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Grand jury in the US state of Georgia returns indictments in Donald Trump 2020 election case
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- Title
- Live updates: The latest news on Trump and the Fulton County, Georgia, election case
- Authors
- By <a href="/profiles/aditi-sandal">Aditi Sangal</a> and Mike Hayes, CNN
- Published
- Aug 14 2023
- Word count
- 3722 words
The fact this is actually a RICO case kinda blows my mind. Also, there's something like 30 unindicted co-conspirators in addition to the 19 people (including the former President) actually charged. This is going to be a huge case both in legal complexity and importance.
The irony here is that now-indicted Rudy Giuliani spearheaded the use of RICO in the 1980s.
https://www.businessinsider.com/rudy-giuliani-indicted-georgia-trump-rico-2023-8
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mafia_Commission_Trial
Re importance, conservative writer and former federal prosecutor Andrew McCarthy thinks it is arguably the most important. Our laws give authority to regulate elections to the states and there are very specific state laws about election interference and tampering. Jack Smith for the department of justice has to charge broader crimes and show how they apply, but the Georgia prosecutor has laws she can use that are exactly on point for the facts in this case.
https://nypost.com/2023/08/14/out-of-all-indictments-georgia-is-the-most-perilous-threat-to-trump/
I've heard from my particular brand of pundits that the Georgia case was always the most dangerous for the former President. It's interesting to hear this perspective bear out in other circles as well.
To my amateur/have friends in law understanding, RICO requirements are honestly extremely concerning. It's the sort of thing that can be applied far outside the intended purpose, and I'm positive that discussion is going to come up because it's the perfect one to trip up people who mean well.
Trump's case might be a good example of a RICO case, but I wouldn't be surprised if there's some legit arguments as to it being misapplied, which will then lead to all sorts of shouting in circles. Vaguely like the people arguing the Jan 6th rioters should be hit with felony murder.
In case anyone was curious, Georgia is one of five states that does not grant pardon power to its governor. It has a board that determines pardons, and a prisoner must serve at least five years in prison before being eligible for one.
Link
Even then, he is being charged with mostly federal crimes, so the board wouldn’t be able to pardon him for much. He could only pardon Trump for whatever state crimes he’s convicted of.
That's the danger. Trump's team is absolutely going to try to get this elevated to the federal system so he or a future Republican can pardon him.
State crimes are what are more threatening, as a future republican president can pardon Trump of any federal crimes.
here's the actual indictment (98 page PDF):
https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23909551/23sc188947-criminal-indictment64.pdf
(found via this post on the NBC News live coverage)
I've been skimming the indictment that I've been waiting for with baited breath. I am not sure that I understand act 22. Obviously it's a summary, but I'm not following what the claim is here:
Likely more details will come out during the trial, but what is the claim of wrongdoing here? How is that post, in and of itself, an "overt act in furtherance of the conspiracy"? It doesn't seem to be advocating for any wrongdoing.
The Georgia hearings on OAN were bullshit, like everything on OAN, but they show that Trump was actively supporting and amplifying disinformation to support his attempts to overturn the election and specifically undermine Georgias election.
And based on the federal case, he is alleged to know it was bullshit. Therefore he used his positional power (the account currently considered to be an official government Twitter account) in furtherance of his conspiracy.
What is OAN?
Wikipedia: OAN
Thank you.
in general, conspiracy, when used in a legal context:
Georgia is one of the jurisdictions with the requirement to commit an overt act
a simplified example might be, Alice and Bob talk to each other and agree that they want to kill Vicky. they debate how they want to do it, and decide that shooting Vicky with a gun would be easiest.
a hour after that conversation, Alice drives to a gun store and buys a gun.
buying a gun isn't necessarily illegal (we can assume in this hypothetical that Alice followed all relevant gun control laws). but the act of buying the gun, when combined with the previous conversation, satisfies one of the elements necessary for the crime of conspiracy to commit murder.
ditto if they discuss how to dispose of the body, and afterwards Bob goes and buys a hacksaw and big heavy-duty garbage bags. there's no requirement that an act furthering the conspiracy be a crime on its own.
also, it's always important to look at the conspiracy as a whole, instead of just the individual acts in isolation:
act 22, as you said, is Trump tweeting about the hearings in Georgia
act 23 is Giuliani, Eastman, Ellis and Smith trying to convince members of the Georgia Senate, at those hearings, to violate their oaths of office
act 24 is Giuliani making false statements at the Georgia Senate hearings
act 25 is Smith also making false statements at the hearings
acts 26 and 27 are further tweets from Trump about the hearings
and all of the above acts happened on a single day (December 3rd)
a hilarious take on this, from April:
and right on schedule, yesterday you had for example Charlie Kirk:
Georgia's RICO law is broad - far broader than even the Federal one. Things named don't have to in and of themselves be illegal - if there was an illegal act, they can name a fairly broad variety of other things done in the furtherance of it as being relevant even if not themselves illegal. I believe this was named as part of that - that he was actively seeking to spread misinformation as part of the broader conspiracy.
