Trump Is Now an Unindicted Felon: US Attorney for Southern District of New York
Sunday, 09 December 2018 14:24
Cole writes: "The Mueller sentencing document for Michael Cohen, Trump's former personal attorney and fixer, is not nearly as important as that from the office of the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York. Robert Khuzami, Thomas McKay and their colleagues not only laid out 5 major crimes committed by Michael Cohen but they established a basis for charging Donald J. Trump with a felony."
Michael Cohen. (photo: Richard Drew/AP)
Trump Is Now an Unindicted Felon: US Attorney for Southern District of New York
By Juan Cole, Informed Comment
09 December 18
he Mueller sentencing document for Michael Cohen, Trump’s former personal attorney and fixer, is not nearly as important as that from the office of the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York. Robert Khuzami, Thomas McKay and their colleagues not only laid out 5 major crimes committed by Michael Cohen but they established a basis for charging Donald J. Trump with a felony.
The US Attorney’s office maintained that Cohen’s payoff to Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougall in the days before the 2016 presidential election constituted an infraction against US election laws and that it was ordered by Donald J. Trump. It was illegal because it constituted an expenditure of funds to conceal a fact pertinent to the election from the public:
“During the campaign, Cohen played a central role in two similar schemes to purchase the rights to stories – each from women who claimed to have had an affair with Individual – 1 – so as to suppress the stories and thereby prevent them from influencing the election. With respect to both payments, Cohen acted with the intent to influence the 2016 presidential election . Cohen coordinated his actions with one or more members of the campaign, including through meetings and phone calls, about the fact, nature , and t iming of the payments. (PSR ¶ 51 ). In particular , and as Cohen hims elf has now admitted, with respect to both payments, he acted in coordination with and at the direction of Individual – 1. (PSR ¶¶ 41 , 4 5 ).”
If what Cohen did was illegal, then he will now be sentenced for the deed. But what will happen to Individual-1 (Trump), who ordered him to commit the act?
It is a peculiarity of campaign finance law that those who violate it must do so in full knowledge that that is what they are doing, in order to be convicted. Usually, ignorance is not an excuse under the law, but in this case, it is.
Trump could conceivably avoid being indicted on violation of campaign finance laws on the grounds that although he told Cohen to break the law, he did not understand that he was thereby breaking the law.
Trump, however, repeatedly lied about the pay-offs to Daniels and to McDougall, which is strong evidence on the face of it that he knew they were illegal. Otherwise, why lie?
It is also possible that the FBI has corroborating evidence from Cohen or from papers in Cohen’s office, demonstrating that Trump knew that having these two potentially greedy or vindictive women out there on the eve of the election was dangerous to his prospects.
This is the first legal document I’ve seen from the Mueller probe that actually could result in jail time for Trump. It probably isn’t a serious enough and clear enough crime to turn the Republicans against him such that he could be impeached in the Senate. But if he ever goes before a judge, this sex cover-up on the eve of the election could be the end of him.
