Mega-Thread: Trump Focused Discussion

[D Luniz]

No. It matters when he lies on a contract (fraud) filing (tax evasion) or on the stand. Everything else is fair game.

IF it can be shown he lied in public to affect the stock price (which there is no other reason to make the claim he did) it is illegal, but its hard to prove without an EXTENSIVE paper trail.

[cubby]

get @cubby to verify, but I think once the jury is sworn in, its possible to get double jeopardy to apply

@Orange Joe is correct, a mistrial does not trigger double jeopardy - you could technically have infinite trails ending in mistrial and then retried and then mistrial...etc. Although on a practical level the prosecution would stop at some point (usually after 3-4, if they even go that far).

What can happen is the judge can dismiss a case, with prejudice, which then affect and triggers double jeopardy. That added phrase "with prejudice" means that the defendant cannot be tried again for the same crime (and then see all that double jeopardy involves).

[Breccia]

Trump announces that he will not testify in the hush money case.

Trump told reporters Friday he would "absolutely" testify in his upcoming hush money trial that is set to begin on Monday.

"Yeah, I would testify, absolutely," he said.

Trump, who is charged with 34 counts of first-degree falsifying business records, repeatedly called the trial a "scam" during his press conference at Mar-a-Lago.

Jury selection in the trial, which is expected to last six to eight weeks, begins Monday.

"I'm testifying. I tell the truth, I mean, all I can do is tell the truth. And the truth is that there is no case," Trump said.

"Wait, you said Trump claimed he wouldn't."

In three...two...one...

"Oh, right. Because Trump lies all the time about everything."

Trump tried testifying in the Carroll lawsuit...uh, the second one, I think...and was shut down by the judge when he tried to give a campaign rally to the jury. Since that won't work here either, and because the case is a felony criminal trial, Trump should be concerned not just with perjury, but also damaging his case by acting as impulsive, unhinged, and stupid as he really is.

Trump won't testify. You heard it here thirty-seventh -- I can't be the first to predict that.

[Draco-Onis]

IF it can be shown he lied in public to affect the stock price (which there is no other reason to make the claim he did) it is illegal, but its hard to prove without an EXTENSIVE paper trail.

The SEC is also a paper tiger the worse he would get is a slap on the wrist fine.

[postman1782]

it's always a fuckin lie lol

also now I know what "blexit" is sorta and I hate it

Literally everyone is paid to be at his gatherings. The rally in Michigan claiming the UAW supported him, they were paid to be there, not actually UAW autoworkers, the blacks for Trump people, the Blexit people that showed up at the Whitehouse with Candace Owens to wear the MAGA hats were paid.

Also, his first trip down the escalator in 2015 when he announced had people paid to be there.

[Dontrike]

Trump tries one more time to get the case tossed out, delayed, such and such by saying because the trial is in the news it will make the jurors biased, and he wants to wait until the news of a president on trial for a felony subsides. Of course the judge said, in a judgely way, "Fuck you."

A New York judge on Friday tossed one of former President Trump’s final remaining pathways to avoid his imminent hush money trial, rejecting his bid to delay the proceedings over “prejudicial” pretrial media coverage.

Judge Juan Merchan ruled that Trump’s trial will go forward Monday with jury selection, rejecting defense arguments that the barrage of media coverage around the trial has prejudiced potential jurors.

“Defendant appears to take the position that his situation and this case are unique and that the pre-trial publicity will never subside. However, this view does not align with reality,” Merchan wrote in the four-page ruling.

The ruling marks the fourth time this week that a judge has rejected a Trump attempt for a last-minute delay of jury selection, which would mark the former president’s first criminal trial.

Trump’s lawyers insisted the former president could not receive a fair trial in Manhattan this year, re-upping their demand to delay the proceedings until after this year’s election. Trump has looked to delay all four of his criminal cases so Trump can first try to retake the White House, which would halt the indictments.

In a motion last month, Trump’s lawyers argued that extensive reporting on his legal woes – only expected to increase as the trial date nears – prevented a fair trial. They cited a media study and polling conducted at the direction of Trump’s team suggesting most Manhattan residents already believe Trump is guilty.

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s (D) office in opposing the delay request questioned the reliability of Trump’s data but also said it suggested the opposite conclusion — that a fair group can be selected through proper jury selection procedures.

“Defendant simply cannot have it both ways: complaining about the prejudicial effect of pretrial publicity, while seeking to pollute the jury pool himself by making baseless and inflammatory accusations about this trial, specific witnesses, individual prosecutors, and the Court itself,” prosecutors wrote in court papers.

Trump’s legal team also pointed to remarks made by two of the state’s expected star witnesses, ex-Trump fixer Michael Cohen and porn actress Stormy Daniels.

