Notably, Vance has recently hired veteran Washington D.C. attorney Walter Dellinger. Dellinger possesses vast litigation experience as ex-Solicitor General and he headed up the OLC for a time. Dellinger also memorably authored a New York Times Op-ed in 2018 that concluded it would be justifiable to indict a sitting President, particularly if pertinent criminal statutes of limitations were in danger of expiration: “The White House should not be a sanctuary from justice.”
ENDSNIP

https://www.justsecurity.org/72227/does-cy-vance-already-have-the-trump-organization-tax-returns/

 

Asked and answered... that is simply not true... it is targeting a single job with a law.....

 

You still haven't provided an actual constitutional basis for your opinion.

And, you can't argue that the president shouldn't get special treatment in one thing, when clearly he gets special treatment in other things. For instance, who else can't be indicted because of their job? In short, is he "special", or not? Because if he's special in one way, he can be special in another, too.

What's more, while it requires a paragraph specific to the president, the NY bill does entitle the president to the same treatment as everyone else. Statutes of limitations are tolled for other people who are not available for prosecution.

And the specificity is not a problem.

When requested to do so by prosecutors, courts can - and often do - toll statutes of limitations for specific individuals in specific cases. That is, for "one person", and that person alone.

 

The DOJ policy that prevents a sitting president and VP from being indicted.
So ... as I see it there are three ways this can work fairly
1 sitting presidents and VPs are not immune from prosecution. That would seem to be your approach because you want the law to apply to everyone and no different rules for one (or possibly two) people
2 They can be indicted during their terms but prosecution is suspended until they leave office.
3 They can be immune from indictment and prosecution during their terms but the immunity expires when they leave office. Any limitation periods are tolled during the period of immunity. And they are not immune from prosecution for the acts they committed during their presidency - just can’t be charged until they leave.

 

But that means the same rules don’t apply to him. The exact opposite of what you claim to support.

 

People keep jumping into the middle of this arguement and ignoring what I have posted in the past. The President can be charged with a crime, and tried during his Administration. He can be tried in Absentia. Nothing in the laws prevent that. That would force the President to either go to NY to face the charges, or give up his right to face his accusers.

But law misses one key point. President Trump could retire from his corporation, turning it over to his children completely. Oh that's right. He already has. Then upon leaving office, he could retire to Florida. That is his current state of residency. Then all he needs is a friendly judge to rule an extradition request is nothing but a political grandstand, and deny it. President Trump live quietly in Florida. Safe from the NY witch hunt.

There is another thing that the President could do, but your really going to love this one. He can simply pardon himself. Nothing to prevent it.

 

Remains to be seen... He could resign and have Pence pardon him, but the jury is out on whether a self pardon would be accepted legally..

DOJ said it wouldn't, but this was in the 70's when the AG wasn't the Presidents personal lawyer

https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/olc/opinions/1974/08/31/op-olc-supp-v001-p0370.pdf

 

I agree - to a degree. As long as the authorities are not prevented from their normal investigative options like search warrants and subpoenas. Evidence can disappear over time and they need to be able to gather the evidence immediately.
I’m still not sure about whether the indictment should be revealed to the defendant privately (so he can also preserve evidence etc), revealed publicly (there are political consequences either way) or kept sealed.

 

Suggestion 1: Because the request for extradition of the President, would have to go through the federal courts, the DOJ would have to handle it. Therefore the DOJ rules would apply. Since the DOJ's OLC issued the policy back in 1973 during Watergate, it seem a exercise in political expediency to set aside the rule now. BTW, that rule was last updated in 2018, and last reviewed in 2020. So, this is not some willy-nilly law ruling issued for a single purpose. It has protected no less then three DNC Presidents. Otherwise, Clinton could have been charged with perjury in a federal criminal court instead of a sham impeachment process, and Obama could have been charged with obstruction for attempting to use Executive Privilege to keep documents out of the hands of the Congress. Remember, both the President and his Cabinet Member (AG Holder) claimed that they have no knowledge of the program when until the media released the story. These Democrat Presidents were protected just like Trump is protected now.

Suggestion 2: Fails due to the 5th Amendment of the US constitution, and (as clennan pointed out) CPL 30.10. Because the CPL states that a person has to be continuously outside the state, or their whereabouts completely unknown to have the statute of limitation to not apply. Since the President has visited NY during his Presidency, and his whereabouts definately known the exemptions to statute of limitation does not apply to him. Therefore the 5th Amendment states that due process must be afforded to the President.

