Should President Obama pardon Hillary Clinton as his last act.

[fwc577]

As far as we're aware, she's done nothing wrong at this point so there is no reason to pardon her. A pardon for Clinton would be devastating to the Democratic party because, whether she did anything wrong or not, for 4 years, that's all the Republicans will talk about in hopes to further suppress Democrat votes. They will sit there and say, we can't let another Democrat in office because they're corrupt and robbed the American people of their chance to serve justice and lock Hillary up and will completely ignore the fact that there was never any reason to lock her up.

We live in a post-fact world. In their mind, Hillary Clinton is already guilty of something and giving her a pardon would "prove" that the Democrats are corrupt.

[Magical Mudcrab]

I don't think the Orangetanic can sink, honestly. People voted for him because he made a few empty promises to them, despite all of the obvious red flags indicating he was a bad idea. I imagine those same people will come out and vote for him a second time, no matter how bad his first term is. It will come down to whether or not the Democrats run a significantly more exciting candidate than Hillary.

Like Bernie, who would have won if the DNC had not shot itself in the foot.

[Stormdash]

He can't pardon her since she didn't do anything criminal. Trump, on the other hand just admitted guilt in the "university"-scandal.

Not what civil settlements mean. There are more unicorns than there are civil settlements in which there is an admission of liability.

As for a Presidential pardon, they can be entirely prophylactic to ward off prosecution. "I pardon for any federal charges that could be filed for actions relating to handling of classified information", words to that effect.

[TZucchini]

No, he doesn't need to pardon her. Trump was never serious about "appointing a special prosecutor" to investigate Hillary. One of the many lies he told during the campaign that his supporters fell for hook, line, and sinker.

[XDurionX]

Not what civil settlements mean. There are more unicorns than there are civil settlements in which there is an admission of liability.

As for a Presidential pardon, they can be entirely prophylactic to ward off prosecution. "I pardon for any federal charges that could be filed for actions relating to handling of classified information", words to that effect.

Guilt in a moral sense. Everybody and their mothers know he's guilty, he wouldn't pay 25M for nothing. He knows he's guilty.

[Magicalcrab]

I'd rather he pardon Snowden and Manning, instead. It's shameful that he hasn't already, to be quite honest.

[dd614]

No and he won't do it.

Besides Trump continuing to pursue Hillary represents one of many ice bergs the Orange Titanic could smash itself up against.

lol still so salty. These 8 years are going to be hard for you.

[Warbrin]

I can't believe it's at the point where democracy has become voting between two crooks and you guys still didn't have a violent uprising (I guess that's not entirely off the cards yet). What the heck happened to you guys.

Fast food, video games, reality TV, etc. Most people are far too comfortable to upset the status quo.

Personally I think we're due, but until something impacts our "comfort" it's not going to happen.

[Acelius]

He can't pardon her since she didn't do anything criminal. Trump, on the other hand just admitted guilt in the "university"-scandal.

Didn't the FBI say that what she did was a criminal offense but they wouldn't charge her because it wasn't intentional?

[unbound]

There is actually no reason to at this time. For all the chest-beating by the conservatives, Hillary Clinton hasn't committed a crime. While people have pontificated that she got away with something, James Comey (and the FBI in general) are very anti-Clinton, but they know very well that if they were to attempt to charge her with a crime, it would be literally laughed out of court. The Clinton Foundation accusations are nothing more than speculation (and actually pale in comparison to the Trump Foundation issues...so I'm not sure they'll want to keep pushing down that path anyways).

This is also why Trump will likely not appoint a special prosecutor despite all his saber-rattling...although I can't rule it out completely as conservatives love their witch hunts, and, while the e-mail server is a non-issue, they may try that route since the non-existent Whitewater issue did lead to the Bill Clinton sex scandal. If you dig long enough and hard enough, you'll eventually find something. Too bad Democrats aren't will to do the same to conservatives...it wouldn't even take that long or require much digging.

[Doomislav]

I thought you couldn't pardon someone until they'd been convicted?

EDIT: Nope, presidential pardons have unlimited scope

I didn't realize the scope of the pardon. If I read that correctly you could pardon somebody BEFORE they actually commit the crime! You could pardon yourself for burning down the white house and taking Air Force One for a joy ride over New York City years before you actually do it. Surprise!

[fwc577]

Didn't the FBI say that what she did was a criminal offense but they wouldn't charge her because it wasn't intentional?

In this case, intent is what makes it criminal.

[Magical Mudcrab]

Didn't the FBI say that what she did was a criminal offense but they wouldn't charge her because it wasn't intentional?

She violated U.S. Code Title 18, Part I, Chapter 101, 2071.
(a) Whoever willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, or destroys, or attempts to do so, or, with intent to do so takes and carries away and record, proceeding, map, book, paper, document, or other thing filed or deposited with any clerk or officer of any court of the United States, or in any public office, or with any judicial or public officer of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for not more than three years, or both.