And the lawyers claimed that the timing of the Wednesday perjury sentencing of Trump’s longtime financial gatekeeper, ex-Trump Organization chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg, was “manufactured” to prejudice Trump in his own case. Weisselberg was sentenced to five months for lying to state lawyers in the business’s civil fraud trial.

“[N]o fair and impartial jury can be selected in this County at any time in the near future, including in April of this year. Therefore, the Court should adjourn the trial date until the prejudicial media coverage subsides,” Trump’s attorneys wrote in court papers.

[Polgara]

Trump tries one more time to get the case tossed out, delayed, such and such by saying because the trial is in the news it will make the jurors biased, and he wants to wait until the news of a president on trial for a felony subsides. Of course the judge said, in a judgely way, "Fuck you."

Maybe I'm just not very smart; but this feels like a "quiet part out loud" saying that "We're too rich to be put to trial because of biases", essentially the system "fails" when addressing high-profile criminals. Either that's fundamentally flawed and the system can ignore it, in which case he has no basis to stand on, or it IS a problem and it redresses a major flaw in the criminal justice system. Either way, it says Trump believes he should benefit from it more than it "is a problem that needs fixing", so the Ovaltine Orator needs to face the music, and the system needs to consider these situations in future until we reach an actual breaking point of abuse IMO, it feels way to close for comfort at this time.

[Endus]

Maybe I'm just not very smart; but this feels like a "quiet part out loud" saying that "We're too rich to be put to trial because of biases", essentially the system "fails" when addressing high-profile criminals. Either that's fundamentally flawed and the system can ignore it, in which case he has no basis to stand on, or it IS a problem and it redresses a major flaw in the criminal justice system. Either way, it says Trump believes he should benefit from it more than it "is a problem that needs fixing", so the Ovaltine Orator needs to face the music, and the system needs to consider these situations in future until we reach an actual breaking point of abuse IMO, it feels way to close for comfort at this time.

It can't work. Lots of trials are in the news, crimes are reported on all the time, including charges filed against the accused by name. About the only way Trump could make this argument stick is if he could convince State if not Federal officials to ban all crime reporting that names offenders before a guilty verdict is issued, which itself would be a massive First Amendment violation.

If it's okay to put the name of a mass shooter in the paper, it's okay to talk about Trump's charges and trial. The Orange Turd is just desperately flailing because he knows he's not gonna win at trial. If he thought he would, he'd be begging them to rush it so he could brag about his exoneration.

[Polgara]

It can't work. Lots of trials are in the news, crimes are reported on all the time, including charges filed against the accused by name. About the only way Trump could make this argument stick is if he could convince State if not Federal officials to ban all crime reporting that names offenders before a guilty verdict is issued, which itself would be a massive First Amendment violation.

If it's okay to put the name of a mass shooter in the paper, it's okay to talk about Trump's charges and trial. The Orange Turd is just desperately flailing because he knows he's not gonna win at trial. If he thought he would, he'd be begging them to rush it so he could brag about his exoneration.

Fair; I hadn't thought of it as having functioned perfectly fine before now, but something about an ex-president fighting this hard, and elongating the process to this degree FELT (nothing attributed to fact mind, just personal extrapolation only, so absolutely fair to dismiss my personal concerns) that we are in a scenario where someone has enough power TO put the state of the judicial system into flux. I don't believe it'll happen; just that Trump is doing the opposite to what most "powerful" people instead step down/disappear with their gains to avoid punitive measurements, in an attempt to keep everything he's gained, or to gain more? I might have to stop and find educated people to give better information, I'm barely lay in this regard.

[Breccia]

"A New York judge on Friday tossed one of former President Trump’s final remaining pathways to avoid his imminent hush money trial, rejecting his bid to delay the proceedings over “prejudicial” pretrial media coverage."

Well, I thought he'd try something more dramatic. This is just...sad.

I fail to see how it's the judge's problem that Trump is such a horrible person that the news shows him in a negative light by merely stating objective facts.

[Dontrike]

Well, I thought he'd try something more dramatic. This is just...sad.

I fail to see how it's the judge's problem that Trump is such a horrible person that the news shows him in a negative light by merely stating objective facts.

Trump will always try to make it the judge's problem, and hopefully Trump acts his Trumpiest at the trial so we can get some actual consequences that aren't a whopping $15k for his zealots to pay off in an hour. Of course, I'm not holding my breath.

[Rasulis]

“Just sat down with my broker yesterday and am having him move $10,000 of my Roth IRA, that we had sitting idle for kind of like an extra ‘emergency fund’, into $DJT stocks!” one user declared excitedly. “This is the only time I would hope for the price to drop so I can get as many shares as possible!”

Another chimed in: “Not going to be able to sleep tonight. If you stick it out I believe you will be rewarded greatly. I believe God directed me here.”

[Breccia]

Speaker Johnson and election denying insurrectionist Donald Trump hold press conference to announce a new law that bans noncitizens from voting.

