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Impeachable Offenses?

~ Examining the Case for Removal of the 45th President of the United States

Impeachable Offenses?

Tag Archives: interference

Trump Balks at “Chinese Propaganda”

27 Thursday Sep 2018

Posted by crosbysamuel in Articles, Uncategorized

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Abraham Denmark, bots, china, China Daily, chinese, Collusion, Conspiracy, conspiracy to defraud the united states, des moines, donald, Impeachment, interference, iowa, president, register, Russian, the des moines register, trump

President Trump charged China with “placing propaganda ads in the Des Moines Register and other papers,” in response to a 4-page advertorial purchased by a Chinese State-run paper. The advertorial was fashioned as a series of articles entitled “China Watch” (PDFs found here). Trump’s response is particularly striking in light of his relative silence in response to the established interference of Russian robots. Abraham Denmark, “a former senior Pentagon and U.S. intelligence official [and current] director of the Wilson Center’s Asia Program,” told the New Yorker that this was an old practice and much less extreme than recent Russian actions: ” . . . there’s a distinction between influence and interference. What China did was the former, what Russia did was the latter.”

Denmark brings up an interesting point for an impeachment discussion. President Trump is being investigated for conspiracy to defraud the United States for his possible collaboration with Russians with the intention of interfering with the Presidential election. Some scholars believe that could constitute fraud. Though Trump could not be charged with colluding with the Chinese, it is an interesting question whether the actions of the Chinese government could similarly constitute fraud. That seems unlikely. In addition to what Denmark has already suggested (that there is a distinction between influence and interference) we are also missing the element of deceit (as described by Professor Bowman in the link posted immediately above). The Chinese were very candid in their attempts to influence voters — there was a banner at the top of each page of their advert which read “section sponsored by China Daily.” This is far from the equivalent of the massive campaign of Russians who adopted American personalities online. Therefore there was no probably no fraud involved; making Trump’s reaction contrast even more starkly his silence in the face of Russian interference. That being said, that’s an answer to a question nobody was asking. More soon.

397c0ded-a693-4cc2-bf77-10f6043cadb3-IMG_5088.jpgThe Des Moines Register

 

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The Consequences of Pardoning Manafort

18 Saturday Aug 2018

Posted by crosbysamuel in Articles, Uncategorized

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18 U.S.C. 1510, bribe, campaign, Collusion, deliberations, Election, Impeachment, interference, jury, Manafort, manager, Mueller, pardon, president, russia, trial, trump, ukraine

Today marked the second day of jury deliberations for the trial of Paul Manafort, the former Trump campaign manager. Manafort is being tried for 18 criminal charges for bank and tax fraud related to the time he spent working for a Ukrainian political party. Manafort refused to cooperate with the Mueller investigation, and it has been theorized that this decision was based on a belief that President Trump would pardon him if he were convicted.

Whether Trump will pardon Manafort is unknown; however he has used his pardon power politically in the past, and his former lawyer, John Down, apparently broached the subject of a possible pardon with Manafort’s lawyers. When asked whether he would consider pardoning Manafort, the President refused to say, but did comment that  “the whole . . .  trial is very sad.”

In an article written for the American Constitutional Society, entitled Why President Trump Can’t Pardon His Way Out of the Special Counsel and Cohen Investigations, Noah Bookbinder, Norman Eisen, Caroline Fredrickson, and Conor Shaw write that “a prospective pardon of a witness in the Russia investigation might . . . constitute an obstruction of a criminal investigation . . . .” They are referring to section 1510 of title 18 of the the United States Code, which makes the “[willful endeavoring], by means of bribery to obstruct, delay, or prevent the communication of information relating to a violation of any criminal statute of the United States by any person to a criminal investigator” a federal crime. If President Trump did, directly or indirectly, promise Manafort a pardon in exchange for his refusal to cooperate with Mueller, then he may not only be subject to criminal indictment but yet another article of impeachment as well.

5b3f9a219e2a102f008b47ed-750-375.jpgDrew Angerer/Getty Images

 

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Mueller Subpoenas the Trump Organization

16 Friday Mar 2018

Posted by crosbysamuel in Articles, Uncategorized

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business, Collusion, counsel, finance, Impeachment, interference, investigation, money, Mueller, records, russia, special, subpoena, trump, trump organization

Special Counsel Mueller has subpoenaed the Trump Organization for business documents. The subpoena is seeking documents related to Russia from the time before Trump ran for office. This is the first time President Trump’s business records have been subpoenaed, and marks an evolution in Mueller’s investigation.

