Matt Zapotosky - National security reporter - May 6 at 2:00 PM
More than 370 former federal prosecutors who worked in Republican and Democratic administrations have signed on to a statement asserting special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s findings would have produced obstruction charges against President Trump — if not for the office he held.
“Each of us believes that the conduct of President Trump described in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report would, in the case of any other person not covered by the Office of Legal Counsel policy against indicting a sitting President, result in multiple felony charges for obstruction of justice,” the former federal prosecutors wrote.
“We emphasize that these are not matters of close professional judgment,” they added. “Of course, there are potential defenses or arguments that could be raised in response to an indictment of the nature we describe here. . . . But, to look at these facts and say that a prosecutor could not probably sustain a conviction for obstruction of justice — the standard set out in Principles of Federal Prosecution — runs counter to logic and our experience.”
Yes, hundreds of former prosecutors joined to say that the Mueller report shows more than sufficient evidence to charge King Trump with obstruction of justice. Others say that the evidence is sufficient to convict. But the DOJ will not allow Trump to be charged. If the House decides to begin impeachment, they will need the evidence and to hear from various members of the Trump kingdom, I mean administration. But King Trump has decided not to let anyone from his administration to respond to congressional subpoenas to appear before them. (seems to be more obstructions to me) But, ultimately, the Trumpublican controlled Senate will not vote for Trump to be removed from office, anyway, regardless of the evidence of his criminal behavior.
The elected Trumpublicans care only about keeping their seats, so that they can further their agenda to thwart democracy and further create a system where they can hold sway even with their minority. They will sacrifice decency, honesty, integrity, justice, and the Constitution, to remain in power and continue to further their goals of dominance thru further stacking of the Supreme Court, and degrading the rights and privileges of anyone other than the rich white Americans who support “conservative” ideals.
They left out the fact that the president has the authority to fire the FBI chairman for any reason whatsoever as that position serves at the president’s pleasure. If Trump was found to have committed crimes then obstruction could be brought, but that’s not the case. Not to mention Trump did not actually fire Mueller or “limit” the investigation, though he has that authority as well, indirectly.
thatoneguy: "They left out the fact that the president has the authority to fire the FBI chairman for any reason whatsoever "
Are you a totalitarian? What about America's balance of powers? What about a guy that's constantly lying?
thatoneguy: "then obstruction could be brought, but that’s not the case."
Besides, missing the point. There is that little Justice Dept memo about not indicting a President, right? And I think I'll take these actual prosecutors' expertise over someone who's fallen under the Spell of Trump. Oh and guess that number is up to 449 signatories to that Statement.
We are former federal prosecutors. We served under both Republican and Democratic administrations at different levels of the federal system: as line attorneys, supervisors, special prosecutors, United States Attorneys, and senior officials at the Department of Justice. The offices in which we served were small, medium, and large; urban, suburban, and rural; and located in all parts of our country.
Each of us believes that the conduct of President Trump described in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report would, in the case of any other person not covered by the Office of Legal Counsel policy against indicting a sitting President, result in multiple felony charges for obstruction of justice.
The Mueller report describes several acts that satisfy all of the elements for an obstruction charge: conduct that obstructed or attempted to obstruct the truth-finding process, as to which the evidence of corrupt intent and connection to pending proceedings is overwhelming. These include:
· The President’s efforts to fire Mueller and to falsify evidence about that effort;
· The President’s efforts to limit the scope of Mueller’s investigation to exclude his conduct; and
· The President’s efforts to prevent witnesses from cooperating with investigators probing him and his campaign.
Attempts to fire Mueller and then create false evidence
Despite being advised by then-White House Counsel Don McGahn that he could face legal jeopardy for doing so, Trump directed McGahn on multiple occasions to fire Mueller or to gin up false conflicts of interest as a pretext for getting rid of the Special Counsel. …
Tim, gotta agree with you. That’s why it’s such a damned scary time. Will the Democrats finally pull it together and stand up to the GOP’s absolutist Faith-blinded crowd and push back? If not . . . . . . lordie, lordie.
Well, for that matter, if they do, … lordie, lordie.
Gonna be a shit show either way - good time to be down under eating pop corn, drinking a cold brew and watching the show.
Mueller may not have found enough evidence to charge Trump with the crime of cooperating and conspiring with Russia, but he did find a lot of shady B.S. that was going on between the Trump campaign and Russia. And the many lies that were told about contacts with Russians were also pretty shady. Trump may have believed some things that he did could have been determined to be illegal.