Appendix: US Attorney for Southern District of New York sentencing Memo for Michael Cohen:
4. Cohen’s Illegal Campaign Contributions On approximately June 16, 2015, Individual – 1, for whom Cohen worked at the time, began an ultimately successful campaign for President of the United States. Cohen had no formal title with the campaign, but had a campaign email address , and , at various times advised the campaign, including on matters of interest to the press. Cohen also made media appearances as a surrogate and supporter of Individual – 1. (PSR ¶ 39 ). During the campaign, Cohen played a central role in two similar schemes to purchase the rights to stories – each from women who claimed to have had an affair with Individual – 1 – so as to suppress the stories and thereby prevent them from influencing the election. With respect to both payments, Cohen acted with the intent to influence the 2016 presidential election . Cohen coordinated his actions with one or more members of the campaign, including through meetings and phone calls, about the fact, nature , and timing of the payments. (PSR ¶ 51 ). In particular , and as Cohen hims elf has now admitted, with respect to both payments, he acted in coordination with and at the direction of Individual – 1. (PSR ¶¶ 41 , 4 5 ). As a result of Cohen ’s actions, neither woman spoke to the press prior to the election. (PSR ¶ 51 ). Cohen Causes the Magazine to Pay Woman – 1 I n approximately June 2016, a model and actress (“Woman – 1” ) began attempting to sell Case 1:18-cr-00602-WHP Document 27 Filed 12/07/18 Page 13 of 40 12 her story of her alleged extramarital affair with Individual – 1. Woman – 1 knew that the story would be of considerable value because of Individual – 1’s candidacy for president . Woman – 1 retained an attorney (“Attorney – 1”) to represent her in this matter. (PSR ¶ 41 ). Attorney – 1 then contacted the editor – in – chief (“Editor – 1”) of a popular tabloid magazine (“Magazine – 1”) and offered to sell t he story to Magazine – 1. The Chairman and Chief Executive Officer (“Chairman – 1”) of the media company that owns Magazine – 1 (“Corporation – 1”) had a prior relationship with Individual – 1 and Cohen . In August 2014, Chairman – 1 had met with Cohen and Individual – 1 , and had offered to help deal with negative stories about Individual – 1’s relationships with women by identifying such stories so that they could be purchased and “ killed. ” Consistent with that offer, after Editor – 1 told Chairman – 1 about Woman – 1’s story , they contacted Cohen to tell him about the offer. (PSR ¶¶ 40 – 41 ). At Cohen ’s urging and with his promise that Corporation – 1 would be reimbursed, Editor – 1 began negotiating the purchase of Woman – 1’s story. On August 5, 2016, Corporation – 1 entered into a n agreement with Woman – 1 to acquire the “limited life right s ” to the story of her relationship with “any then – married man,” in exchange for $150,000 and a commitment to feature her on two magazine covers and publish over one hundred magazine articles authored by her. The agreement’s principal purpose was to suppress Woman – 1’s story so as to prevent the story from influencing the election. (PSR ¶ ¶ 41 – 42 ). Between August 2016 and September 2016, Cohen agreed with Chairman – 1 to assign the rights to the non – d isclosure portion of Corporation – 1’s agreement with Woman – 1 to Cohen for $125,000. Cohen the n incorporated a shell entity called “Resolution Consultants LLC” to be used in the transaction. Both Chairman – 1 and Cohen ultimately signed the agreement , and a consultant for Corporation – 1, using his own shell entity, provided Cohen with an invoice for the payment of Case 1:18-cr-00602-WHP Document 27 Filed 12/07/18 Page 14 of 40 13 $125,000. That assignment was never completed, however. (PSR ¶ ¶ 43 – 44 ). Cohen Pays Woman – 2 On October 8, 2016, an agent for an adult film actress (“Woman – 2”) informed Editor – 1 that Woman – 2 was willing to make public statements and confirm on the record her alleged past affair with Individual – 1. Chairman – 1 and Editor – 1 contacted Cohen and put him in touch with Attorney – 1, who was also repre senting Woman – 2. Over the course of the next few days, Cohen negotiated a $130,000 agreement with Attorney – 1 to purchase Woman – 2’s silence. Cohen received a signed confidential settlement agreement and a separate side letter from Attorney – 1. (PSR ¶ 45 ). Cohen did not immediately execute the settlement agreement, nor did he pay Woman – 2. On the evening of October 25, 2016, with no final deal in place with