Posted on 05/31/2024 7:26:28 AM PDT by Red Badger
The guilty verdict against former President Donald Trump reached by a Manhattan jury on Thursday could ultimately be reviewed by the U.S. Supreme Court, legal experts said.
Trump was convicted on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in an unprecedented verdict against the presumptive Republican presidential nominee just months before the 2024 election. The verdict is likely to be appealed by Trump’s legal team, however, and experts say the final decision in Trump’s hush-money trial could come down to a ruling from the highest court in the land.
Attorney Roger Severino, who is the vice president of Domestic Policy and the Joseph C. and Elizabeth A. Anderlik fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told “Morning Wire” on Friday that Trump’s legal team could make “constitutional arguments that his right to a fair trial was violated.”
“And the Constitution means something,” Severino added. “It means, if anything, you cannot jail political opponents because you don’t like what the American people are going to vote for.”
Severino said that he believes the Supreme Court will intervene in the case if Trump doesn’t win on appeal.
“Ultimately, I think the Supreme Court, if he doesn’t win on appeal, will take this up and reverse,” the attorney said. “This is a political prosecution. We are better than this as a country and this cannot stand.”
The Heritage Foundation fellow added that whether Trump ends up behind bars is still unknown, saying “it would be shameful if this judge were to order this man to go to jail when they weren’t able to point to any victims.”
“This is so shocking and unprecedented that we’re even discussing the possibility of putting political opponents in jail in the middle of an election,” he said.
Judge Juan Merchan scheduled Trump’s sentencing for July 11, just four days before the start of the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee where Trump is set to be nominated for president. The former president could face up to four years in prison.
Lawyer and political commentator Mark Levin also wrote about the possibility of the Supreme Court ruling on Trump’s guilty verdict, saying he was surprised that “TV lawyers and others” talking about Trump’s conviction “ignore a federal path to the Supreme Court.”
“The issue is how to get out of the New York system and bring the case to the Supreme Court, which may or may not take it up,” Levin wrote on Thursday night. “That is why I look to Bush v Gore, where the S Ct decided to step in BECAUSE it was a presidential election.”
“There was another court involved, the Florida Supreme Court. And it was that court that the Supreme Court believed was violating the Equal Protection Clause. That was the doctrine it settled on, given the unequal treatment of voters,” he added.
Levin then laid out how the case that was prosecuted by Manhattan Democratic District Attorney Alvin Bragg and decided by 12 Manhattan jurors could go before the Supreme Court.
“In New York, you would file the notice of appeal, ask for a stay of the trial court, and seek expedited review,” he wrote. “You need to protect your ability to timely appeal and not abandon it. You might then file applications for common law writs with the US Supreme Court, where the S Ct can take action if it chooses, and legitimately claim the harm is immediate and ongoing not just to a presidential candidate, but to the federal electoral system, federal campaign jurisdiction (reverse federalism), and the precedent that might otherwise be set and spread throughout the country. The denial of due process infected every aspect of the case.”
I noticed the entire conservitive movement was saying Trump would not be found guilty. Wrong then. Wrong now. 2AM exists for good reason.
They fear you.
Perhaps it is an over-simplification, but did not the jury rule on a Federal Crime in order to establish the necessary predicate for the state charges to be filed in the first place? Would not be sufficient grounds to involve SCOTUS?
That's why Mark Levin was suggesting a fast-track to SCOTUS using Bush v Gore as an example.
I said yesterday that the timeline is different between Florida 2000 and New York 2020. In Florida, Bush was looking at a one week remaining window for certification of the vote when SCOTUS stepped in to stop the Florida Supreme Court from allowing a cherry-picked recount of only the three most heavily Democrat counties in Florida before irreversible damage was done.
In New York, the timing isn't that dire, but it is still accelerated. Republicans are looking at their nominating convention in July and it appears that Merchan set the Trump sentencing hearing purposely to interfere with the Republican nominating process (affecting not just Trump). Merchan could have set the date two weeks later and would still have sentenced Trump without affecting the larger Republican party, but he didn't.
The entire Republican party has a claim to appeal to SCOTUS that the Merchan sentencing date ruling is evidence that the true purpose of the case was to interfere with the Republican Party at-large through Trump and must be set aside if the New York Appeals Court can't address it in a timely manner before irreversible damage is done.