(b) Whoever, having custody of such a record, proceeding, map, book, document, paper, or other thing, willfully and unlawfully conceals, removes, mutilates, obliterates, falsifies, or destroys the same, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for not more than three years, or both; and shall forfeit his office and be disqualified from holding any office under the United States.

The U.S. Court of Appeals has decided that messages contained in personal email accounts can sometimes be considered government records, and subject to Freedom of Information Act requests. This means that emails sent from any account that pertains to matters of the state are considered property of the state, specifically federal agency records. While not all emails are subject to FOIA requests, this is due to exemptions granted by the FOIA requests where they can be explicitly denied.

Hillary and her staff willfully destroyed federal records, which is what the emails are. However, she isn't being charged because this is something that every Secretary of State has done since email became popular -- I don't believe the government supplies the Secretary of State and their staff with private email services, so it needs to be set up personally. If we charge Hillary, we need to retroactively charge previous Secretary of State.

[Skroe]

I don't think the Orangetanic can sink, honestly. People voted for him because he made a few empty promises to them, despite all of the obvious red flags indicating he was a bad idea. I imagine those same people will come out and vote for him a second time, no matter how bad his first term is. It will come down to whether or not the Democrats run a significantly more exciting candidate than Hillary.

Trump will make a mistake. He'll do something, probably unthinkingly or with terrible alt-right advice, and that will be it.

It is in his nature. He is a lazy, untalented, arrogant, sloppy man and he has surrounded himself with nothing but enablers that often times (during the campaign) he utterly ignored.

He will take a bribe, or a quid-pro-quo, or engage in some kind of ironic sloppy handing of classified intelligence. Or lead the country into a military or foreign policy catastrophe. The fact that he actually asked Jack Keane to be Secretary of Defense, to have him in in the same room handling National Security with Michael Flynn, underscores this. He is going to unthinkingly mix elements and an explosion will happen.

I doubt his administration makes it to 2020.

Because most people don't know their history, they forget, Nixon looked around to staying on despite possible impeachment. It was only after a phone call with Barry Goldwater, who refused to back him, did Nixon realize the jig was up, and his supposed allies had abandoned him.

Look for the Republican Majority, namely the de facto Head of Government and Romney acolyte Paul Ryan, and institutionalist Mitch McConnell, to make a move to trade up to Michael Pence.

[Acelius]

In this case, intent is what makes it criminal.

Funny that when rich people do criminal stuff but without the intention, they don't get punished.

[Barnabas]

I thought she didnt do anything wrong?

[Skroe]

lol still so salty. These 8 years are going to be hard for you.

Salt? You haven't even salt yet. When Trump fails.... and he will... salting the Earth, so to speak, is what we have in store for the Alt Right and Trumpkins.

Anyway what is to be salty about? Not winning the election? Not the first time. Not gonna be the last. Life is funny like that.

Because on election day I DIDN'T vote for the unqualified authoritarian racist, mysonginst, isolationist, fascist, billionaire friend to Vladmir Putin. And when the Trump Disaster befalls this country your side is going to get all the blame for it. And yes, we will remember who made him possible.

This is just the beginning. Bannon wants his 50 year Trumpkin reign? I say: like hell. They are already doing what all leadership failures do overestimating the security of their political position.

[beanman12345]

trump won't go after her. they are friends. he just said it cause it polled well and riled people up.

[JohnBrown1917]

I don't think the Orangetanic can sink, honestly. People voted for him because he made a few empty promises to them, despite all of the obvious red flags indicating he was a bad idea. I imagine those same people will come out and vote for him a second time, no matter how bad his first term is. It will come down to whether or not the Democrats run a significantly more exciting candidate than Hillary.

Just do it in time before he complete lets the US fuck up climate change, a 2th term will fuck it up even more,

[Skroe]

We'll see, but I think you are overly optimistic.

I don't think so. Hell I'm willing to even take an educated guess as to what it is:

It will come out that in order to cover his financial losses, Donald Trump is in hock to Russian banks connected to Vladmir Putin.They may even have blackmail on him owing to his stay in Russia a few years back (in the same suite used by Obama earlier).

If a disclosure like that came out, Trump would have basically no choice but to resign.

That would be the past actions.

Insofar as future actions, I wouldn't be shocked if in a couple years it comes out that various agreements with other countries have been sweetened by fire sale real estate deals to Trump Inc, nominally under his children's controls.

Same deal there.

He'll screw up. He's careless and think the rules apply to him. Well unlike most other countries, the President of the United States does not have executive immunity (rather it has executive privlege for executive branch documents and immunity from prosecution for policy exectuion). The same anti-corruption laws that send Congressmen to jail could do the same to Trump.