Woman – 2, Attorney – 1 told Editor – 1 that Woman – 2 was close to completing a deal with a media outlet, un der which she would make her story public. Editor – 1 texted Cohen that “[w]e have to coordinate something on the matter [Attorney – 1 is] calling you about or it could look awfully bad for everyone.” Chairman – 1 and Editor – 1 then called Cohen through an encr ypted telephone application. Cohen agreed to make the payment and the n called Attorney – 1 to finalize the deal. (PSR ¶ 46 ). On October 26, 2016, Cohen emailed an incorporating service to obtain the corporate formation documents for another shell corporati on, Essential Consultants, LLC, which he had incorporated a few days prior. That afternoon, he directed that $131,00 0 from his HELOC – the same HELOC he had obtained by means of false statements, see p. 8 – 10 , supra – be deposited into an account he had just opened in the name of Essential Consultants LLC. The next day, Cohen wired $130,000 from that account to Attorney – 1. On the wire form, Cohen falsely indicated that the purpose of the wire was to pay a “retainer.” On November 1, 2016 , Cohen received copies of the final, signed confidential settlement agreement and side letter agreement from Attorney – 1. Case 1:18-cr-00602-WHP Document 27 Filed 12/07/18 Page 15 of 40 14 (PSR ¶¶ 4 7 – 50 ). After the election, Cohen sought reimbursement for election – related expenses, including the $130,000 payment he had made to Woman – 2. Cohen presented an executive of the Company with a copy of a bank statement reflecting the $130,000 wire transfer. Cohen also requested reimbursement of an additional $50,000, which represented a claimed payment for campaign – related “tech services . ” Executives of the Company agreed to reimburse Cohen by adding $130,000 and $50,000, “grossing up” that amount to $360,000 for tax purposes, and adding a $60,000 bonus, such that Cohen would be paid $420,000 in total. Executives of the Company decided to pay the $420,000 in monthly installments of $35,000 over t he course of a year. (PSR ¶¶ 52 – 53 ). At the instruction of an executive for the Company, Cohen sent monthly invoices to the Company for these $35,000 payments, falsely indicating that the invoices were being sent pursuant to a “retainer agreement. ” The Company then falsely accounted for these payments as “legal expenses.” In fact, no such retainer agreement existed and these payments were not “legal expenses” – Cohen in fact provided negligible legal services to Individual – 1 or the Company in 2017 – but were reimbursement payments. Cohen then received the $420,000 during the course of 2017. (PSR ¶¶ 5 4 – 56 ).
If This Is Not Murder, Then What Is? Cop Who Killed Unarmed Dennis Jeffrey Will Not Face Charges
Written by <a href="index.php?option=com_comprofiler&task=userProfile&user=44501"><span class="small">Michael Harriot, The Root</span></a>
Sunday, 09 December 2018 14:15
Harriot writes: "Richard Nicoletti is not a murderer. Let's be clear about that."
Dennis Jeffrey, who was shot and killed by police officer Richard Nicoletti on August 20, 2018. (photo: Merritt Law Firm)
If This Is Not Murder, Then What Is? Cop Who Killed Unarmed Dennis Jeffrey Will Not Face Charges
By Michael Harriot, The Root
09 December 18
ichard Nicoletti is not a murderer.
Let’s be clear about that.
Pennsylvania law describes first-degree murder as an “intentional killing” and second-degree murder as a criminal homicide “committed while [the] defendant was engaged as a principal or an accomplice in the perpetration of a felony.”
So when Officer Nicoletti, a 29-year-veteran of Philadelphia’s police force, shot and killed unarmed Jeffrey Dennis on August 20, it was not murder. Even though Dennis was unarmed, it was not murder. Even though five other officers on the scene did not fire their weapons, it was not murder. Even though there is video of 53-year-old Nicoletti pulling the trigger at point-blank range, it was not murder.
And even though I am not a lawyer, I can assure you this is not murder because, according to Philly.com, Nicoletti will not face criminal charges for firing three rounds into Dennis’ head and arm, killing the 36-year-old at the scene. The brave officer should never be called a murderer, because state attorney Josh Shapiro has declared it so.
Dennis, the engaged father of three, was traveling down a one-way street when an unmarked police car entered the street going the wrong way. The narcotics team was headed to Dennis’ home to serve a search warrant when they said they spotted his Camry on a street near his home.