-PJ
But without question they fear something. Is it communism? Is it their career loss? Is it some deep dark secret? Whatever it is they fear, unless they act, their fears will become their reality, but exposure of a deep dark secret may bring them salvation, an people may be forgiving depending upon the nature of it, for doing the right thing. Besides, getting rid of that which must be hidden it being revealed can be great for the soul.
Yes, you are correct.
They determined that a FEDERAL CRIME had been committed, when no such crime has been charged, in order to justify the indictment of a STATE CRIME of actions that were totally legal at the time of their occurrence.
The DA, the judge and the jury have no jurisdiction in the Federal matter.
A snake eating it’s own tail.................
I agree that the whole proceeding was a violation of Citizen Trump’s rights.
I also agree that the Constitution is in crisis, and has been since the USSC accepted the erection of the State of West Virgina upon the territory of Virginia without the consent of the Virginia General Assembly (Virgina v. West Virginia, 1871).
But Citizen Trump is very likely to be vindicated and criminals Bragg and Merchan will likely face consequences.
I am resisting the ideas that because Citizen Trump is “running for President” as the candidate of a “major party” (neither of which concepts exist in the Constitution) that the crimes of Bragg and Merchan, or the state of low-level rebellion that exists in States like New York and California, WORSEN the crisis we are already in.
In order for a government to come to power that will act to destroy “combinations too powerful to be suppressed by the ordinary course of judicial proceedings or by the powers vested in the marshals by law” either an election result beyond imagining (Trump in the White House with 67 Patriot Senators and 293 Patriot Members of Congress) will need to occur OR the Constitution will be discarded by a new government taking a form which “seems most likely to effect [our] Safety and Happiness”.
I’m not holding my breath for either of those things to happen.
“That’s why his team needs to consider Levin’s suggestion of trying to circumvent the NYS appellate system and apply for writ of certiorari directly with the US Supreme Court to review it”
Absolutely. Before 5 pm today.
But Bush v. Gore was a Federal power grab over a process SPECIFICALLY DESIGNED to keep the National government out of it, and the only thing that could have possibly been different had the Constitution been followed was a small chance that Joe Lieberman might have become VP in 2000.
If that had prevented the Iraq disaster and the rise to regional dominance of Iran, a) it would have resulted from following the Constitution instead of the Supreme Court claiming a power it doesn't have; and b) been more than worth a 2-3 week delay in seating the village idiot from Texas.
The 6th and 14th Amendments permit Trump to go directly Federal District Court to have the convictions vacated based on due process violations. Trump has a Constitutional right to call witnesses of his choosing. A judge who denies that Constitutional right has committed a felony.
A judge who denies that Constitutional right should be disbarred for life..................
Not true. The US Supreme Court has recently ruled that the whole nonsense of “Comity” is not binding.
The wording is basically a defendant/party has a 14th Amendment right to go to the Federal Courts at any point in a prosecution if there is a due process violation. Trump does not have to go through the state appeals process.
The point is will the SCOTUS accept Trumps case.
It’s all up to Roberts...................
As a result, there are far more than just citizen Trump being injured by this farce of a conviction. It involves serious implications to the Constitution in that it is election interference, which the Constitution does have direct involvement in.
The conviction allows the opposition to claim that Trump is a convicted felon, giving a potential advantage to one party in the election, and that is the incumbent party who are currently beyond the reach of the law.
The time & expense that Trump is saddled with based upon a complete sham of a trial, that was held unconstitutionally. The timing is also not without question, as it could have been brought many years ago. In fact, many legal entities rejected taking on the case. The time alone provides jeopardy of a tainted election process. The Supreme Court justices are beholden to uphold & protect the Constitution.
Your concerns are heard and taken into consideration, but I think not getting involved at this point in time overrides whatever concerns you have mentioned, because time is important for a quick ruling to either clear or confirm the sham trial. In fact, if the situation were reversed, I would also support the Supreme Court do a quick ruling.
If this was limited to just citizen Donald John Trump I might stand in aggrievance with you, if he were not the oppositions candidate, but this law case has far reaching impacts upon all citizens. If it an be done against him, it can be used to prosecute whomever they want to, and secure a conviction.
This is communism on display, and you think it has no Constitution crisis attached to it? I suggest you rethink your argument and the real consequences this has.
