Icon from a picrew by grgikau. Call me Tir or Julian. 37. He/They. Queer. Twitter: @tirlaeyn. ao3: tirlaeyn. 18+ Only. Star Trek. Sandman. IwtV. OMFD. Definitionless in this Strict Atmosphere.
I feel that today is a good day to post this picture from an ACT UP demonstration at Trump Tower on Halloween 1989 because it is more pertinent than ever
For people who weren’t sure what indictment means, it means trump officially has to be arrested and processed next, mugshots and everything. He might come willingly but it’d be so funny if they had to chase him a little.
- the trump org was convicted on 17 counts of fraud and tax evasion
- Special counsel Jack smith subpoenaed multiple state officials for their communications with Donald trump
- Trump’s lawsuit requesting a special master has been rejected. He will not appeal, meaning the DOJ now has access to all of the material it seized from Mar A Lago as of Dec. 9th
- the January 6th committe is preparing to release it’s final report on Dec. 21st. It is expected to include a referral for criminal charges against Donald trump, and they will also turn over all of their evidence to the DOJ
- the DOJ has asked a judge to hold the trump legal team be in contempt for refusing to affirm to the court that all classified material has been returned
- a company hired by Donald Trump’s lawyers did a sweep of all of his properties, finding additional classified material in a storage unit
- a congressional investigation has been opened into Jared Kushner for alleged tax violations in regards to his property in New York
Trump: your honor, I am here today to request a 3rd party to go through all the stuff the FBI illegally and unceremoniously stole from me
Judge: and what kind of stuff are we talking about here?
Trump: the documents I took from the White House
Judge:
Trump:
Judge:
Trump:
Judge: you do know everything you say can and will be used against you, right?
I feel the need to supply more context here, because the backstory is actually funnier than the post
Donald trump filed a lawsuit today seeking a “special master” (a neutral a third party) to go through all the documents the FBI seized from mar a lago and determine which of those documents pertain to the search warrant, and which ones don’t. In the filing, they argue that the documents that were taken are covered under Executive Privilege.
There’s just one teeeny, tiny problem here.
Documents that are created by the EXECUTIVE branch under EXECUTIVE privilege are property of the EXECUTIVE branch, under the authority of the National Archives, pursuant to the federal records act of 1950.
By arguing that the FBI, an arm of the EXECUTIVE branch, unlawfully took documents that were created during Donald trumps presidency, they’re arguing that documents belonging to the EXECUTIVE branch, under EXECUTIVE privilege, were… found at mar a lago
Which is the very crime Donald trump is being investigated for. Keeping EXECUTIVE documents at mar a lago.
you guys. if you haven’t been following the mar a lago fbi raid saga this week you have really been missing out. it came out monday night that the fbi had spent the day collecting boxes of documents from mar a lago and maga world lost it. “this is war”, hard right demands to abolish the fbi, insane posturing, every single pundit on the record saying “if this search was for anything short of the nuclear codes, this is going to massively backfire on the biden administration” (foreshadowing!). eventually report comes out that people close to trump are quietly telling the rest of the gop to dial it back just a hair, because things might get worse before they get better. most crucially is that the susan collinses of the world are demanding accountability from the justice department, demanding that they explain why this raid was warranted. (notably, trump himself has the warrant describing exactly what the fbi was there to collect, and is free to share that with the world at any point - the judge/doj is typically barred from making that public at any point, so by hounding the wrong figures for the warrant they’re thinking they can control the narrative.)
not so. today, attorney general merrick garland makes a statement saying you know what? you guys are so right. there’s actually significant public interest in making the details of this warrant - why a former president was raided by the fbi - public knowledge. so with your blessing, mr trump, i am asking the judge who signed the warrant (he and his synagogue have been getting death threats already btw, rot in hell forever you maga fuckwits) to unseal the warrant. trump, you have until 3pm friday to publicly object to this action. love and light, merrick
and then wapo reported tonight that the warrant was for, among other things, nuclear documents. yeehaw
Anonymous:
Ok wait what why is the FBI investigating the orange????
Well, you see, the thing is that Donald Trump has done literally so many crimes that when the news first broke, everyone was like “but in relation to which crime though?” It now has been confirmed that the raid was about the 15 boxes of top-secret documents that Trump stole from the White House and took to Mar-a-Lago with him. The salient points to appreciate are therefore these:
Federal law does not fuck around with the penalties for mishandling classified information and/or presidential records (all of which are required to be preserved and turned over to the National Archives, even if they aren’t literal top-secret classified intelligence). If Trump is convicted of this, one of the penalties includes… being barred from holding federal office ever again. If it turns out that he was selling secrets to foreign actors, such as, say, Russia or Saudi Arabia, both of which the Trump crime cabal has close ties with, the penalty is LIFE IMPRISONMENT OR DEATH. As I said. Does not fuck around. Either way, Trumpie got (let us fucking hope) a lot of pain coming.
The amount of evidence that it takes for a federal judge to sign off on a warrant for a no-knock raid is… a lot. The same but for a FORMER PRESIDENT? Yeah. It’s a lot.
This also required the personal approval of both AG Merrick Garland and FBI director Christopher Wray. Wray is a lifelong Republican appointed by… you guessed it, Trump, after he fired James Comey in an attempt to obstruct the Russia investigation.
Pause for sad trombone noise.
Also, this proves that Garland is in fact willing to authorize operations that target Trump directly, which means that, hopefully, he isn’t afraid to charge Trump in connection with January 6.
The amount of right wing whining and crying about the pOlitciZeD jUsTICe dEpARtMenT!!!!1 is, predictably but depressingly, absolutely insane. Once again, consequences are something that are only supposed to happen to somebody else. Even if the guy in question literally tried to use the Justice Department to launch a coup to illegally stay in power and destroy American democracy. FAKE NEWS!!!
Objectively, “they even broke into my safe!” is absolutely fucking hilarious. As was the Anonymous Source (let’s be real, probably Donnie Jr.) who complained that the FBI guys just grabbed boxes and documents without “going through them properly.” WHAT DO YOU ORANGE FUCKFACE TWATWAFFLES THINK A RAID BY THE FBI ACTUALLY IS??? THAT THEY JUST STAND THERE AND ASK NICELY TO ONLY LOOK AT WHAT YOU’RE WILLING TO SHOW THEM???
In conclusion, the “Lock Up Hillary Clinton For Mishandling Her Private Emails!!!” crowd suddenly isn’t super fond of an ex-federal official getting locked up for mishandling top-secret documents.
“Now, you may have heard that — this was just announced, I just read it, so I can’t confirm it’s true, but — this campaign has taken away his Twitter. In the last two days, they had so little confidence in his self-control, they said ‘We’re just gonna take away your Twitter.’ Now, if somebody can’t handle a Twitter account, they can’t handle the nuclear codes. If somebody starts tweeting at 3 in the morning because SNL made fun of you, you can’t handle the nuclear codes.” — Barack Obama
