The decision today (to be appealed--hopefully unsuccessfully) that Donald Trump, Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka Trump should sit for deposition in the NY AG civil case regarding "copious financial fraud" sounds like the gentle rumble of the accountability train, coming at long last. I think. I mean, I've had my head on this track listening for fucking ever.
The case that was put on by Trump's lawyers to quash the subpoenas for his documents (is someone pouring ketchup on Trump Organization papers even as we speak?) and the deposition of Trump and family was absurd, but then again, TrumpWorld is a funhouse mirror universe where things always look bizarre. Is NY AG Tish James unduly biased against Trump? It would hardly matter given that the actual case against him based on copious available documents suggests justice would be served by giving him his day in court--why does Trump have a problem with that?
And isn't Trump in a protected class? While obviously, former one-term twice-impeached presidents are rare, no, he isn't a protected class just because he used to have some vague kind of immunity (which should never have covered shit he did before assuming the office of POTUS, anyway).
In a bit of weirdness, one of Trump's lawyers even pulled out "Why aren't you investigating Hillary Clinton for spying?" This is the sort of thing a badly-overmatched attorney might bring up if her briefcase were stuffed with notebook paper with unhelpful suggestion from the client scrawled in Sharpie marker. This is exactly how I imagine it, and how it will be portrayed in the screenplay.
Another argument--won't it look bad? Was knocked down by the obvious answer: well, what if it is bad? If Trump pleads the Fifth Amendment, yes, it does work against him in the civil trial, and he should obviously consider whether telling the truth might be one way of avoiding that disaster. But if he obviously would incriminate himself if he told the truth and that information is shared in a criminal context--
Why are we doing this? Look, Trump has history. He had to settle Trump University cases and his Trump Foundation was scattered to the winds. It isn't that he isn't known to be crooked, it's that his fan club doesn't admit it to themselves because they are enjoying the ride he's taking them on and the system hasn't figured out how to shut him all the way down yet. NY AG Tish James is doing something very important here: the hard work of bringing a lawless business to account. Trump having been president should not exculpate him or his dumb kids. If anything, that and his potential for running again makes inspecting his morality and concern for the law more important, not less.
Especially because there is every reason to expect that he ran the office of the presidency, from the very first day, with the same lawless attitude he engaged in his business practices. Especially because even his exit from that office is marred by lawlessness and involves the complicity of his family.
Should Trump continue to benefit from the same luck he's experienced all his gifted, grifting, and corrupt life after all we know now? (Shouldn't his lease to his Washington DC hotel be voided because of fraud before he can sell it and get an ill-gained cash infusion for his suffering business?)
Trump's party always likes to talk about being in favor of the rule of law, against crime, and for personal responsibility. Well, Trump is being made responsible. You gotta love it.
I mean, unless for some stupid reason you put all your eggs in a deplorable handbasket, or something. But who is that dumb?
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