The Trump/Bragg Kerfuffle

President Donald J. Trump delivers remarks at the 2020 Council for National Policy Meeting Friday, Aug. 21, 2020, at the Ritz-Carlton in Pentagon City, Va. (Official White House Photo by Tia Dufour)

Opening Pandora’s Box Is a Sad Day for the Country

The precedent of a Manhattan grand jury indicting former President Donald Trump is a sad day for the country, “with political ramifications that are unpredictable and probably destructive,” argue the editors at the WSJ. The indictment comes at the hands of Alvin Bragg, reportedly a George Soros-funded DA. For certain, Donald Trump never seems to fail in generating strange, unique situations.

The WSJ:

Mr. Bragg is busting a political norm that has stood for 230 years. Once a former president and current candidate is indicted, some local Republican prosecutor will look to make a name for himself by doing the same to a Democrat. U.S. democracy will be further abused and battered. Mr. Bragg, the provincial progressive, is unleashing forces that all of us may come to regret.

If there was ever a case that opens Pandora’s box, the first indictment of a former President in U.S. history is it.

Indictments Still under Seal

Because the indictment itself remains under seal, the editors are unable to examine the specific charges and evidence. What the editors know, as we all know, is the charges relate to hush-money payments in 2016 to adult film actress Stormy Daniels about her alleged affair with Mr. Trump.

Does Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg have new evidence that will be compelling? Here’s what the WSJ editors think:

• Any prosecution of a former President should involve a serious offense.
• The evidence should also be solid enough that a reasonable voter would find it persuasive.
• The last thing a politically polarized America needs is a case in which partisans line up on either side like a political O.J. Simpson trial.
• The prosecution must be seen by most of the country as an example of fair-minded justice.

Why the Feds Didn’t Want to Prosecute

In a separate column, the WSJ’s Holman W. Jenkins, Jr. calls the prosecution a stretch for DA Alvin Bragg.

There are issues of the statute of limitations, issues of selective prosecution, issues of overreach in tying the Stormy Daniels payment to an alleged campaign-finance offense the feds themselves declined to prosecute.

The Journal urged Alvin Bragg not to revive a seven-year-old case that federal prosecutors declined to act on.

That is doubly so when the case involves a former President who is also running again for the same office, as Mr. Trump now is. Add that the prosecutor belongs to the same Democratic Party as the current President whom Mr. Trump is running against, and the suspicion of a political prosecution will be rampant.

It also presents difficulties to GOP challengers, where they will be expected to take a position on this prosecution and perhaps others to come. Instead of asking about the failures of the Biden presidency, the focus will be on Mr. Trump.

Donald Trump’s reckless personal behavior has made himself vulnerable as usual, but as the WSJ argues, Democratic excess could rescue him again.

… there is no doubt that Mr. Bragg is doing what most Democrats want. They want Mr. Trump in the dock and at the center of the political debate. Even if he’s not convicted, they figure the indictment and spectacle will help him become the Republican nominee. They think (Trump) is the easiest candidate to beat because he motivates Democrats and divides Republicans and independents. That is certainly the lesson of the GOP election disappointments of 2018, 2020 and 2022.

“Here we go again,” laments Mr. Jenkins …

… with the FBI, intelligence agencies, prosecutors and the courts getting ready to turn the 2024 presidential election into legal-political cluster phenomenon against which even the 2016 antics of FBI Chief James Comey will pale in comparison.

Why 34 Counts?

In NRO, Andrew McCarthy explains how the game works. No matter how flimsy the case Bragg has presented, Bragg is banking on the jurors’ not knowing that (Bragg) only needs them to convict on one count to achieve his objective. It is a political objective, not a law-enforcement objective. That way, Trump will be branded a convicted felon, continues Mr. McCarthy. By contrast, Trump can only “win” if he prevails on all 34 counts.

A prosecutor may have scant evidence that a person committed felonies as defined in penal law — i.e., proof beyond a reasonable doubt of all essential elements of a statutory offence — yet have copious evidence showing the defendant is a dissolute character.

What can happen in such a case is that jurors who closely follow the law as instructed by the judge will want to acquit; jurors who are more emotionally moved by proof that the unpopular defendant is a scoundrel will want to find a rationale to convict — in effect, giving state prosecutors the benefit of the doubt, even though our due-process standards demand that the defendant be given the benefit of the doubt.

Bragg is inflating the number of counts, just like he is inflating trivial misdemeanors into ostensibly serious felonies, because he just needs one.

Dan McLaughlin alerts readers in NRO that even the NYT seems apologetic.

Jonathan Weisman wrote in the NYT on March 25:

The payoff to Stormy Daniels . . . has a Manhattan grand jury weighing criminal charges against Mr. Trump . . . The potential criminal charges against Mr. Trump for his role in the passing of hush money to Ms. Daniels — falsifying business records to cover up the payment and a possible election law violation — may seem trivial when compared to the prior efforts to fend off a history-altering October surprise.

The NYT reported 31 March:

The case against Mr. Trump might also hinge on an untested legal theory. According to legal experts, New York prosecutors have never before combined the falsifying business records charge with a violation of state election law in a case involving a presidential election, or any federal campaign. Because this is uncharted territory, it is possible that a judge could throw it out or reduce the felony charge to a misdemeanor.

There are more levels of hypocrisy than one could count here, continues Mr. McLaughlin.

Democrats and their media cheerleaders have hardly been silent about the investigation or the indictment, or about other Trump investigations long before they yielded charges that never arrived.

Have we forgotten Russiagate, or Senate Democrats such as Chuck Schumer and Elizabeth Warren arguing against Neil Gorsuch’s nomination to the Supreme Court simply because Trump was under investigation? Have we forgotten how Democrats poured a public barrage on Kenneth Starr for months before anybody saw the Starr Report?”

Good luck to the American voter.