Posted on 06/21/2015 2:24:08 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
I don’t know how the political process could carry on without the New York City media. First the New York Times broke the story of Marco Rubio’s demonic record of traffic violations. The nation was rocked, but somehow we managed to heal and move forward. But no sooner had our heads stopped reeling than the New York Daily News discovered that newly minted candidate Donald Trump has his own Bonny and Clyde history hidden in the shadows. He failed to show up for jury duty multiple times.
Presidential candidate Donald Trump’s road to the White House skipped several scheduled stops — for jury duty.
The Donald, who entered the sprawling GOP primary field last week, ignored five jury summonses in the past nine years from the Manhattan County Clerk, the Daily News has learned.
Trump’s delinquencies became so persistent that the court system finally caught up with him three months ago.
The billionaire businessman was ordered to appear at a March 6 hearing for “failure to respond to summons for petit jury service” twice in 2006 — and then again in 2008, 2013 and on Feb. 9, 2015.
Trump was fined 250 dollars, nearly derailing his self funded presidential campaign. But his attorney insists that he never received the summons in the first place.
Michael Cohen, special counsel to Trump, said the Republican hopeful never received the notifications.
“Any assertion that Mr. Trump doesn’t take his civic responsibilities seriously is absolutely false and only being used as an attempt to discredit his stellar reputation,” Cohen said. “Mr. Trump has not received any of the notices. Had he, he would have complied.”
I don’t want to put this exactly on the same level as traffic violations because it’s not. Everyone is responsible for jury duty (assuming the state manages to get you on the list of people to summon) and it absolutely is your civic duty. But it’s also not impossible to think that Trump is telling the truth and those forms made it into the circular file of some administrative worker who handles the ton of correspondence he must receive. And if not? Well, you shouldn’t dodge jury duty, as I said, but it’s really not on par with some of the actual crime sprees pulled off (or at least allegedly pulled off so far) by current and recent elected officials in Trump’s home state of New York. On the Richter scale of political scandals, if Rubio came in at a 0.7, Trump may have managed a 1.6 if Blagojevich scored a 7.0.
With all that in mind, it might not even be worth covering this story beyond a quick, light hit on a weekend except that the shark tank of the GOP primary will always see a few denizens heading for the least drop of blood in the water. When the news broke, the NY Daily News was able to get the campaign of Trump’s fellow New Yorker, Governor George Pataki to comment.
“Sadly, this is the exact same attitude of politicians like Hillary Clinton and the Washington insiders who consistently put themselves above the laws the rest of Americans respect,” said Pataki spokesman David Catalfamo. “The American people are fed up with the rich, powerful and connected picking and choosing what laws apply to them.”
Pataki memorably appeared at the Putnan County courthouse for jury dury while governor in 1997.
Let’s get out the social media predictions. Will #TrumpCrimeSpree be trending by tomorrow?
He throws them away. I was told by a lawyer friend to just throw them away - they can’t prove you didn’t receive it. I just didn’t have the guts to do it. Got a doctor’s excuse instead.
Was the punishment a fine? Did he pay the fine? Let’s move on and talk about who can lead a nation with a lot of real problems.
“Ted Cruz Has to Deal With Jury Duty, Just Like the Rest of Us But unlike everyone else, he actually goes.”
Marco Rubio is still unacceptable.
He sided with Schumer and fraudulently documented foreigners against the citizens.
Absolutely hysterical. Shrillary is crime incorporated and the MSM is digging up navel lint on our guys.
Just tell the judge after hearing the charges that the defendant sounds guilty.
I've been "summoned" 3 times for jury duty. The first 2 times, I sat in a little waiting room with others, watching C.N.N. and reading old Time and Newsweek magazines for three days each. The third summons, I simply threw away.
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