In the footage captured by a nearby coffee shop, Dennis backs his car up after seeing the unmarked car going the wrong way. He is then blocked by another unmarked car.
After Dennis is blocked in, six plainclothes officers jump out of the two cars. Five surround Dennis’ car and the other goes to the trunk to get what appears to be a pickaxe, to break Dennis’ window. Dennis continues to attempt to maneuver his way out of the blockade and Nicoletti (in the gray shirt) fires three times into the drivers side.
Dennis is pronounced dead on the scene.
The video was made public on Tuesday, when Shapiro announced that no officers will face criminal charges for Dennis’ death.
“My office conducted a thorough four-month review of this case, interviewing witnesses, examining video footage, and analyzing all available evidence,” the state’s attorney said in a statement. “We applied the facts to Pennsylvania law, and accordingly, no criminal charges against Richard Nicoletti will be filed by my office.”
Shapiro’s office noted that, while criminal charges won’t be filed, the officer could still face disciplinary punishment. The Philadelphia Police Department said it is still conducting its investigation.
At the time of Dennis death, a police officer hadn’t been criminally charged with an on-duty shooting in nearly 2 decades. In September, Philadelphia district attorney Larry Krasner charged Ryan Pownall with the murder of David Jones, who was shot in the back by Pownall in June.
Krasner, known for his criminal justice reform, had to recuse himself from prosecuting the Dennis case because he once served as Dennis’ defense attorney.
Philadelphia’s policy forbids officers from shooting into a moving vehicle. They are also forbidden from shooting “to subdue a fleeing individual who presents no immediate threat of death or serious physical injury to themselves or another person.”
But this was not murder. Maybe there is no such thing as murder...
Brockovich writes: "Mists of weedkiller drifted downwind toward them. The main active ingredient in that mist, and in the weedkiller being sprayed throughout Tampa Bay, is glyphosate, one of the most widely used herbicides in the US."
Erin Brockovich. (photo: EcoWatch)
The Weedkiller in Our Food Is Killing Us
By Erin Brockovich, Guardian UK
09 December 18
Growing research show that glyphosate, one of the most widely used herbicides in the US, causes cancer
n a recent Saturday afternoon, in an estuary near Tampa Bay, Florida, I watched airboats move up and down the river banks, spraying massive plumes of weedkiller on to the vegetation. The state of Florida was trying to control and kill off scores of plant species. Nearby, children were lying out in the sun, though they knew better than to swim in the water, which has recently been blooming with toxic algae. Mists of weedkiller drifted downwind toward them.
The main active ingredient in that mist, and in the weedkiller being sprayed throughout Tampa Bay, is glyphosate, one of the most widely used herbicides in the US. First registered for use here in 1974, it is now an ingredient in more than 750 products, including the most widely deployed herbicide in the world, Monsanto’s Roundup. For more than a generation, Americans have been using Roundup and other glyphosate-based chemicals to improve agricultural yields, manage forests, ripen fruit and kill the dandelions sprouting from our front lawns.
This August, the jury in a civil trial found Monsanto, which was acquired earlier this year by the German chemical behemoth Bayer, guilty of causing the cancer of Dewayne Johnson, a school groundskeeper. The jury awarded Johnson $289m (a judge later reduced the award to $78m, citing statutory limits). Roughly 8,700 similar cases against Monsanto are also before the courts.
Growing research suggests that glyphosate causes a form of cancer called non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, with which Johnson was diagnosed in 2014. At least three studies, in the US, Canada and Sweden, have linked glyphosate exposure to the disease, and, in 2015, the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer found glyphosate to be a “probable” cause of cancer in humans. California’s state environmental protection agency has also declared it a probable carcinogen.