There doesn’t have to be a chargeable underlying crime for Obstruction of Justice to be done. If that were the case, then all dedicated criminals might attempt everything they think is necessary to keep their crime covered up by actively obstructing investigation. Tampering with witnesses, lying, destroying evidence before it is subpoenaed, all would go without punishment as long as the underlying crime could not be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.
And the President is breaking the law if he fires someone in order to obstruct justice. He could have fired Comey or anyone else in his administration for having green eyes, or whatever, but not in order to obstruct justice. If Trump fired Comey out of fear that an investigation might find something criminal on him, that is obstruction of justice. Do not pass go. Go directly to jail. Unless you are an immoral, unethical sociopath of a POTUS.
Trump wanted to fire Mueller but was held back by his own ppl, for fear that it would be too obvious a ploy to obstruct justice.
Our current POTUS is a lying sack of sh!t who would be found guilty of the crime of obstruction of justice, were he not, so far, been above the law, by being POTUS.
What were there? 10 or 11 counts of potential obstruction of justice. Chances are that a halfway decent prosecutor could get a jury to come to a unanimous decision to convict on a least one or a few counts.
Trump has gradually progressed toward undermining the checks and balances of our system and becoming a dictator. Bit by bit. Demonstrating that he can be above the law is a major step toward that end. It may happen a little at a time, until … whoops, there it is! Dictator Trump declares Marshall Law. Civil disobedience is suppressed with deadly force. Tin soldiers and Trump are comin’ - Our democracy’s finally blown.
If the 2020 election goes against Trump, but is close, there are those who think that Trump will probably not abide by our tradition of a peaceful transition of power.
It’s now up to 566 former DOJ officials who have signed on to the letter. And that number will probably rise more.
Trump committed the crime of obstruction of justice. An underlying crime is not required for that to be the case. However, it is a blatant, shameless, lie that there were not underlying crimes committed by members of the Trump campaign. There are former Trump loyalists, including the former campaign mgr who are in federal prison right now! Whether Trump acted to directly protect himself from justice OR was acting to protect others in his campaign, he clearly did not want the crimes to be prosecuted and thus committed various acts of obstruction.
It is more than a travesty that Trump can get away with undermining the law. And he continues to do so, by not allowing his ppl to respond to ANY oversight requests or subpoenas by the House. He hopes to force these into the court system and thereby delay them for months or years until they become moot. And it may work. Or even worse, the stacking of the federal courts, including the Supreme Court, with Trump appointees, may get the Courts to rubber stamp Trump’s trampling on the rule of law.
Trump is now trying to use the power of the White House to keep McGahn from testifying to Congress. McGahn is no longer even an employee of the White House. Thus Trump is trying to use his power to stop a private citizen from abiding by a subpoena from the House of Representatives. This is because the Mueller report shows McGahn to be a prime witness in Trump’s commission of obstruction. Telling McGahn to ignore the subpoena, subverts the Constitutional oversight power of Congress.
As far as McGahn. All I see is Trump helping out the poor citizen. I hear the attorney cost is now 100K to go in front of congress. Look what it did to Gates, he plead guilty instead of bankrupting his family. And for what? The Dems showboating.
Still waiting for the fast and furious subpoena to be enforced. Fast and furious took place in 2009 – 2011.
This is all political. The Dem have nothing. They are in full time election mode and this is all they have. Their only hope is for 2020 is to take Trump out of the picture. Trump doesn’t have to do anything, the Dems will beat themselves.
Although I read Huffpost US every day, I find it hard to keep up with US domestic politics.
I read awhile ago that Democrats will lose the election if they concentrate on running a negative campaign against Trump. If they concentrate on Trump, they will be preaching to the choir of Democrat voters ,and further alienating Trump’s voter base. Seems to me they will have a real chance of winning if they run a positive campaign, as Obama did (from memory). It seems that Republican will not win, Democrats will simply lose.That has happened here often, especially with our Labor party. (Centre left)
HaveI completely misunderstood, or are the Democrats really as stupid as they seem in the way they’re going after Trump?
Of course, as far as I can tell, the Democrats don’t have another Obama.
Australian Federal election next week. Campaign started early this year, about 6 weeks ago. Aussies REALLY don’t like expensive political campaigns . There has been talk for at least a decade of putting a cap on campaign expenditure and even of political campaigns being paid for from general revenue.(not a popular idea).
