Trump NY Trial Commentary
Your rights as an American citizen are directly at stake here
MAY 31, 2024
I’m interrupting my regularly scheduled programming, to give you an urgent weather alert! Whether or not you agree or disagree with the NY v Trump verdict, and whether or not you are a Republican or Democrat, the MOST IMPORTANT QUESTION is: did this defendant get a fair trial that every American citizen is legally entitled to?
I’m not an attorney, but any citizen can — and should — do some critical thinking about situations that could have a major effect on our country and our freedoms.
Let’s start with the claimed issue: Donald Trump was essentially charged with falsifying records of paying off a woman, to enhance his 2016 election chances. (FYI, here are all legal documents related to this case Read them at your own risk..)
When answering the fair trial question consider the following:
1 – Even if Trump did do what he was charged, isn’t that a misdemeanor offense? Yes: see New York’s election law 17-152. Please read it, as it is only two sentences. But wait — this underlying potential misdemeanor expired years ago, due to the statute of limitations!
2 – Then how come Trump was charged with felonies? Sleight of hand. Alvin Bragg, the prosecuting attorney, chose to categorize this misdemeanor as a felony (i.e., more serious). “The prosecutors … argument is that the [misdemeanor election] crime was committed to further another crime as an unlawful means to influence the election.” Got that? (See here.) Is this fair treatment of an American citizen?
3 – How can an expired, unproven misdemeanor, be resurrected as a more serious offense? More sleight of hand + a sympathetic Judge. Is that fair to an American citizen?
4 – What was the “other crime” that Trump was supposedly guilty of? Not clear. From what I heard and saw, the “other crime” was not specified or proven. For example, a Bragg supporter wrote: “The former president’s actions rose to the level of felonies, Bragg said in court documents, because they were made to further additional violations of the law. However, he only broadly suggested what those additional acts could be.” Is that fair to an American citizen?
5 – Doesn’t a NYS Prosecutor, only have the power to prosecute NY charges? Yes. One of Bragg’s supporters wrote: “It is not entirely clear that New York’s law allows prosecutors to rely on a defendant’s intent to commit or conceal a federal crime, in order to bring the falsification of business records charge up from a misdemeanor to a felony. The best reading of the plain language of the New York law is that it does allow prosecutors to do this, but there has yet to be a definitive ruling on this point.” Is that fair to an American citizen?
6 – Was the defendant allowed to present a reasonable case against the prosecution? No. A major part of the case hinged on Trump’s purported actions being an “election law violation.” The defense put forward an election law expert to testify that there was no election law violation — but the Judge refused to allow that independent expert to testify! (See here [4:40 – 5:05].) Is that fair to an American citizen?
7 – Is it reasonable to have the Prosecutor’s #1 source of “evidence” be a convicted serial liar, and a disbarred, convicted felon? No. (See here for a sample of Cohen’s credentials.) Is that fair to an American citizen?
8 – Is it reasonable to have the Judge allow the Prosecutor to repeatedly make unsubstantiated claims against a defendant during the trial? No. The Prosecutor is not legally allowed to testify. (See here [1:20 – 3:20].) Is that fair to an American citizen?
9 – Is it reasonable that the charges were not summarily dismissed by the Judge? No. Per many sources (e.g., here), even though the trial was purportedly about falsifying business records, “Bragg’s team didn’t even show that Trump had actually falsified any business records!” Is that fair to an American citizen?
10-Did the Judge give the Jury objective and reasonable instructions? No. (See here.) For example, the Judge said that Jurors can find Trump guilty of any one of three different crimes, and they didn’t have to agree on which ones: “1- violations of the Federal Election Campaign Act; 2- falsification of other business records; or 3- violation of tax laws.” Is that fair to an American citizen?
11-Considering the judge’s evidentiary rulings and instructions, was there any other conclusion that the Jury could have made? No. Is that fair to an American citizen?
12-Is this a case of selective prosecution? Yes. In the history of America, no one else has ever been prosecuted for this combination of claims. This summarizes it fairly well: “The high stakes would, one hopes, compel the authorities to have the most exacting standard for their own conduct and put a premium on maintaining the perception and reality of fairness. However, the charges were rigged, the prosecution’s presentation of the case was rigged, the judge’s management of the case was rigged, the gag order was rigged, and the instructions to the jury were rigged. The whole thing was rigged from beginning to end, in the hopes of — to the extent this case and the guilty verdict will matter in November — rigging the presidential election.” The hypocrisy is that this is exactly what the accusations against Trump were! Is that fair to an American citizen?
The Bottom Line
Sample Other Observations…
Here are a few relevant comments from some others with more legal expertise than I have…
“In the end, this amounts to lying about sex. I think the view probably of the majority of Americans is that everybody lies about sex,” said Analyst Bill Galston, who has worked on Democratic presidential campaigns.
Judge Jeanine said it well: “Americans believe in justice, and I think that in their gut, they realized there is something very wrong here. This was a defendant for whom crimes were created, where a judge was handpicked for this defendant, who denied him the ability to defend himself the way he needed to, who brought in crimes that we’ve never heard of in New York before. Where they had dead misdemeanors that they resurrected into felonies, based upon non-unanimous verdicts of crimes that are federal over which no state court or no state judge, or prosecutor, has jurisdiction.”
Former Assistant U.S. Attorney Andy McCarthy echoed Pirro’s sentiment: “It’s inconceivable in New York that anyone else other than Donald Trump would have been indicted in this way.” McCarthy added that the judge “turned the jury instructions into a road map to conviction.”
Jonathan Turley (an attorney and professor at George Washington University Law School) emphasized that he does not blame the jury for the verdict, saying the judge “gave them instructions that made it very easy to convict… I’m an optimist now about the appellate judges. I think at some point people will step forward and say enough… hating this man is not enough to forget the lack of evidence.”
“This is a very sad day for American justice. This is the weakest case I have seen in 60 years.” – Alan Dershowitz, Constitutional Lawyer and a Democrat.
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PS — Here is a relatively balanced discussion of some of the other questions arising from this development — like can Trump still run for President?
PPS — As fate would have it I came across this very short video yesterday. It is about what happens when citizens do not speak up when they witness injustice — and the professor specifically references Critical Thinking!
Here are other materials by this scientist that you might find interesting:
Check out the Archives of this Critical Thinking substack.
WiseEnergy.org: discusses the Science (or lack thereof) behind our energy options.
C19Science.info: covers the lack of genuine Science behind our COVID-19 policies.
Election-Integrity.info: multiple major reports on the election integrity issue.
Media Balance Newsletter: a free, twice-a-month newsletter that covers what the mainstream media does not do, on issues from COVID to climate, elections to education, renewables to religion, etc. Here are the Newsletter’s 2024 Archives. Please send me an email to get your free copy. When emailing me, please make sure to include your full name and the state where you live. (Of course, you can cancel the Media Balance Newsletter at any time – but why would you?
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