Almonds, carrots, quinoa, soy products, vegetable oil, corn and corn oil, canola seeds used in canola oil, beets and beet sugar, sweet potatoes – these are just some of the foodstuffs which typically contain high levels of glyphosate. Research released in August by the non-profit Environmental Working Group (EWG) found that Cheerios, Quaker Old Fashioned Oats and at least 29 other popular breakfast foods contained what the EWG considers unsafe quantities of the herbicide. The environmental group has been urging public action to get the EPA to revise its outdated standards, which currently fail to protect the public from glyphosate in foods. Levels of glyphosate in the bodies of people in some areas appear to have jumped over 1,300% in the past 20 years, according to a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
There is also evidence that glyphosate is an important driver of Florida’s toxic algae bloom and of similar algal efflorescences across the country. According to research conducted on Lake Erie, the algae thrive off the phosphorus released when the compound is sprayed on certain soils. In turn, human exposure to the toxic algae, which regularly kills pets and wildlife, has been linked to neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and ALS.
Glyphosate is only one of more than 80,000 registered commercially produced chemicals in the US. Some of these compounds, such as PFOA and the one I made my name investigating, hexavalent chromium, have also been convincingly linked to health crises – testicular cancer in the case of PFOA, and lung cancer in the case of chromium-6.
Unlike pharmaceuticals, which have to go through relatively rigorous (if imperfect) testing before being released on the marketplace, the vast majority of chemicals like glyphosate will never be adequately tested for their effects on ecosystems or human beings. Governments don’t have the resources, and companies don’t have the incentive. Even when safety guidelines and regulations are in place, the rate of chemicals acceptable by law may be far higher than what is genuinely safe.
The fact is we simply have no idea the extent of the harm most chemicals are doing to our bodies or our planet. And as the Trump administration undermines the Environmental Protection Agency and Republicans seek to gut the meagre safeguards that are in place, our exposure to glyphosate and other such chemicals is only likely to increase.
Many people are looking for a simple answer or new insight into the issue, but the answer has always been the same. We need to petition our legislators, exercise our right to vote, rally our communities, lobby for what we believe in, and most importantly, understand that it’s the health and welfare of our families that is at stake.
FOCUS: John Kelly Was a Bully, Bigot, and Liar for Trump. Goodbye and Good Riddance.
Written by <a href="index.php?option=com_comprofiler&task=userProfile&user=44184"><span class="small">Mehdi Hasan, The Intercept</span></a>
Sunday, 09 December 2018 12:41
Hasan writes: "Donald Trump confirmed to reporters on Saturday. 'I don't know if I can say "retiring," but he's a great guy.' This 'great guy' will leave behind an administration mired in scandal, chaos and corruption; a president perhaps even more reckless and lawless today than he was when Kelly arrived for work at the West Wing on the morning of July 31, 2017."
White House chief of staff John Kelly listens as President Donald Trump speaks during the inaugural meeting of the President's National Council for the American Worker at the White House on Sept. 17, 2018. (photo: Oliver Contreras/Getty Images)
John Kelly Was a Bully, Bigot, and Liar for Trump. Goodbye and Good Riddance.
By Mehdi Hasan, The Intercept
09 December 18
oodbye, John Kelly.
The president’s chief of staff is heading for the White House exit. “John Kelly will be leaving,” Donald Trump confirmed to reporters on Saturday. “I don’t know if I can say ‘retiring,’ but he’s a great guy.”
This “great guy” will leave behind an administration mired in scandal, chaos and corruption; a president perhaps even more reckless and lawless today than he was when Kelly arrived for work at the West Wing on the morning of July 31, 2017.
That was a period in which political pundits and correspondents also believed the retired four-star general to be a “great guy.” Remember how his appointment, as replacement for the hapless Republican operative Reince Preibus, was greeted by the liberal press? Kelly, we were told, would be the “adult in the room”; he would rein in a brash and belligerent commander-in-chief.