Of the 23 Dem candidates for POTUS none are really going after Trump. Biden is a little but not with Trump’s grotesque style and lies. As far as cheap campaigns, that is not an option in the US since the conservatives on the Supreme court said that Corporations are people and that money equals free speech. Dem candidates often try to combat this by raising money in small amounts from lots and lots and lots of donors, rather than from a small number of big donors.
Trump’s core voter base would rather see the US go down in flames than to abandon their hero. They are a lost cause. Granted there are probably a small % of more independent minded who might not vote again for Trump, but why would they if he continues to hold sway with his perpetually repeated alternative realities?
Take Mike, for example, there is clear evidence in the Mueller report of 10 or 11 counts of obstructive behaviors. But he wants to believe that none of that. Mike asks why would Trump obstruct. Trump clearly wanted the investigation to stop and go away. That is not a difficult concept, but with Trump’s alternative reality machine going constantly, Mike and others don’t get it.
Trump is such a successful scammer. Today, it came out that in his '85 - 94 tax returns, he reported losing many millions every year. He paid significant taxes in one of the years. He paid a little bit of taxes in another year. In 8 of the years, he paid ZERO taxes. He may not even be a billionaire. But he is a known cheater, so the more that is learned from his tax returns, the more likely it is that tax cheating will be found. Trump has directed his ppl to not obey a law that says the tax returns of any citizen SHALL be provided to the House judiciary committee on request. In fact he will not allow anyone in his executive branch to respond to subpoenas to report to the House, despite the Constitutional duty of Congress to oversee the executive branch.
The House Dems are in a catch 22. They could lie back and allow Trump to rape the Constitution, at will, or they can put up a struggle and give him as much grief as they can, while he rapes the Constitution. If voters grow fed up with the Dems struggling and crying rape, then those voters wanted a Constitution raping POTUS all along.
There doesn’t have to be a chargeable underlying crime for Obstruction of Justice to be done. If that were the case, then all dedicated criminals might attempt everything they think is necessary to keep their crime covered up by actively obstructing investigation.
Didn't say otherwise. I said if he was found guilty then obstruction charges could be brought. That's it.
Tampering with witnesses, lying, destroying evidence before it is subpoenaed, all would go without punishment as long as the underlying crime could not be proven beyond a reasonable doubt.
And the President is breaking the law if he fires someone in order to obstruct justice. He could have fired Comey or anyone else in his administration for having green eyes, or whatever, but not in order to obstruct justice. If Trump fired Comey out of fear that an investigation might find something criminal on him, that is obstruction of justice.
thatoneguy: “They left out the fact that the president has the authority to fire the FBI chairman for any reason whatsoever “
Are you a totalitarian? What about America’s balance of powers? What about a guy that’s constantly lying?
Balance of powers are fine. It's not like the investigation was shut down. And Trump isn't lying about this.
thatoneguy: “then obstruction could be brought, but that’s not the case.”
Besides, missing the point. There is that little Justice Dept memo about not indicting a President, right? And I think I’ll take these actual prosecutors’ expertise over someone who’s fallen under the Spell of Trump. Oh and guess that number is up to 449 signatories to that Statement.
The memo from decades ago about how indicting a sitting president impedes the executive branch; what about it? It doesn't apply here.
Take Mike, for example, there is clear evidence in the Mueller report of 10 or 11 counts of obstructive behaviors. But he wants to believe that none of that. Mike asks why would Trump obstruct. Trump clearly wanted the investigation to stop and go away. That is not a difficult concept, but with Trump’s alternative reality machine going constantly, Mike and others don’t get it.
What I do get is Trump never did anything wrong, period. So of course, he doesn’t want all the lies and political BS the Left is putting out. So, what in the hell is obstructive behaviors? You guys invent stuff up to keep playing a political game. Kill Trump by a thousand cuts is your policy. The Dem have no morals at all.
You never read the last part of the Mueller report, did you? It is now, i think, more than 600 former prosecutors who have signed on to the letter. There are plenty of Republicans among them. “Trump never did anything wrong, period.”? That is inane. Trump, by personality, is a liar and a cheat. He only cares about laws to the extent that they either help him or he can find a way around them if they don’t. In 1987 he had “The Art of the Deal” written for him, tho he claimed to be the author. That book portrayed him as an extraordinary businessman and deal maker. From 1985 - 1994 he lost more money (according to his tax records) than any other American tax payer. IF he wasn’t cheating on those tax returns. He had $1.17 BILLION loss reported over that 10 yr period. He should have had a book written for and about himself, called the “Art of the Con”. You Mike, are just one of the many who have been bamboozled by one of the most effective con-artists in history.