Why I believe a Stormy Daniels hush money indictment of Trump is a bad idea

I came to this view by listening to the argument presented by former Washington DC prosecutor, Glenn Kirschner, who convinced me about this.

1. *In my view, it's a terrible idea merely to indict Trump on the hush money crimes primarily because some 75 million persons in his base will view it as 'out to get Trump' given that it's not a serious crime, or at least that is how it will be perceived and this will embolden Trump in a very big way, improve his chances of winning the 2024 election.

Now, Mr. Kirschner didn't put it this way, he merely stated that norm is for state prosecutors, if there is a federal indictment on the horizon, to allow the federal indictment to commence, first or just led the feds take it over, altogether and no state level indictment. I just took that and added the political angle to it, to strengthen that conclusion.

Counter argument? Some might argue that the base will see any indictment of Trump with an 'out to get Trump' so this, as the logic goes, is not a reason not to proceed with Bragg's indictment. However, the counter to that (thus affirming #1) is that a really serious charge, as a public trial will reveal, that if is proven incontrovertibly that he committed the crimes listed in the indictment, a serious charge, which would be a federal charge, the moderates on the right will come to their senses and that will be enough to dampen the 'emboldening effect' of an indictment to his hard core base. In short, though a federal indictment will still embolden Trump to his hard core base, it won't to the moderates in that group (sufficient to assure victory in 2024) but a state indictment on a minor charge will embolden Trump to all of his base.

2. Michael Cohen's 3 year sentence, only several months of that sentence are believed to be attributed to the sentence from the hush money crime, and if he hadn't been indicted on the other crimes, tax and bank fraud, etc., he probably wouldn't have been indicted as a felony on the hush money conspiracy with 'individual - 1' and/or just made to pay a fine or it might have been reduced to a misdemeanor. Therefore, unless Trump is tried for other crimes, merely indicting him for the hush money crime will probably just result in a fine, and no jail time. So, what's the point? I see no upside to a state level hush money indictment.

Additional points:

3. Federal indictments, a long list of them, all the crimes listed in the Mueller report, and various crimes committed resulting in the attack on the capitol, and the hush money crime should indicted as federal 'fraud against the united states' (because the hush money influenced the 2016 election) that might work, and these, in my view, are the way to go.

4. A public airing proving that Trump lies on 'fraud' ie., 'Democrats stole the election', are false, establishing the concept that Trump's lies have greatly contributed to the erosion of America's confidence in democracy, i.e., that of it's elections, and this, if not an actual, a de jure crime, it is a de facto crime in principle, and this will contribute to the justification for indicting him for real federal crimes and for this, a resolution in Congress to disallow him to run for any public office of public trust.

5. Legislation should be proposed and enacted to make a massive promulgation of a lie which greatly contributes to the erosion of democracy should be made an actual crime, and raised to the level of Treason, constituting 'treason II' as a two tiered crime. The aforementioned resulting in a long sentence with parole, and 'treason-I' the already established constitutional crime of 'aiding, giving comfort to, the enemy of the United States', which is the crime punishable by death (though I favor a life sentence without parole). A constitutional amendment should be proposed to include such an act of betrayal of an core American value as treason because, in point of fact, this crime does, indeed, help our de facto (undeclared by congress) enemy, which is Russia.

6. All his 1/6 'overturn the election' co-conspirators, Giuliani, Bannon, Eastman, Navarro, et al., should be indicted right along with Trump. A congressional resolution disallowing them to hold any office of public trust.

 

The counter argument being M. Cohen went to jail for carrying out Individual 1's request that an illegal hush money payment be made to Daniels. Not prosecuting the person for which Cohen committed the crime, the person who orchestrated it, reinforces the idea of a two tiered legal system in this country. Exactly the kind we have seen played out numerous times where Trump's underlings get charged with crimes for pursuing his agenda, but not Trump.

 

did he commit the crime, if so... do the crime, do the time

 

"1. *In my view, it's a terrible idea merely to indict Trump on the hush money crimes primarily because some 75 million persons in his base will view it as 'out to get Trump' given that it's not a serious crime, or at least that is how it will be perceived and this will embolden Trump in a very big way, improve his chances of winning the 2024 election."

not all those people belong to the cult of Trump, some just vote republican and always will, but we don't let cult leaders off when they commit crimes just cause they have a lot of followers regardless

 

It was also thoroughly investigated by the US Attorney for Manhattan where they found that there was no there there. A sure indication that the current prosecution is pure hubris.

 

If I understand this right, the hush money is a convoluted case in which the prosecution is going at it or the charges are in a round about way which probably in my opinion isn’t enough direct evidence to get a guilty verdict. On all the rest, I just sitting back relaxing and letting it all play out.


On the 75 million number, Trump’s base is much smaller these days. Sure, the Republicans will probably call it all a witch hunt due to politics, not the evidence. But that doesn’t matter as any charges in any case will cause the same hollering. I think you have about half of all Republicans today wanting Trump gone. They’ll holler like a stuck banshee, but silently be clapping their hands if Trump is indicted on this hush money scheme. These silent republicans blame Trump for 3 straight election loses, 2018, 2020 and 2022 when a red wave was expected. They fear if Trump is their party’s nominee, that will ensure a 4th straight loss.

 

The OP clearly believes that Trump is going to be indicted for something, and he's probably right. He will likely be indicted next year for something, but it won't be this. The problem is the hush money isn't illegal. The only way to stretch it as a crime, is if it runs afoul campaign finance laws, which is why they were anxious to get Cohen to plead guilty to campaign finance laws on this very issue by offering him a plea deal, rather than try to prosecute it in court.

John Edwards went to trial over this very issue but he was actually guilty of breaking campaign finance laws because he got donors to pay his hush money for him. If memory serves, Cohen paid the hush money out of Trump's client account, so no donors or campaign money was involved.

