Flynn
The NPR coverage of the Flynn Guilty plea includes a copy of the Plea Agreement at the end.
Rachel Maddow did some research on the two members who signed the deal for the Mueller team.
Brandon Van Grack is in the national security division of the Justice Department and was leading the grand jury investigation of Flynn in the Eastern District of Virginia when he joined Mueller’s team. He is an espionage specialist. Zainab Ahmad is an Assistant US Attorney in the Eastern District of New York and a terrorism specialist. Ms Ahmad is 13-0 for terror prosecutions.
This is the varsity. These are professionals with a proven record of success. Trump and family need to find some professional criminal defense attorneys and start listening to them. There is nothing that says a sitting President can’t be indicted. A President can only be removed from office by impeachment, but that doesn’t mean he/she can’t be convicted of a crime.
6 comments
Well, Eugene Debs ran for President from the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary. It’s unclear what would have happened if he’d won, though… would the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary become the new seat of government? But then, Debs would have been the President, the head of the executive department. Could he have ordered his own release? Could he have pardoned himself?
Trump could be convicted of a crime, but who would actually incarcerate him? The Bureau of Prisons of whom Trump is the head? What would prevent Trump from ordering his own release? Basically, if you convict Trump but he’s not impeached, it has basically no effect. He can simply defy the court’s sentence by ordering his own release from prison, and while the court might try to impose contempt of court, who will enforce that? A U.S. Marshalls Service that is in the Department of Justice, i.e., the executive department, even though it’s the courts that usually order it around? What’s keeping Trump from simply ordering them to stand down while ordering the Secret Service to not let them arrest him?
Talk about your Constitutional crisis!
He’d subcontract with Mar-a-lago as a federal penitentiary with the Golf course as the exercise yard.
If we assume a Federal warrant there is one set of problems, but a state criminal warrant creates another set of problems, which is why ruling that a sitting President could be sued [Clinton] made everything a mess. The Supreme Court made the ruling, so it must be so.
Good one, Shirt, and probably correct. He certainly wouldn’t want to go to New York. The only problem with Mar-a-Lago is the coastal flooding from the “non-existent” climate change.
A state criminal warrant against a sitting President would really set up a crisis. Especially since he can’t pardon himself if convicted in a state court. Hmm….
NYS Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is hoovering up all of the crumbs that Robert Mueller leaves behind. Schneiderman wants the whole clan in Singsing. There is a cooperative agreement between Mueller and Schneiderman because of the possibility of Federal pardons.