What does this have to do with the price of tea in China? Who the heck is John Galt? What in god's name does this mean? Well in a nutshell, it means that if there is a specific law or statute that governs an action, that another "general" law cannot be used to charge a crime where the specific law is not broken.
So what is a specific law? Well to use a relative example, the Presidential Records act of 1978 is a very specific law that oversees how the Presidential records of a former President are handled. While it might not be a law that has criminal implications, it does very specifically cover how these records are handled, stored, transferred, and everything else.
So what is a general law? To use some examples of things we hear from nutty TDS legal experts when they talk about Trump, we would be looking at laws like treason or conspiracy or obstruction. Things that are exclusively used in real life situations when other crimes are proven, but the prosecutors feel that those illegal activities together warrant a higher crime should.
To be clear, until everyone and their brother started investigating Trump, the idea of a series of legal actions becoming a nefarious illegal treasonist plot was unheard of. Until Mueller and his special counsel came alongs, the idea of an obstruction charge (that did not involve destruction of evidence or serious witness tampering) during an investigation that found no underlying crime would have been laughed out of court.
So in terms of the most recent raid on the Trump Mar-a-Lago estate, the controlling law (and according to Morton v. Mancari the only law that should matter) is the Presidential Records act. If the President was following the explicit portions of the law, then no other generic law can legally or constitutionally be applied. In other words, he would have to be proven to be in violation of that act, before any murky legal semantical arguments are made about classifications or espionage.
The act in question allows for the former President to have access to all of his own Presidential records. According to the law, they do not belong to the Archives or the Government itself. In fact, other than the ex-President himself and employees of the archives, nobody else is allowed to view these records for five years after the President leaves office (or twelve years if the former President chooses to restrict them). Technically that could include the FBI agents reviewing them right now. They could be in violation of this law. What these records will eventually become are "public records".
The law acknowledges that every President "leaves" with these records and does not provide a specific manner or deadline as to how to turn them over. The law leaves the process open to negotiations between the President and the Archives. The law also does not distinguish between classified and unclassified, which was a deliberate choice by the Congress that created the law. That 1978 congress (being grown ups without a grudge to hold) were aware that these records would very likely include both unclassified and classified records. That fact alone was not considered criminal.
So if you view Morton v Mancari at face value (and I would suspect that at least 5 member of our USSC would do so) then charging Trump with espionage for retaining records when that retention was not in violation of the PRA would be seen as unconstitutional. Charging Trump with some sort of general election conspiracy when he broke no other laws would fall under the same category. That logic would apply to both a federal and state charge. Seriously, how many "generic" crimes have been investigation since Trump has been President without anyone really suggesting (much less proving) any underlying crime?
Think about it....
33 comments:
The previously unreported email — sent about 100 days after the former president left office with the subject line “Need for Assistance re Presidential Records” — also illustrates the myriad efforts Archives officials made to have documents including classified material returned over an 18-month period, culminating with an FBI raid this month at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club in Florida.
Cipollone was the White House counsel for Trump and was designated by Trump as one of his representatives to the Archives. A spokeswoman for Cipollone declined to comment Wednesday.
Stern does not say in the email how he determined that the boxes were in Trump’s possession. He wrote that he also had consulted another Trump lawyer during the final days of Trump’s presidency — without any luck. “I had also raised this concern with Scott in the final weeks,” Stern writes in the email, referring to Trump lawyer Scott Gast, who is also copied on the email.
Trump then returned 15 boxes of documents to the Archives in early 2022, and Archives officials urged Trump’s team to continue looking for more material at the beachfront club. But they also referred the matter to the Justice Department after realizing there were hundreds of pages of classified material in the boxes returned to the National Archives.
After extensive interviews with Trump aides, FBI officials raided Mar-a-Lago on Aug. 8 and seized an additional 11 sets of classified records after executing a search warrant — adding to the large volume of secret government documents recovered from the former president’s club.