Trump has previously stated that he would “draw a line” before he allowed his and his family’s records to be subpoenaed. Though Trump’s business records are not quite his personal records, they do bring the investigation closer to his private affairs. Mueller’s willingness to hone in on Trump indicates at least a reasonable belief that he will find documents related to Russia, and, considering the fragility of the situation, could mean an even greater suspicion.

Image result for trump org Getty

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Trump Claims Obama Acquiesced in Face of Russian Interference

21 Wednesday Feb 2018

Posted by crosbysamuel in Articles, Uncategorized

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attorney general, Conspiracy, Election, hackers, impeach, Impeachment, interference, Jeff Sessions, obama, Obstruction of Justice, Politics, president, russia, Russian, trump, twitter

In response to the indictment of a group of Russians for meddling with the 2016 presidential election, Trump seems to have asked why Attorney General Jeff Sessions has not investigated the crimes of President Obama, because the meddling happened during the Obama administration, and “. . . . [he] [didn’t] do something about [it].” The allegation came in the form of a tweet, which read:

Question: If all of the Russian meddling took place during the Obama Administration, right up to January 20th, why aren’t they the subject of the investigation? Why didn’t Obama do something about the meddling? Why aren’t Dem crimes under investigation? Ask Jeff Sessions!

Trump’s question as to why Jeff Sessions, the Attorney General, is not investigating the Obama Administration and the the crimes of the Democrats, reads as an allegation of criminal conduct. The fact that he sandwiched Obama’s lack of action in the middle of his question further suggests that President Obama, by virtue of his inaction, is guilty of a crime. If that analysis is correct, the President is suggesting that acquiescence in the face of a complete conspiracy is criminal conduct. There is some argument to made here (though a very poor one). Section 3 of Title 18 of the United States Code says that “whoever, knowing that an offense against the United States has been committed, receives, relieves, comforts or assists the offender in order to hinder or prevent his apprehension, trial or punishment, is an accessory after the fact.” This crime, though arguably the most relevant to Trump’s allegation, is a very bad fit. One would have to believe that Obama, in not speaking out harshly enough against the Russian meddlers, relieved, comforted, or assisted them to prevent their prosecution. One might argue that if Obama were to impose no sanctions on Russia he may in some way be preventing its “punishment.” Still, that would be a very abstract argument, because if President Obama had decided not to sanction the Russians, there would be no punishment to prevent. This argument is still more outrageous, in light of the fact that Obama DID sanction Russia for election meddling in the last two years of his administration.

All that being said, I think it is far from accurate to suggest that a less-than-fierce reaction to Russian election interference could be considered criminal. However, if it could, Trump would have something far worse to fear than President Obama — President Trump himself has yet to impose the Russian sanctions passed by Congress last year. Despite all this analysis, I doubt Trump meant to make a serious accusation. Rather he continues to try and distract the American people by pointing fingers away from himself.

f63d3fa9e9b34571ca1b4b11f5a8598b.jpgJim Watson/AFP/Getty Images

 

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Russian Bots Preferred Trump

29 Monday Jan 2018

Posted by crosbysamuel in Articles, Uncategorized

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2016 election, bots, Collusion, committee, impeach, interference, judiciary, russia, Senate, trump, tweeter, tweets

The Senate Judiciary Commitee’s probe of social media platforms uncovered data concerning the number of retweets Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton each received from Russian robots between September 1st and November 15th. While Trump received 470,000 retweets from the Russian bots, Clinton only received 50,000.  C-NET reports that Twitter has around 450,000 suspicious logins (possibly from bots) a day, and as such the number of retweets the candidates received is relatively insignificant. However, it does establish the Russian bots had a preference for retweeting Trump. Additionally, this preference cannot be said to be a mere reflection of the candidate’s rate of tweeting, as their daily average was more or less on par with each other.

This information falls far short of establishing collusion. Even if we could take the data to mean that the Russian government supported Trump, it does not show that Trump solicited said support. However, it does help to further establish Russian interference with the 2016 election. To look at the Committee’s complete report click here.

download (1).jpegJosh Haner/New York Times/Redux

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Frank O. Bowman, III


Floyd R. Gibson Missouri Endowed Professor of Law
University of Missouri School of Law

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