"I didn't know they could."

They can't in federal elections, which is the only kind of election a federal law could regulate.

"Then...what's the point?"

To keep Greene from throwing Johnson out. Obviously there's a lot of other stuff in there too, fear, misinformation, racism, 2020 denial, and an exceptionally Trumpian own-goal.

we cannot wait for widespread fraud to occur

-- Mike Johnson, standing in front of Trump, said that

"So he admits--"

Yes. But the point is really Johnson and Trump realizing that only Trump has control of the RNC/GOP and Johnson needs to get on board or be fired. So he's announcing a law that already exists, will never pass the Senate, will never be signed, will never overcome a veto, and of course, does nothing because it already exists.

P.S. The conference was held at Mar-a-Lago. That's how much Johnson knows he's outnumbered.

[Edge-]

Just sat down with my broker yesterday and am having him move $10,000 of my Roth IRA

Their Roth? This is fascinating to me, because they were smart enough to have a Roth that they've been contributing to (Roth's are great!), but are both dumb enough to take the penalty for cashing out early (IIRC) and well...dumb enough to "invest" in Truth Social.

This reeks of someone on the internet doing a little bit of the trolling, actually.

[Odinfrost]

The fake transparency hurts.
But not nearly as much as those investing zealots

[Breccia]

dumb enough to "invest" in Truth Social.

To be fair, they are not investing in Truth Social. They are handing Trump some money in a way that's not regulated like a PAC. Yes, some of them think they'll get something back for it, those people are dumb, but the main goal is not an investment, it's about handing Trump some money. You know, the man who claims to be so rich he doesn't need people to hand him money.

Also, ABC News and likely others saw that press conference and had some thoughts. Mostly "he's lying".

ABC News is fact checking some of Trump's previous and false comments on elections and voting ahead of the joint appearance with Johnson.

State and federal courts have dismissed more than 50 lawsuits across six states from Trump and his allies aiming to overturn the results of the 2020 election. In many of the cases, Trump pushed thinly supported allegations of election misconduct and fraud.

An Associated Press investigation found fewer than 475 cases of voter fraud in six battleground states during the 2020 presidential election -- a number far too little to have make any different in the outcome of that election. Arizona had the highest number of potential fraud cases of the states AP examined with 198 of the 3.4 million votes cast -- and that amount of potential fraud cases comprised less than 2% of the margin by which Biden won, according to the AP. In Nevada, the AP found that local officials identified between 93 and 98 potential fraud cases out of 1.4 million ballots cast, representing less than one-third of 1% of Biden’s margin of victory.

Trump has continued to falsely claim he won the 2020 election in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan, but he lost all three of those states in the last presidential election. In Pennsylvania, Biden won by 81,660; in Michigan, Biden won by about 21,000 votes; in Wisconsin, Biden won by more than 20,000.

The United States National Intelligence Council, comprised of the United States' intelligence and security agencies, announced in 2021 that it found "no indications that any foreign actor attempted to alter any technical aspect of the voting process in the 2020 elections."

Trump routinely disparages mail-in voting and has made unfounded claims about the process which he claims, in part, led to his 2020 election loss. Despite his repeated claims about mail-in vote fraud, no widespread fraud has been found. A Washington Post analysis of data collected by three vote-by-mail states with help from the nonprofit Electronic Registration Information Center found that there were 372 possible cases of double voting or voting on behalf of deceased people out of about 14.6 million votes cast by mail in the 2016 and 2018 general elections. That comes out to 0.0025%.

"Mail-in voting is totally corrupt. Get that through your head. It has to be," Trump said at a rally in Michigan in February, repeating unfounded claims about mail-in voting.

Trump has also continued to float claims against voting machines, pushing for paper ballots instead.

"I will secure our elections. We are going to secure our elections. Our goal will be one-day voting with paper ballots -- very simple -- and a voter ID, but until then, Republicans must win. Landslide. We want it to be too big, too big to rig," Trump said at an April 2 rally in Wisconsin, where he continued to falsely claim he won the state in 2020.

However, the vast majority of Americans already vote with hand-marked paper ballots or on touch-screen machines that print one.

Trump and his allies have claimed that Democrats are "importing voters" to allow non-U.S. citizens participate in the U.S. elections.

"That's why they are allowing these people to come in -- people that don't speak our language -- they are signing them up to vote," Trump said at a January rally in Iowa.

While election officials and law enforcement authorities have found cases of non-citizens voting or attempting to vote over the years -- either by mistake or with malicious intent -- it has not been enough to affect the any outcome of an election, the Washington Post reported.

PolitiFact reported that it has found no effort by Democrats to register people in the country illegally.

"Most noncitizens don't want to risk jail time (or deportation if they are here illegally) by casting a ballot. Election officials take several steps to ensure that only eligible voters cast ballots," PolitiFact reported.