The Post has previously reported on the former president’s long-standing habit of retiring to his private residence in the White House with official documents that regularly piled up. In interviews with former White House staffers, they recalled sending boxes of disorganized materials to the residence with Trump’s body man, at the then-president’s request.
Trump and his advisers have claimed that there was a standing declassification order for all documents taken to the residence, but multiple senior former administration officials have said they knew of no such order. Trump has also lamented to friends that he did not give the documents back because they were his personal property and did not belong to the U.S. government.
The real news of today 🙌
The Justice Department on Thursday is expected to file a heavily redacted version of the affidavit used to support a search warrant of former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate earlier this month, as a magistrate judge weighs whether to make portions of it public.
Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart gave department officials a noon deadline to submit proposed redactions under seal as well as a legal memorandum explaining their justifications for the information that they believe should be kept hidden from public view. Reinhart said he was not inclined to keep the full affidavit sealed, saying he believes there are portions of it that could presumably be unsealed.
The government argued in court last week that the redactions they believe would be necessary to protect the integrity of their ongoing criminal investigation would essentially render the document “meaningless.”
A coalition of media organizations, including ABC News, has urged for release of the affidavit even with redactions -- citing the need to further inform the public in light of the historic nature of the search of a former president’s residence
Off topic but important
Biden constitutionally questionable student loan action has a provision that is getting far less attention but could have serious consequences. Before Obama, borrowers could have to pay up to 15% of their income for a maximum of 25 years. Obama reduced those levels to 10% for 20 years. After that, the debt would be written off. Now Biden is lowering it even more to 5% for 10 years. This will likely have far reaching damage. It will cause many more loans to be passed onto taxpayers. Not to mention benefit those who have the biggest loans from the most elite universities.
I guess Ch thinks that if an ex president is asked, Did you comply with the law by not having in your possession or by returning from your possession documents which by law you are preventing from having in your possesion, and the president replies "yes" when he has not, or even says, "they're mine, not yours," he has broken no law.
Mr. President, did you ever tear up presidential documents that your staff were aware were supposed to be saved?
No, I never did.
_____________
According to the January 6 Panel, some records sent to them were torn up.
When the National Archives and Records Administration handed over a trove of documents to the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection, some of the Trump White House records had been ripped up and then taped back together.
Former president Donald Trump was known inside the White House for his unusual and potentially unlawful habit of tearing presidential records into shreds and tossing them on the floor — creating a headache for records management analysts who meticulously used Scotch tape to piece together fragments of paper that were sometimes as small as confetti.”
_________
Next question:
And did you sometimes flush such documents down the toilet.
No, never.
But your staff says you did.
This makes a lot of logical sense. Something that is missing with the whole obsession with getting Trump
Well that makes sense too once you realize it is just an elaborate partisan game played by the major players in politics, the administrative state, the media and big tech.
With one goal and rule
get Trump
and mostly played on their home court in Washington DC
disgusting
hopefully voting integrity is still at a point where this can be overcome, but the game is rigged
and the rules are evolving
https://www.nationalreview.com/2022/08/trump-worlds-mar-a-lago-offensive-backfires/
Andrew McCarthy: “In my columns Monday and Tuesday, I stressed that President Trump could talk himself into being charged by the Justice Department by making public claims that prove to be untrue. This is especially so if what proves to be untrue are claims depicting Trump as fully cooperative and transparent, in contrast to the Justice Department, which is portrayed as the corrupt cat’s-paw of the Biden White House.”
“I should have added that the former president could find himself in even hotter water if, as is often the case, his more exuberant allies try to substantiate his combative story lines, without much thought about whether they are well thought through and, well, you know… true.”
https://www.nationalreview.com/2022/08/trump-worlds-mar-a-lago-offensive-backfires/
And did you sometimes flush such documents down the toilet.
No, never.
But your staff says you did.
So when did you interview Trump, Reverend?
KD.
When does that sweet, sweet Built back better start?
Real final sales
Blogger Honest, decent, truthful Rev. said...
Mr. President, did you ever tear up presidential documents that your staff were aware were supposed to be saved?
