{"id":36495,"date":"2018-08-27T06:00:50","date_gmt":"2018-08-27T10:00:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/?p=36495"},"modified":"2018-08-25T15:42:35","modified_gmt":"2018-08-25T19:42:35","slug":"trumps-problems","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2018\/08\/trumps-problems\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump’s Problems"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

President Trump\u2019s latest legal problems have little to do with special prosecutor Robert Mueller\u2019s investigation of collusion with Russia and obstruction of justice.<\/p>\n

When Trump\u2019s personal attorney Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations\u2013in the course of paying off a porn star and a Playboy bunny with whom Trump had affairs\u2013he said that he did so at Trump\u2019s direction.\u00a0 And directing someone to commit a crime is said to be itself a crime, a matter of being a co-conspirator.<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

But can paying off a girl friend, however sordid, really be counted as a campaign contribution?\u00a0 That seems highly questionable<\/a>, but read this<\/a>, from Business Insider<\/em>, on why this is, in fact, a crime.<\/p>\n

But Trump reimbursed Cohen for the cash.\u00a0 So was this really a contribution if it was just a cash flow issue with the candidate\u2019s own money?\u00a0 Candidates can spend however much of their own money in an election.\u00a0 That Trump did so, as he now agrees, contradicts what he said earlier, but not telling the truth is not a crime, unless it\u2019s under oath in a legal deposition.\u00a0 But now it turns out that the president apparently\u00a0didn\u2019t report the amount<\/a> he actually gave Cohen in his financial disclosure documents, which can also be a crime.<\/p>\n

Cohen\u2019s case is separate from those being prosecuted by Mueller.\u00a0 When in the course of an investigation a special prosecutor finds evidence of other non-related crimes, those can be sent by \u201creferral\u201d to a prosecutor in the relevant jurisdiction.\u00a0 That\u2019s what happened with Cohen.\u00a0 But now Cohen is reaching out to Mueller\u2019s team, offering to give evidence<\/a> of a \u201cconspiracy to collude\u201d with Russia on the Trump\u2019s collusion with the Russians.<\/p>\n

In addition to Cohen, other long-time insiders with Trump and his business dealings are turning against him.<\/a>\u00a0 These include his company\u2019s Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg, who has been granted immunity, as has his friend David Pecker, who heads the tabloid National Enquirer,\u00a0<\/em>which would buy up the rights to stories about Trump\u2019s sexual escapades, whereupon it would\u00a0 refuse to publish them, thus preventing anyone else from doing so.<\/p>\n

So who knows what else will be coming out?<\/p>\n

But whether you consider all of this a high crime, a misdemeanor, a pretext, or a witch hunt, the President\u2019s problems are intensifying.<\/p>\n

Even if Mueller\u2019s Russia investigation ultimately draws a blank, Trump may find himself in legal jeopardy from these kinds of\u00a0 financial charges.\u00a0 (Such as those his former campaign manger Paul Manafort was found guilty of.\u00a0 For example, he was convicted for disguising $900,000 from an offshore account as a loan<\/em> so that he wouldn\u2019t have to pay taxes on it.\u00a0 He received millions for advising the pro-Putin party in the Ukraine, which raises the question, why did Trump have an unregistered Ukrainian agent as his campaign manager?)<\/p>\n

As a Republican lawyer with White House ties said, the Cohen plea gives Trump\u2019s enemies a basis, justified or not, for filing impeachment charges.\u00a0\u00a0\u201cIt\u2019s the only excuse they\u2019ll need,\u201d he said<\/a>. \u201cAnd believe me, they won\u2019t need much of an excuse.\u201d<\/p>\n

This makes the midterm elections a referendum on impeachment.\u00a0 Those who support Trump and those who aren\u2019t crazy about him but do not want the country to go through the trauma of an impeachment trial need to turn out in vast numbers to vote for Republican congressional and senate candidates.\u00a0 Trump\u2019s opponents are already showing signs of turning out in force.<\/p>\n

If the House of Representatives goes to the Democrats, impeachment proceedings (which must be initiated in the House), I think, will be a certainty.\u00a0 But the trial would be in the Senate, and I don\u2019t see how two-thirds of that body\u2013even if the Democrats would win a majority\u2013would vote to impeach the president.<\/p>\n

Do you think these offenses, even if they turn out to be proven, are sufficient grounds for impeachment?\u00a0\u00a0And even if they are, are they worth the ordeal for the country?<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Photo:\u00a0 \u201cTrump Executive Michael Cohen,\u201d by IowaPolitics.com via Flickr, Creative Commons License<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p><\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

President Trump\u2019s latest legal problems have little to do with special prosecutor Robert Mueller\u2019s investigation of collusion with Russia and obstruction of justice. When Trump\u2019s personal attorney Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations\u2013in the course of paying off a porn star and a Playboy bunny with whom Trump had affairs\u2013he said that he […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1281,"featured_media":36513,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,26,36],"tags":[1074,7510,6223,4923],"class_list":["post-36495","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","category-law","category-politics","tag-impeachment","tag-michael-cohen","tag-mueller-investigation","tag-president-donald-trump"],"yoast_head":"\nTrump's Problems<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The guilty plea of Donald Trump's personal attorney, Michael Cohen, may hurt the president more than the investigations of Robert Mueller.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, 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