In Georgia, for example, the attorney general's office announced in 2022 that the state had found a total of 1,634 cases of potential noncitizens registering to vote in the state since 1997 -- none of whom were permitted to vote.

Again, Trump is just flat-out lying. In addition, he's pushing for a solution to a problem that only exists in his demented head: that he didn't lose 2020. Or, he knows he did and is lying, that's arguably better because at least he's not insane.

As a reminder, one-day in-person-only voting has been discussed before. It benefits people who are retired, and people rich enough they don't need to work on a random Tuesday. Quite frankly, anyone should be suspicious of a political party that wants it to be easier to get a firearm used to kill other humans, than it is to vote.

From the Heritage Foundation:

Although voters may find early voting convenient, turnout data show that early voting may actually decrease turnout, not increase it. Early voting raises the costs of political campaigns, since expensive get-out-the-vote efforts must be spread out over a longer period of time. There is also no question that when voters cast their ballots weeks before Election Day, they do so without the same access to knowledge about the candidates and the issues as those who vote on Election Day. When there are late-breaking developments in campaigns that could be important to the choices made by voters, those who have voted early cannot change their votes.

"Is the expense to candidates really that important to the voter or the election?"

It is when you're the Republican Party, it seems. Bear in mind, this is the Heritage Foundation I'm quoting.

"What kind of sudden last-minute information could change people's minds?"

A falsehood that hasn't been debunked yet, like the laptop in 2016. Trump routinely tells vicious lies based on nothing, and hates being proven wrong. It would be a viable and appropriate strategy to make something up Nov 1st and hope it holds weight the following Tuesday.

"What if someone commits a crime between the first and last days of the election?"

I would suggest they be arrested, and if possible, ejected from their role if they win. I don't think Biden will knock over a gas station, however.

And, based purely on Jan 6th, if you insist on one-day in-person-only voting, and then by coincidence voting sites are shut down due to intimidation and terrorist threats/attacks, you can push for those districts to be ignored. Obviously that would be a conspiracy theory to anyone who didn't see the attack on the Capitol Building, where a one-day vote was taking place and disrupted by a terrorist attack.

For more on early voting and who benefits, Ballotpedia has tried to show both sides' arguments in an impartial way. Make your own decisions. But I'll point out that there's actual studies, polls, and evidence on the side that says early voting lets more categories of people, especially women, vote.

[Odinfrost]

"we cannot wait for widespread fraud to occur"
-- Mike Johnson, standing in front of Trump, said that

To be fair, that quote sounds out of context.
Sure, it can mean they're looking forward to it, but can also mean that they cannot just sit and do nothing.

Of course, we all know that what they mean is: We want to restrict Democrats from voting

[Breccia]

but can also mean that they cannot just sit and do nothing.

It does, let me find the whole line...

The House Republicans are introducing a bill that will require proof of citizenship to vote. It seems like common sense. I'm sure all of us would agree — we only want U.S. citizens to vote in U.S. elections. ... There are so many millions of illegals in the country that if only one out of 100 voted, they would cast potentially hundreds of thousands of votes in the election.

We cannot wait for widespread fraud to occur, especially when the threat of fraud is growing with every single illegal immigrant that crosses the border

That bolded. "You'd have to be an idiot to deny the thing that never happened and is illegal will happen hundreds of thousands of times."

But let's extend that incorrect line of thinking. Do you know what else is illegal, but could happen hundreds of thousands of times? Someone getting a gun and murdering another human. Which, actually, happens a lot in real life, too. There is far more evidence of Americans using guns to successfully murder people than nonAmericans to successfully vote. And you could make a pretty good argument that the right to vote comes after the right to not be murdered.

[s_bushido]

Their Roth? This is fascinating to me, because they were smart enough to have a Roth that they've been contributing to (Roth's are great!), but are both dumb enough to take the penalty for cashing out early (IIRC) and well...dumb enough to "invest" in Truth Social.

This reeks of someone on the internet doing a little bit of the trolling, actually.

Almost a decade now of Trump's cult being insane, and you're skeptical of this...why?

Hell, we still have people literally buying into Musk's hype despite him spending the past few years very publicly demonstrating his incompetence.

[Benggaul]

Also, ABC News and likely others saw that press conference and had some thoughts. Mostly "he's lying".

I really, really want to see the breakdown by party affiliation/who they voted for in terms of those documented cases of fraud (and whether they were malicious or faults of omission/confusion), because I'm willing to bet it's at least 50% GOP and probably a good deal higher given that almost all of the cases we've found news items about have been Republicans intentionally voting fraudulently. There was some hay made by the GOP of convicted felons voting in Florida that we later learned was the result of the government telling those felons they could vote and then arresting them when they did, but apart from that I can't recall any non-Republican cases.