No, I never did.
Nancy Peloshee did. On national TV at the SOTU.
I read McCarthy's article Roger...
He makes some valid points, but I think he misses one important thing (or does not really bring it up). Under the PRA of 1978 the outgoing President has executive privilege granted automatically for five years. The PRA does not provide that any records (classified or otherwise) are immune from that. In fact, the law allows for the outgoing President to use executive privilege to keep the records private for 10 years.
Moreover, the PRA does not have a deadline for turning these records over to the National Archives. Maybe is "SHOULD" - but it doesn't.
In other words... based on the PRA - neither the DOJ or the FBI would be entitled to those records prior to the five years and at best could argue that if they did not like the manner in which they were stored, that they could have come taken them "from" Mar-a-Lago" and given them to the National Archives.
But everything in the PRA suggests that they do not have access to those records (classified or not).
When the "leaks" claim that Trump executed "executive privilege" they make it sound like he was doing something out of the ordinary (when in fact that privilege is granted explicitly by the PRA law). For five years such privilege is GRANTED and ASSUMED under the law. He could invoke it to last for 12 years.
again... all Presidential records are under seal (executive privilege of the outgoing President) for five years BY LAW.
Biden made the unprecedented (and possibly legally dubious) move to revoke that privilege and basically undermined the PRA law.
So right now you have a law that states all Presidential records are sealed for 5 years... and you have FBI agents rummaging through ALL OF IT - not just classified documents.
No, I never interviewed Trump, Ch. But what's it going to be like when he IS interviewed in a testimony under oath situation?
Got any idea how that will go?
Newsmax.
Former President Donald Trump ripped into President Joe Biden for claiming that the White House had no advance notice about the FBI raid at Mar-a-Lago.
Trump made his remarks in a post on his Truth Social platform on Thursday.
He wrote: "Joe Biden said he knew nothing about the Break-In of Mar-a-Lago or, the greatest political attack in the history of the U.S. Does anybody really believe this???"
Biden had said on Wednesday that he was not given a heads-up by the Justice Department or Attorney General Merrick Garland about the Aug. 8 raid.
"I didn't have any advance notice," Biden said when asked by a reporter after announcing his student debt relief plan at the White House Wednesday. "None, zero — not one single bit."
Minutes earlier Trump had proclaimed his innocence in another Truth Social post.
He wrote: "Even though I am as innocent as a person can be, and despite MY campaign being spied on by the Radical Left, the FISA COURT being lied to and defrauded, all of the many Hoaxes and Scams that were illegally placed on me by very sick & demented people, and without even mentioning the many crimes of Joe and Hunter Biden, all revealed in great detail in the Laptop From Hell, it looks more and more like the Fake News Media is pushing hard for the Sleaze to do something that should not be done!"
And in three other posts, Trump wrote: "The Radical Left Democrat prosecutors are illegally trying to circumvent, for purely political gain, the Presidential Record's Act, under which I have done absolutely nothing wrong. It can not be circumvented, for me or any other President. They illegally Raided my home, and took things that should not have been taken. They even broke into my safe, an unthinkable act!"
And he added: "Presidential Records Act! The Justice Department and FBI are 'leaking' at levels never seen before — and I did nothing wrong!!!"
Trump may be getting himself into real legal jeopardy by claiming that he was always fully cooperative with the investigations when he was not.
"I didn't have any advance notice," Biden said when asked by a reporter after announcing his student debt relief plan at the White House Wednesday. "None, zero — not one single bit."
He's either lying, since we know he is a pathological, serial liar...
...or he simply doesn't remember due to his advanced cognitive decline.
Either way, we find ourselves living in a banana republic police state.
Blogger Honest, decent, truthful Rev. said...
Trump may be getting himself into real legal jeopardy by claiming that he was always fully cooperative with the investigations when he was not.
Read the post, pederast. Trump was certain that he was fully compliant with the PRA. And he was.
How does one find themselves 'in legal jeopardy' when one is in 100% compliance with the law?
