late 2022 US political wrap-up

In the media, there are lots of summaries and lists as the old year closes and the new one begins.

Here at Top of JC’s Mind, I sometimes post about US politics to summarize what has been going on and offer my viewpoint in such a way that people who don’t follow US politics can get the gist of the situation. Over these last few weeks, though, it’s been impossible to keep up and synthesize what has been going in with the various investigations into our former president.

The House Select Committee on January 6th held its final public hearings and issued an 845 page final report. It has also released thousands of pages of transcripts from interviews they conducted. I haven’t been able to read all the materials but have seen and heard commentary from lawyers and analysts I trust. With these materials, there is lots of publicly available evidence showing what seemed to be happening at the time: that President Trump knew that he had lost a fair election to Joe Biden but orchestrated an elaborate plot to lie about it and try to stay in power. The plot encompassed not only the ultimate 1/6/21 attack on the Capitol but also pressure on lawmakers in various states to throw out legally cast votes and appoint alternate electors to the electoral college, pressure on the vice-president to fail to certify the electors so that the election would be thrown to the House where each state would get one vote and Trump would likely win, and the call for Trump supporters to descend on Washington and “be wild” on January 6th when Congress would meet to fulfill their Constitutional duty to certify the presidential and vice-presidential election.

The Select Committee referred Donald Trump and others to the Justice Department on a number of counts, including obstruction of an official proceeding, conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to make a false statement, and inciting, assisting, and/or giving aid and comfort to an insurrection. The Justice Department will be deciding in the coming months whether or not to file these charges or others. We know that there are grand juries reviewing evidence but we don’t know what they will decide or when. It does seem, though, that things are moving more quickly since the appointment of Special Counsel Jack Smith.

Jack Smith and the Justice Department are also investigating other possible crimes of Donald Trump and his administration. One area of investigation is the presidential documents that Trump took with him when he left office. He then defied subpoenas to get the documents back to the National Archives. Some of the documents that have been recovered were classified, including some that should only be viewed in a secure location. Legal analysts think that the documents case may be getting close to the point of indictment.

Another area that is coming under public scrutiny is Donald Trump’s personal and business tax returns. Since Nixon, presidential candidates have released their tax returns publicly and have placed their business investments in a blind trust so that the public can see that they aren’t being influenced by personal financial factors when they are making decisions for the country. Trump refused to do this and fought the House Ways and Means Committee request to review his taxes and the IRS audits that should have been routine for all presidential and vice-presidential tax returns. The IRS hadn’t even begun the audits until Ways and Means Committee Chair Rep. Richard Neal requested them in 2020, midway through Trump’s term. Trump fought the returns being turned over all the way to the Supreme Court, which finally decided that they should be made available to the Committee just a few weeks ago. The Committee redacted personal data like Social Security numbers and released six years of returns publicly just a few days ago. They show that the Trumps paid little or no federal income taxes in most of those years and showed lots of business losses. There are lots of questions about the legality of some of the deductions, business expenses, and losses, but it will take forensic accountants to unravel all that information.

The release of the tax returns follows the recent New York State court ruling that convicted the Trump Organization of tax fraud. Trump, his three elder children, and the Trump Organization are also named in a civil lawsuit in New York for fraud for lying to insurers and lenders about the value of assets.

Meanwhile, in Georgia, a grand jury has been hearing evidence about attempts to overturn Biden’s victory in the state. After they finish their report, the Fulton County district attorney Fani Willis may decide to indict Trump in the case. It’s possible that federal charges could be made in the same case, but it’s worth noting that, if Trump were convicted on state charges, he could not be pardoned by a future Republican president, as would be possible for federal convictions.

I think that it is likely that Trump will be indicted on numerous charges over a period of time. It seems that there is a lot of evidence of guilt and I am hoping there will be accountability for Trump and for those who took part in the planning and execution of crimes against the Constitution and the people of the United States.

Guilty pleas or verdicts on some of the possible charges would bar Trump from ever again holding office. Of course, despite the losses of many Trump-backed candidates in the midterms, Trump has already declared himself as a presidential candidate for the Republican party for the 2024 election. So far, the campaign does not have many backers but I am scared about the prospect of Trump ever holding political power again, having experienced the harm he has already inflected.

Meanwhile, the new Congress is being sworn into office. It’s still unclear if Kevin McCarthy has enough votes to be elected Speaker of the House. (As I publish this, the House is schedule to convene for the Speaker vote in a couple of hours.) The Republicans are arguing among themselves so much that it may not be possible for them to pass much legislation, especially bills that the Democratic majority in the Senate would also agree to pass so that they could become law.

I’m trying to remain hopeful that support from Congress for Ukraine will remain strong, as well as for keeping the basic functions of the federal government running. The Republicans don’t have a great record for passing bills, though, so we’ll have to wait and see. I have the feeling that I will need to write to my member of the House frequently; he is a newly elected Republican who stressed his ability to work with Democrats to get things done. We’ll see if he can do that on the federal level. With the House majority so slim (only a four seat margin for Republicans), a handful of Republican moderates could join with the Democrats to pass bills, even if they have to use the discharge petition process to force a floor vote.

We’ll see.
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This post is part of Linda’s Just Jot It January. Join us! Find out more here: https://lindaghill.com/2023/01/03/daily-prompt-jusjojan-the-3rd-2023/

Russia – again

People sometimes describe the torrent of daily news in the US as “trying to drink from a fire hose.” Last week, there was deservedly a lot of focus on the Democratic National Convention that officially nominated Joe Biden and Kamala Harris to run for president and vice president in November.

