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The Next Prosecution of Donald Trump
Wall Street Journal ^ | 5 Oct, 2025 | Eugene Kontorovich

Posted on 10/06/2025 5:55:35 AM PDT by MtnClimber

Plans are under way to try him in the International Criminal Court. This time he can strike first.

Before his second term began, President Trump was prosecuted repeatedly in state court, federal court and the Senate. After it ends, he could face trial in another venue, the International Criminal Court in The Hague. The U.S. didn’t sign the Rome Statute and therefore doesn’t belong to the ICC, but the court can find a jurisdictional hook in actions the administration has taken abroad in ICC member states.

The strikes on Venezuelan narcoterror smuggling boats provide one possible avenue. Shortly after the U.S. Navy destroyed the first such vessel, Ken Roth, a former head of Human Rights Watch, endorsed ICC intervention. “Trump just did what the International Criminal Court has charged former Philippines Pres. Duterte with doing—ordering the summary execution of alleged drug traffickers,” Mr. Roth tweeted. Venezuela is a Rome Statute party, which in the court’s thinking gives it jurisdiction over U.S. officials and servicemen involved in the attacks. The ICC has already launched an investigation against a nonmember state (Israel) based on a single boarding of a vessel flagged by a member state, so it has all the precedents it needs.

Mr. Trump has thus far taken an incremental approach to the ICC. He revived a first-term executive order authorizing sanctions against the court and applied it against four ICC officials. None of this has significantly reduced the risk to the U.S. or led the ICC to change its ways.

The ICC’s supporters don’t see the existing sanctions as an “existential threat.” The tribunal can easily ride it out by lying low until a Democratic president lifts the sanctions, as Joe Biden did. The court takes a long view—its prosecutors and judges have nine-year terms

(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...


TOPICS: Society
KEYWORDS: eugenekontorovich; icc; lawfare; wallstreetjournal

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1 posted on 10/06/2025 5:55:35 AM PDT by MtnClimber
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To: MtnClimber
NOTE: The article is behind a paywall and the link may be blocked. You can go to RealClear Politics for Oct 6 and find the link to the article about half way down the morning list. Using this link will allow you to view the entire article.
2 posted on 10/06/2025 5:56:34 AM PDT by MtnClimber (For photos of scenery, wildlife and climbing, click on my screen name for my FR home page.)
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To: MtnClimber

If they don’t jail or bankrupt the lawfare activists, there will be plenty of cases against Trump & Co. here when his term ends.


3 posted on 10/06/2025 5:57:00 AM PDT by fruser1
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To: MtnClimber

Cut off international aid to every single country that signs on to this crap and deport every single one of their people.


4 posted on 10/06/2025 5:57:26 AM PDT by Cowgirl of Justice
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To: MtnClimber

Now is a perfect time to dismantle super-national entities like the ICC and UN. They’ve become party to the highest bidder.


5 posted on 10/06/2025 5:59:02 AM PDT by struggle
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To: MtnClimber

Trump pisses off the globalist cabal again.
Film at 11:00.


6 posted on 10/06/2025 6:09:35 AM PDT by bk1000 (Banned from Breitbart)
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To: MtnClimber

Owwwwwwww! The ‘aye see see”.


7 posted on 10/06/2025 6:09:54 AM PDT by rktman (Destroy America from within? On hold! Enlisted USN 1967 proudly. 🚫💉! 🇮🇱🙏! Winning currently!)
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To: Cowgirl of Justice

:: Cut off international aid to every single country that signs on to this crap and deport every single one of their people. ::

Then tell the ICC that their continued existence is dependent on NATO funding (and any incoming missiles).
We have the ability to declare such legal wranglings an ‘act of war’.
After the smoke clears... the US courts might say we were wrong.
Meh.


8 posted on 10/06/2025 6:10:04 AM PDT by Cletus.D.Yokel (The Democrats' official policy is now, “Hate, Violence and Murder". Change my mind.)
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To: MtnClimber

“Venezuela is a Rome Statute party, which in the court’s thinking gives it jurisdiction over U.S. officials and servicemen involved in the attacks.”

_________________________________________

Sorry, none of this works like that.


9 posted on 10/06/2025 6:14:12 AM PDT by jacknhoo (Luke 12:51; Think ye, that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, no; but separation.)
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To: MtnClimber

The most dangerous people are the ones going after Trump he’s blocking the bolshevik aganda of the left.