Most often lawyers don't agree that PRA of 1978 the outgoing President has executive privilege granted automatically for five years.
If he tries to use it if he gets indicted, no judge is going to extend executive privilege for five years.
https://www.archives.gov/presidential-libraries/laws/1978-act.html
Most often lawyers don't agree that PRA of 1978 the outgoing President has executive privilege granted automatically for five years.
It is specifically in the Law Roger...
Can you show me an attorney who specifically states that that portion of the law either does not exist of is not valid?
Or are you just pulling this out of your ass?
I posted the link and the data in the legislation that did in no way said that he had executive privilege protections for five years as you said.
The Justice Department submitted to a federal judge on Thursday a redacted version of the affidavit that supported its application for a search warrant for former president Donald Trump’s Florida residence earlier this month.
The document remains under seal, and it’s unclear whether the judge will release it publicly or whether the redacted version would reveal any illuminating details about the high-profile investigation.
Scott Supreme Court decisions did not allow it
United States v. Nixon, established that executive privilege is not absolute, and does not shield a president from handing over records in a criminal prosecution. The special prosecutor in charge of the case wanted Nixon's taped discussions with his aides. The Supreme Court determined that Nixon's concerns were outweighed by the needs of the investigation.
When he tries to use what you said the precedent will matter.
The Supreme Court decision in 74 blows up your argument..
So Roger...
You linked a cut and paste from an article that only had a specific passage. Irrelevant.
Go read the entire law yourself...
Then check back with us!
And your link was to a summary of the law... not the law itself.
Roger...
Read this article - it basically states the same thing I did - but in much better "legal terms".
The PRA lays out detailed requirements for how the archivist is to administer the records, handle privilege claims, make the records public, and impose restrictions on access. Notably, it doesn’t address the process by which a former president’s records are physically to be turned over to the archivist, or set any deadline, leaving this matter to be negotiated between the archivist and the former president.
The PRA explicitly guarantees a former president continuing access to his papers. Those papers must ultimately be made public, but in the meantime—unlike with all other government documents, which are available 24/7 to currently serving executive-branch officials—the PRA establishes restrictions on access to a former president’s records, including a five-year restriction on access applicable to everyone (including the sitting president, absent a showing of need), which can be extended until the records have been properly reviewed and processed. Before leaving office, a president can restrict access to certain materials for up to 12 years.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-trump-warrant-had-no-legal-basis-mar-a-lago-affidavit-presidential-records-act-archivist-custody-classified-fbi-garland-11661170684?st=0nb40x5729qgbtx&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
Moreover...
The situation with Nixon was different.
They were looking for Documents to prove an entirely different crime having nothing to do with the holding of any documents. Also this was BEFORE the 1978 PRA.
The current situation... they are saying that holding the documents themself "is" the crime.
Way way way different...
Judge indicates he may not unseal much, if any, of Trump Mar-a-Lago search affidavit
“Having carefully reviewed the Affidavit before signing the Warrant, I was — and am — satisfied that the facts sworn by the affiant are reliable,” the judge wrote.
Redacted affidavit will be released by noon tomorrow.
This is going to effect the election in November
Gallup: “After hitting a record low in July, President Joe Biden’s job approval rating is up six percentage points to 44%, his highest in a year.
Separately, Mr. Trump’s lawyers on Monday filed a motion asking that a special master be appointed to review the documents seized at Mar-a-Lago. A special master is a respected third party, usually a retired judge, tasked with reviewing evidence and filtering out irrelevant materials or communications protected by attorney-client privilege, executive privilege, or similar legal doctrines.
That motion, which decried the FBI search as “a shockingly aggressive move,” seemed more directed at the public than the judiciary, said H. Scott Fingerhut, a trial lawyer and law professor at Florida International University.
Wsj
Gallup: “After hitting a record low in July, President Joe Biden’s job approval rating is up six percentage points to 44%, his highest in a year.
yay.
The dumb fucking parasites who make up the democrat base are loving the student loan bribe.
shocker.
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