I want to highlight a news story that is extremely important, but that did not get as much attention as it deserved. The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence published a one-thousand(!) page, bipartisan report on “Russian Active Measures Campaigns and Interference in the 2016 U.S. Election Volume 5: Counterintelligence Threats and Vulnerabilities“. Yes, the link is to the actual report, just in case anyone is in the mood for a political horror story…

The report details dozens of links between Trump associates and Russian intelligence, including the relationship between one of Trump’s 2016 campaign manager Paul Manafort and Russian operative Konstantin Kilimnik. It makes clear that Russia interfered extensively in the election to aid Trump and that the Trump campaign knew it and aided in various ways.

It’s not that there wasn’t plenty of evidence in public before this. Prior investigations, reports, and court documents had already established the Russian interference, but this new report reveals even more, albeit with some redactions.

It still sickens me that the 2016 election was tainted by foreign interference, but I wish this report had been available sooner. Here we are, with the 2020 election only two months and a bit away, facing the continuing danger of Russian interference, as well as influence from other foreign countries. The US electorate expects our elections to be fair and free, yet we face foreign attacks as well as domestic shenanigans.

I hope that all US voters will take their responsibilities seriously. We need to make sure that we are receiving reliable, truthful information and that we cast our ballots in a safe and timely way. We must have this election be one of integrity so that everyone can honor the results.

after the report

Nana is dozing in her recliner, so I thought I would try to do a quick post on my reactions so far to the redacted release of the Mueller report. With everything going on in my family life, I haven’t been able to read all 400+ pages, but have seen excerpts and analysis from lawyers and investigative/legal reporters, which I have found very helpful.

As longtime readers may recall, I was very concerned about Russian hacking and interference in the 2016 US presidential election, even before the voting took place, so volume one of the report, which details the Russian attacks, is chilling. It reveals how extensive the attack was, confirming that it reached millions of potential voters, some of whom were targeted with particular posts or ads because of where they lived, their race, and other personal factors. It also deals with the hacking of the Democratic National Committee and other campaign systems with release of materials to the public, as well as attempts to hack voting systems.

I am very concerned that Congress has not done enough to help the FBI and the states and localities identify potential weaknesses, especially in technology systems, and rectify them for the 2020 race, which has already started with many candidates declaring their intent to run in the party primaries. We need to be prepared for both similar attacks and for different kinds of attacks from Russia and from other countries. This should not be a partisan issue at all; people across the political spectrum should all be committed to protecting our national security and our freedoms.

The second part of the report is about possible obstruction of justice by the President. It makes it clear that no charges were filed because it is Justice Department policy not to indict a sitting president. Mueller also made it clear that he could not gather all the evidence needed, as the President and several other key figures were not able to be interviewed by the investigators. However, the report lays out details of possible counts of obstruction, which could be taken up by Congress as part of their investigations (which could lead to the filing of impeachment charges) or which could be charged by the courts after Trump leaves office. The statute of limitations for most of the actions taken by the president is five years, so if he leaves office during his first term or fails to win a second term, court charges could be brought for obstruction of justice.

The question of whether the House of Representatives will move toward impeachment is open. It’s complicated by the fact that the Mueller investigation was focused on Russian interference, but there are investigations on-going in other areas, among them illegal campaign contributions, emoluments, and financial crimes. Trump is trying to block them by ignoring subpoenas, not providing records, and not allowing even former staff to testify to Congress. It’s plausible that this could cause additional impeachment charges of obstruction for not cooperating with a Congressional investigation.

Additionally, people have to be aware that the standards for impeachment are different than they are for court trials. For example, one of the impeachment charges against President Nixon was lying to the American people. There isn’t a specific law against this, but it is considered a “high crime or misdemeanor,” which is the Constitutional impeachment criteria.

Some people say that Congress should just wait until the 2020 election, but I disagree. I’m afraid if these things aren’t investigated, with impeachment charges filed if found appropriate, it will look as though anyone who is elected president can get away with breaking laws and ethical codes for four years without consequence.

That is a terrible message to send. We, the People of the United States, deserve better.

do-it-yourself 2016 summary

Once upon a time, I think I got a year-end summary from WordPress that compared how many people visited the site to various buildings or transportation modes, like trains. You could share it to your blog.

I assumed that WordPress sent us an email with a link to our personal information, although I didn’t remember. I have been on the lookout, though.

I finally searched for my 2015 summary and realized that I had the info well before now. I started searching and found out that, unfortunately, WordPress is not sending out year-end summaries for 2016.

As a (less fancy and engaging) substitute, I am taking a (rare) look at my stats page to share a bit.

In 2016, Top of JC’s Mind had 226 posts, which garnered 7,507 views from 3,578 visitors from 62 countries.  (Or thereabouts, given that people who read my blog via email don’t show up in my stats.) The United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada were the top three countries.

The top posts were:
Shock 
crying does not help dry eyes
Poem: Crowning Glory
Feeling the Bern in Binghamton
the legacy of Father James
April 8

It’s a fairly eclectic list, albeit a bit heavy on the personal trauma scale, but that was the kind of year that 2016 was.

I want to thank everyone reading this post and everyone who visited Top of JC’s Mind in 2016.

And thank you to Linda for once again motivating me to get off to a good, energetic start in January with Just Jot It January. No promises, but I’ve made every day so far…
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Linda is hosting Just Jot It January again this year. Join us! Details here:  https://lindaghill.com/2017/01/06/jusjojan-daily-prompt-jan-617/