Analysis of how the case is likely to proceed.
https://www.justsecurity.org/87598/what-to-expect-when-youre-expecting-a-georgia-indictment-of-trump
Meanwhile, in completely unrelated news Trump Calls Out Key Witness In Georgia Saying He “Shouldn’t” Testify
Edit: Actual law
I am struggling to see how Trump gets granted bail in Georgia.
There's approximately a 0% chance that Trump will be detained in any jurisdiction prior to his conviction. Indicting a former President is already unprecedented -- no judge will send Trump to jail over a technicality, as justified as they may be. it would be impossible to excise the political ramifications from the legal ones.
Think of the stink Republicans have made over Hunter Biden receiving a plea deal, which they continue to whine about despite that prosecutor having been since promoted to special counsel.
Now imagine a judge sending Trump to jail over a social media post. Every Republican politician in the country would call for that judge to be impeached. The task of finding an impartial jury would become doubly impossible.
And even after his inevitable conviction, the requirement that Trump receive secret service protection will likely preclude the possibility that Trump spends time in prison. The most likely sentence here is house arrest.
To grant bail, the law states the judges will have to find that Trump poses no significant risk of intimidating witnesses or otherwise obstructing the administration of justice.
I'm sure the assigned judge will want to grant bail, I am simply struggling to see how they can grant bail, given the law as it is written, and the facts as they are.
The concept of denying pretrial release for risk of witness tampering or obstruction of justice isn't unique to Georgia, however. You could make the same argument for detaining Trump while any of his other three criminal trials are ongoing, and yet he's still free. (I mean, he literally wrote on his social media platform "IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I'M COMING AFTER YOU", so it's not like he's been subtle about it, either).
Ultimately it's the judge's decision to make.
Georgia state has pretty significant requirements for preventing evidence, witness and jury tampering, far more severe than federal at that level.
While judges have some discretion in setting bail, they must do so within the constraints of the law and their assessment of the particular factors involved in the case.
It will be trivial for a judge to say that trump meets the requirements for bail and figure "they can argue about it later". They literally just did this with SBF who finally crossed enough lines to wind up in jail, and I'm not sure they will jail Trump for any bail violations unless they're EXTREMELY blatant (attempted fleeing the country/having a witness beat up).
No one wants to touch that issue with a 10ft pole and it could jeopardize/drag out the entire process (something that's already going to be ugly since I don't think any of these trials will be close to finishing before the election). The standard on these sorts of things is supposed to be that denying bail, especially on possible 1st amendment issues, should side on the edge of caution, and while that obviously doesn't happen for the vast majority of people, naturally those who can afford real lawyers get the real law.
Add all the confounding extra issues on top of this and i'll be shocked if he sees a day in prison before a trial ends.
There is no first amendment exemption for witness tampering.
Of course not.
But you have to prove it's witness tampering, and it's not like he beat these people with a crowbar on camera. He made claims on a private companies publicly viewable content. Damn near everyone knows his wording is almost exactly that, but it's extremely hard to prove (as all things relating to the 1st are, like defamation cases) and failing to do so is going to tank the case.
No, a judge has to find that Trump isn't at risk of tampering with witnesses, in order to grant bail.
I’m aware. And I’m pretty sure the defense has the right to appeal that. And then you need to prove why. And then you’re giving trump even more time to delay and score a win on something that has a ton of case law behind that
Simple. They bonk their gavel and then say "bail is set at $X."
I think it'll more simply be he's a public figure running for office his threshold for first amendment rights and such are higher, ya know the typical bs we've been hearing.
The issue here is that Fulton County is pretty well-known for releasing known violent offenders that are a danger to the community on bond. It will not be hard for the defense to find plenty of cases of individuals arrested for murder that were given bond (even folks arrested for bail jumping or failure to appear are granted another bond), and it will be hard for the court to go back on the precedent it has set for itself.
Why is there NOT a rule that says you can NOT run for president if you are under indictment ?