Suggestion 3: Falls under the same restrictions as Suggestion 2. In researching this subject, I came across an article that stated that laws can be tailored for a single person. Just not laws that make something criminal. The suggested NY law would make the President subject to criminal Prosecution. Therefore, it can not apply to just one person. Further, if you read my last post to Clennan, you will see that there are ways to avoid the law even if it were passed, and found Constitutional.

My stance is that it is too easy to use a prosecution of a President as a political grandstand. Therefore, it should be avoided. No matter who the President is, or their party affiliation.

Also, let me clear up a misstatement on your part. The DOJ OLC ruling that protects the President from Prosecution while in office, does not apply to the VP. A sitting VP can be prosecuted for crimes while in office.

 

The president can be charged with a crime committed while in office right after he or she leaves office. So the same rules apply. The idea is to take the politics out of prosecution.

 

Goodness, you're depending on a lot of unlikely's here - never stepping a foot in NY, a case with no merits, a friendly judge...

Tried in abstentia? That could only happen if he was present at the start of the trial.

Pardon himself? Technically a possibility, but for Nixon, at least, the answer was No.

Per long-standing DOJ policy, presidents can't be indicted in office. Technically, this doesn't extend to state indictments, but state prosecutors recognize that an indicting a president in office would undoubtedly trigger to a protracted legal drama. That's why, in Trump v Vance, NY prosecutors deferred to DOJ policy re indictments and focused on investigative powers - their ability to gather evidence they need to make their case.

And, of course, SCOTUS ruled that presidents are not above the law.

 

Lot of "having their cake and eating it too" in this thread.

 

But Shampeachment during a pandemic was OK? I tuned out of this one after reading "NY lawmakers propose....".

 

Great point, and I don't have an answer. I would have no problem with private notification in that case.... If the indictment is announce publicly, at that point, you might as well have the trial since the ability to do POTUS business is impacted by the mere indictment announcement...

The other factor that somebody brought up is the potential for the POTUS to self pardon. If that is considered constitutional or is allowed, then you might have to keep the indictment sealed (which won't prevent self-pardon anyway).

Personally, in the Trump case, I'd prefer to go the way the Nazi's handled Rommel after the Hitler assassination attempt...

 

Of course... don't be silly... In fact, his pandemic response is impeachable on it's face, with the Woodward tapes...

And FYI, the impeachment was well before the pandemic....

 

Just replying to this point.

“In researching this subject, I came across an article that stated that laws can be tailored for a single person. Just not laws that make something criminal.”

Tolling the limitation period would not “make something criminal”. All it would do is remove a limitation defense that might otherwise be available. It would stop the click from running. It would not target the president specifically, to make something he did illegal that would otherwise be legal.

 

Nice try, but your wrong in every case. A friendly Judge could block a political extradition. And you have not followed the wording of the CPL 30.10, As long as the President has been present in New York, and has had his position known, the Statute of Limitation will apply. A law that claims otherwise in the instance of a President would be Unconstitutional because of Article 5 of the US Constitution. It affords due process to every citizen of the US. Even if a friendly judge in New York were to allow the extradition of the President, it would not withstand an appeal in Federal Court.

A trial be absentia only requires a Parker Warning. It would give the President the right to appear in court at the start of the trial, but does not require his presence.

If a DA were to indict the President, and you were right, then they would have to extradite the President from Federal Property, and under the protection of the Federal Secret Service. Seeing as no civil authority has the right to order the Sec Service to do anything, they can not arrest the President. That would require the Federal Courts, and the DOJ. As such the DOJ OLC ruling from 1973 would apply. I understand why DA Vance would not want to go that route. It would be unwinnable, and would have been dragged out longer then a challenge to a unconstitutional law. But it does not change the facts in this case. They can't touch the President. The good news is that a conservative state could not touch a DNC President either. The rules apply equally. Just as they always have.

 

Well see what the SCOTUS eventually decides. Until then, it is nothing but our opinions.

 

What are you basing that on? When you say "NY Prosecutors", are you talking about SDNY (who likely did defer, being a part of the DOJ) or Vance (we don't really know where he stands on his investigations)??

As I posted in #82, it's still possible Vance indicts before the next inauguration...