 

All quite true. The hush money escapade was pretty much an open and closed non-case which is why the Manhattan District US attorney gave it the boot. I almost agree but probably with lesser chances that Trump might get indicted depending on which Federal Court district (or Grand Jury) is involved. A conviction is even less likely except for maybe in Washington DC. However, an indictment is 90% of the goal of his political opponents.

 

so now I just heard Trump is saying he never had an affair with stormy

 

But that's exactly what it is. As is almost everything else Trump is chased around the world for. Trump did this! Trump did that! We hate Trump! Get Trump!

Hillary Clinton kept government emails on a private server so she could hide all her dirty deals and when the government luke-warmly came looking for them, she deleted them, destroyed her server, and the entrenched deep state ignored it.

Joe Biden's family made tens of millions off selling his influence and no one seems to care.

Those are the big political crime in the past 10 years. A few hundred morons running around the Capitol weren't overthrowing any government. That's a joke.

 

but Hillary.... always Hillary did this! Hillary did that! We hate Hillary! Get Hillary!

 

I rarely listen to him. He is too politicalized in my opinion.

That being said, anything, and I do mean anything the government does that is not in Trump's favor, his base will view it as "out to get Trump" argument.

Second, I don't like politics with any trial. Either the evidence is enough to warrant an indictment or not.

Thrid, The Mueller Report was a special prosecutor to determine if any potential crimes were involved. He referred quite a number of people, including Cohen, to the DOJ for prosecution. The problem was Trump was President and the 1990 DOJ memo states that Presidents are not to be referred or indicted. There is another process called impeachment, which happened but Trump was not removed. Same fate as Clinton.

Fourth, we all know Trump loves to exaggerate and lie to get his way. That being said, for any indictment forthcoming, that is immaterial if he did it publicly and not under oath.

Fifth, won't happen given today's political environment. I don't consider it treason, and that type of bill would have dire consequences on our democratic institutions and legal system. I don't like conspiracy theories, but they have been around for hundreds of years, if not longer. What we do have is a lack of discernment among people who cannot tell they are being lied to or not. and there is no law that will prevent that.

Sixth, I think Navarro is in the pipeline to be indicted because he had direct involvement. However the others have other serious legal issues concerning that lawsuit about Dominion Voting Machines. Let that play out.

 

One of the differences is Hillary actually did do this, that, and the other thing.

 

Sometimes the paranoid really do have people after them. It is self evisent and obvious that tens of thousands of politicos have been vociferously out to get Trump in any way they can dream of for 7 or 8 years now and counting

Well, there is that and the fact that Mueller didn't find anything indictable.

 

So now I just heard Trump is saying that the moon is made of blue cheese

 

Don't leave out the fact that these payments were revealed in 2016, and investigated back then. And dismissed, if I recall correctly.
Oh, and the issues raised in the Mueller Report WEREN'T crimes - they were suggested possible areas for further investigation. There's a reason they never went any further; see if you can guess why?

 

This obsession with hoping that they "get Trump" is not really healthy.

I for one do not believe he's going to be the 2024 nominee. I believe that is more of an excuse to keep him on the forefront of people's minds, who have this obsession.

As good of a president as he was I hope for the future sake of this nation that him and Biden do not become our choices again.


I vote for the new "fascist".....

The one that really scares the hell out of the lefties, our next president Ron DeSantis.

But if somehow we get left with the choice between Trump and Biden you can bet your sweet ass that it would be a very cold day in hell before I would ever vote for Joe Biden.

 

I think an indictment would likely come out of the Justice Department. The Southern District of New York has been investigating Trump for the crime of Orange since Trump first became President, but ultimately didn't think they could come up with something. I don't think that's an issue for the Justice Department. Second degree Orange or some such crime would suffice, because a DC grand jury is going to indict Trump even if the only evidence brought by the prosecutors are old Rachel Maddow shows. And of course any DC jury is going to convict. But just getting the indictment will be victory enough for them.

 

innocent until proved guilty, just like Trump

 

agree, pretty much what I think we all know about anything Trump says, but I suppose his cult believes it?

 

Perhaps you'd like to explain to M. Cohen "there was no there there." The guy who went to prison for committing the crime with his co-conspirator........Individual 1.

 

Ever hear of Mark Pomerantz?

Former prosecutor says Manhattan DA could have charged Trump with multiple crimes
https://www.npr.org/2023/02/07/1155...-could-have-charged-trump-with-multiple-crime

 

...and yet, for some mysterious reason, they didn't. Even though the entire establishment of the country was screaming for it.

 

could'a, would'a, should'a - the left's lament.

 

I don't think your argument is strong enough to counter the argument that federal indictments will do more to assuage among moderates that the prosecutors are out to get Trump and that might make the difference in the next general election.

I disagree with your contention that the failure to prosecute the hush money case will constitute (in fact but not by perception) a two tiered system of justice because prosecutors often exercise
prosecutorial discretion when they are faced with a crime. So not prosecuting Trump for hush money will fall under prosecutorial discretion which is the status quo and won't necessarily constitute a two tiered justice system as you allege.

On the other hand, anytime there is prosecutorial discretion applied to the rich someone or many will always allege a two tired justice system and this perception probably is unavoidable. Whether it's true in a specific case will depend entirely on the facts.

While it is also true that a number of prosecutors and cases against trump that are currently going we see a failure to indict him and this may be due entirely Due to the fact that the 1st indictment against the former prez will be a "maiden voyage prosecution" which takes guts. In fact if they have not the cajones to do it and that do it is scary because we're talking about the former president, well, you know the old saying that If you "shoot an arrow at the king you'd better not miss" and that concept must be on their minds. For such an indictment the stakes are astronomical as the entire world will be watching.