Let's say it's 2020, Trump is president. He gets his AG to indict Biden for some random made up crime (maybe connecting to the Hunter Biden stuff in Ukraine). The burden of proof for an indictment is not high - the saying goes that a good prosecutor can get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich. A grand jury isn't presented with both sides, the prosecutor just gets to yap at them the whole time, so it's not hard to get indictments.
Now Joe Biden can't run for president after he was chosen as the Democratic nominee. With Democrats in chaos, Trump glides to an easy win. The trial against Biden gets thrown out, but hey, it doesn't really matter, does it?
I struggle to find a good reason for having laws preventing people to run for office even if they've been convicted to be honest. Isn't it a foundational element of a democracy is being able to elect whoever is deemd fit to serve? I get not liking Trump, but if people want him as president... now I know this ignores many other problems with the American election system, but as a principle why does being convicted of any type of crime make someone unfit for office?
for crimes in general, I tend to agree. the one exception I can think of is section 3 of the 14th Amendment:
if you held federal office, and sworn an oath to uphold the Constitution, and then violated that oath by committing insurrection (such as by fighting for the Confederacy in the Civil War) you were barred from holding federal office in the future. but even then they allowed an escape hatch in the form of two-thirds of each house of Congress voting to allow someone.
Sure, I can see the point that electing that person again would be dumb... but again, if they've served their sentence shouldn't people get their rights back?
Ignoring for a moment that people don't always get their rights back after serving the sentence for their crime (and the existence of wrongful convictions).
People who commit particularly bad crimes are sentenced to a lifetime of imprisonment, people who violate their federal oath are effectively sentenced to a lifetime of not being able to take another. Sometimes that is the solution for public good.
Well... Hitler did serve his sentence in 1924... Then run again and everyone lived happily ever after.
Also, can you believe no one was taking him seriously until he won?
For the same reason, those convicted and in prison should be given the opportunity to vote, although their ability to know anything about the candidates or not be compelled to vote for something without persuasion makes that more difficult. After they are released though, they absolutely should have that right restored.
Just to add a little context for at least the federal cases, the Feds are reticent to bring cases they don't have a good chance of winning. Now, these Trump indictments are unprecedented (or... well... now precedented 3 times over), so the value in conventional wisdom is murky.
Those aren’t contradictory ideas. For an independent prosecutor or state attorney general, to launch a case like this and have it flop would be very embarrassing and damaging to your political career in the future.
That they launched the case is notable in Biden’s America, because it’s fair to assume that Biden is not exerting political pressure to prosecute trump.
That they got the indictment from the grand jury is not that notable. It’s what came before. And that this can be a dangerous weapon when the prosecutors are NOT independent, and acting in their own will, is just as true.
These are fair points. And like you said, my understanding is the Biden admin is very hands off with regard to the DOJ, but as we saw during the Trump years, this seems is just another one of those unwritten rules established by history and convention that is at risk of abuse.
Everyone’s giving the right reply, but to see how this might play out, look to Cambodia. Not a single person opposing Hun Sen on the ballet because they were all put in jail for various made up crimes. Very easy to abuse to go against your political enemies.
Rules are usually created in reaction to a situation, and since this is a fairly unprecedented situation in the US it's not surprising that rules haven't caught up with it yet.
That being said, I think disqualification just based on being indicted (not criminally convicted) would run afoul of the principles of due process and innocent-until-proven-guilty.
Eugene Debs actually ran for President while in prison. He got 3.4% of the vote as well!
Debs is also a good example for why you can run for President while in prison - he's not exactly guilty of a heinous crime. Debs was a member of the socialist party and made an anti-war speech in 1918 and was arrested, tried, and found guilty under the Espionage Act of 1917 for potentially leading recruits away from the military with his speech.
The Espionage Act was repealed in 1921 and Harding commuted his sentence. Even beyond that, his imprisonment sure sounds like bullshit to a modern ear!
https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/15/politics/mark-meadows-fulton-case-federal-court/index.html
Mark Meadows trying to move case to federal court
Article about the computer intrusion featured in the indictment. https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/what-the-heck-happened-in-coffee-county-georgia
https://www.axios.com/2023/08/15/judge-trump-georgia-scott-mcafee
About the judge in the case
https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/the-fulton-county-indictment-an-initial-examination
The Fulton County Indictment: An Initial Examination
https://www.vox.com/trump-investigations/2023/8/15/23831815/trump-georgia-indictment-giuliani-eastman-powell-meadows
The Five conspiracies at the Heart of the Trump Indictment in Georgia