We already had a judge in New York that said the 2nd amendment has no place in HER court. The Supreme Court has to start being proactive on certain law cases ,otherwise, lawyers thrive while we lose freedoms & rights. No one should not have to spend large amounts of money to receive justice. That is the major obstacle of justice in this nation.
That's debatable.
The state legislature had set the rules for the election, but the Florida Supreme Court was going rogue and making up new rules on the fly to help Gore.
The people of the state of Florida felt that the Florida Supreme Court was not giving equal protection to all the voters in Florida by not letting, say, Pensacola (a military city) have their votes recounted too. Remember that the statewide vote margin was only a few hundred votes. A few votes picked up in Miami might be offset by a few votes picked up in Pensacola or Tampa. That's what the Florida Supreme Court was trying to prevent.
The people were not asking SCOTUS to interpret Florida election law or change Florida election law, they were asking SCOTUS to stop the Florida Supreme Court from interfering in the election as the legislature defined it.
So there were legitimate federal issues regarding certifying the election in time for the Electoral College to work that SCOTUS was faced with.
People forget that there were two SCOTUS rulings in Bush v Gore.The first was a 7-2 decision for Bush that the 14th amendment equal protection was being violated by only recounting the three heaviest Democrat counties in the state. Voters in the other counties had an equal right to have their votes recounted, too.
The second vote was 5-4 on the remedy of whether Florida had time to do a full statewide recount. SCOTUS ruled that there wasn't enough time for a full recount and put a stop to the recounts, making Florida go with the certified counts at the time.
This was all because of the short timeline to meet the Electoral College safe-harbor date.
To your point, though, note that two years later SCOTUS declined to hear the challenge from New Jersey Republican Senate candidate Doug Forrester that New Jersey illegally replaced Bob Torricelli with Frank Lautenberg on the state ballot when the election was already in progress because Torricelli was losing. THAT would have been a true power-grab of getting into state elections since there were no overarching constitutional issues at stake.
Another point in your favor is the 2000 Senate election with Missouri Governor Mel Carnahan and John Ashcroft. Recall that Mel Carnahan died in an airplane crash about three weeks before the election. The Lt. Governor vowed to appoint Carnahan's widow Jean Carnahan if Mel Carnahan won.
Critics said that since Carnahan had died and the Constitution says that a Senator must be a resident of the state, votes for him on the ballot should be discarded.
Ashcroft declined to seek SCOTUS review and eventually conceded the election when Carnahan's name won. Jean Carnahan was appointed to serve in her husband's place. Ironically (and a foreshadowing of what to expect in the future from Democrats), when President Bush nominated John Ashcroft for Attorney General, Senator Carnahan voted against his nomination despite Ashcroft graciously not contesting her win.
In fact, John Ashcroft might be a good example of the way that Republicans treat Democrats and how Democrat react in response. Sixteen years later, Jeff Sessions from Alabama seemed to be of the same kind as Ashcroft. In the intervening years, Republicans had to endure Eric Holder, Loretta Lynch, and Merrick Garland, while Republicans put up Alberto Gonzales, Michael Mukasey, and Bill Barr.
That's why we're today seeing calls for Republicans to elect fighters to stop the Democrats. That's why Mark Levin is calling for a route to SCOTUS to stop Bragg and Merchan from interfering with the RNC National Convention. We're seeing calls for no more McConnells or Grahams or Hutchinsons in the party. Electing "genteels" only emboldens Democrats to run them over by using lawfare as a weapon against their more unassertive nature.
-PJ
what’s the supreme court case you are referring to?
I will be looking for it this weekend. I’m busy with appointments at MD Anderson today.
“ It involves serious implications to the Constitution in that it is election interference, which the Constitution does have direct involvement in.”
Where do you see anything in the Constitution about a national election to choose the President or a Federal right to vote in such an election if it exists?
All 50 State Legislatures retain the right to appoint Electors who will vote in the election that IS in the Constitution for Trump, they can do that even if he is in ADX Florence.
Before the Electors are appointed, o can’t see and Federal rights that are implicated (other that DJT’s numerous rights that were trampled in this farce).
But the Florida Legislature had and has plenary power over appointment of Electors, who are State, not Federal, officials.
That Legislature had large GOP majorities in 2000, they were in session, and they were ready to appoint Bush Electors no matter what SCOFLA did or didn’t do.
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