10 posted on 10/06/2025 6:15:37 AM PDT by Vaduz
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To: struggle

“”Now is a perfect time to dismantle super-national entities like the ICC and UN. They’ve become party to the highest bidder.””

Lol...and how, pray tell, would the US go about doing that? It’s an international conglomerate of European and smaller nations around the globe. The US has no power or ability to “dismantle” it. The best we can do is ignore it for now. And Trump could kick the UN the hell out of the USA. But for some reason Trump is not in favor of that. But as soon as the Democrats regain power, whatever we have done will be reversed.


11 posted on 10/06/2025 6:20:51 AM PDT by Danie_2023
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To: MtnClimber

Unfortunately, the ICC does have teeth. It’s not the court itself. It’s the leftist governments that are willing to do the bidding of the ICC.

For example, the ICC issued an arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu. So Netanyahu has to be careful about which countries he enters. The link below has a list of countries that said they would arrest Netanyahu.

(The article is from November of 2024. The list might have changed since then.)

https://www.newsweek.com/netanyahu-arrest-warrant-list-countries-comply-icc-1990062


12 posted on 10/06/2025 6:25:47 AM PDT by Leaning Right (It's morning in America. Again.)
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To: Danie_2023

“ The US has no power or ability to “dismantle” it.”

We are not a member.


13 posted on 10/06/2025 6:29:42 AM PDT by EQAndyBuzz (Gary Gilmore the POS who murdered Charlie Kirk!)
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To: MtnClimber

Wall Street Jourinal sounds so pleased.


14 posted on 10/06/2025 6:31:12 AM PDT by Jane Long (Jesus is Lord!)
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To: Jane Long

That was my first thought. The Wall Street Journal goes hand-in-hand with the US Chamber of Commerce.

Both into open borders and globalization.


15 posted on 10/06/2025 6:33:30 AM PDT by rlmorel (Factio Communistica Sinensis Delenda Est.)
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To: Cowgirl of Justice

“Cut off international aid to every single country that signs on to this crap and deport every single one of their people.”

Exactly. Do it now. Quit funding the UN, NATO, and the World Bank.


16 posted on 10/06/2025 6:36:10 AM PDT by Racketeer
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To: MtnClimber

Reminder to ICC: The American Service-Members’ Protection Act (ASPA), AKA the “Hague Invasion Act,” is still United States federal law.

The next Dem president will be so depraved that ICC won’t be necessary to ‘get Trump’.


17 posted on 10/06/2025 6:42:17 AM PDT by jjotto ("...saith the LORD: yet I loved Jacob, And I hated Esau...")
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To: MtnClimber
"...the ICC has charged former Philippines Pres. Duterte with ordering the summary execution of alleged drug traffickers”

The ICC may charge Pres. Trump with killing Venezuelan drug traffickers.

The ICC sure loves global drug trafficking and the destruction of tens of millions of lives.

18 posted on 10/06/2025 6:43:22 AM PDT by ProtectOurFreedom
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To: MtnClimber
Trump just did what the International Criminal Court has charged former Philippines Pres. Duterte with doing

I do not like Duterte personally, but he was addressing an existential problem in the Philippines. You have general poverty, Red China seizing islands and waterways, Muslim troublemakers, and drug cartels wanting the make the Philippines a full-fledged narco-state.

When the problem is so extreme and pervasive on the cartel side, fire is sometimes fought with fire. Not by choice, but in pure self-defense. The Philippines is not 18th century Massachusetts, Right now, they, along with Vietnam and Malaysia are starting to get their piece of the manufacturing and export action. That likely would NOT have happened had Duterte played by Queensbury rules.
19 posted on 10/06/2025 6:45:06 AM PDT by Dr. Sivana ("Whatsoever he shall say to you, do ye." (John 2:5))
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To: Racketeer

US out of NATO and out of the World Bank. And usefulness those organizations might have had are long gone.

But I’d keep the US in the UN for one reason only. We have the veto in the Security Council. That will keep the UN from getting even worse than it is.

Oh, and about funding the UN. The US is one of 193 countries in the UN. So we should pay for 1/193 of its upkeep. No more. If they don’t like that, they can pass a resolution. Which we will veto.


20 posted on 10/06/2025 6:46:58 AM PDT by Leaning Right (It's morning in America. Again.)
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