The New York Times called the former Marine commander a “beacon of discipline” who would be “unafraid to challenge” the president. The Washington Post said he would “bring some plain-spoken discipline to an often chaotic West Wing.” Axios listed him as a key member of the “Committee to Save America.” Then there was my favorite headline, from Bloomberg News, on August 6, 2017: “New Chief of Staff Kelly Moves Quickly to Tame Trump’s Tweets.” (How did thatworkout?)
It was all a bunch of nonsense from lazy reporters and commentators who should have known better. Kelly, lest we forget, arrived at the White House from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), where he had quickly and proudly built a reputation “as one of the most aggressive enforcers of immigration law in recent American history,” to quote from a scathing evaluation of his six-month tenure in charge of DHS by the New Yorker’s Jonathan Blitzer. On Kelly’s watch, wrote Blitzer, “immigration arrests in the U.S. increased by forty per cent and DHS became one of the few branches of the federal government that has been both willing and able to execute Trump’s policy priorities.”
In March 2017, while defending Trump’s ‘Muslim ban’, Kelly had threatened to walk out of a meeting with Arab-American and Latino groups in Michigan. In April 2017, in a speech in Washington D.C., the DHS Secretary had told members of Congress to either change the country’s immigration laws or “shut up and support the men and women on the front lines.” In May 2017, at a Coast Guard ceremony, the retired general was caught on a hot mic telling Trump, who was holding a ceremonial sword, that he should “use that on the press, sir.”
***
So why did anyone with functioning eyes or ears assume he would do anything different at the White House? Why did political and media elites pretend he would be a sober and moderate figure, a check or restraint on the president, rather than Trump’s nasty and brutish mini-me?
How else are we supposed to describe his gaffe-laden, controversy-filled 17 months in charge? This was a chief of staff who told Fox News that “the lack of the ability to compromise led to the Civil War,” while praising the pro-slavery Confederate general Robert E. Lee as an “honorable man”; who protected and promoted White House staff secretary Rob Porter — a man accused of domestic abuse by both of his ex-wives — and described him as a man of “true integrity and honor, and I can’t say enough good things about him”; who repeatedly misled the press about what he knew about Porter and when he knew it, which led to one of his White House colleagues calling him a “big fat liar”; who claimed the “vast majority” of undocumented immigrants “don’t integrate well” and “don’t have skills”; who described immigrants who were eligible for DACA but had failed to apply for it as “too lazy to get off their asses”; who said he wanted to reduce the number of refugees admitted into the United States to “between zero and one”; who defended the separation of migrant children from their parents on the grounds that the kids would be “put into foster care or whatever” and bragged that the “big name of the game is deterrence”; who signed a “Cabinet order” authorizing the (potentially illegal) use of lethal force by troops at the border; who lamented that women were no longer treated as “sacred and looked upon with great honor” but who was also accused of suggesting women were more emotional than men; who breached security protocols by firing White House aide Omarosa Manigault in the Situation Room and threatening her in the process; who boasted to Manigault on a secret recording that everyone in the White House “works for me and not the president”; who made a series of falseaccusations against black member of Congress, Frederica Wilson, and then swore he would “never apologize” for lying about her; and who shamelessly allowed Trump to use his dead son to attack former President Barack Obama.
Yes, he was quoted calling the president “an idiot” multiple times, according to NBC News; yes, he was quoted by journalist Bob Woodward describing the Trump White House as “Crazytown”; yes, he publicly undermined the president by suggesting Trump had “evolved” on the issue of a border wall (spoiler alert: Trump hadn’t). So, yes, not unsurprisingly, all of this annoyed and upset Kelly’s thin-skinned master in the Oval Office, who — with the encouragement of his daughter — finally gave the retired general the big heave-ho over the weekend.
But let’s be clear: Kelly was never a “great guy”; never the “adult in the room.” He was a bully, a bigot and a liar; as racist and reactionary as his soon-to-be former boss. He was an enabler of Trump’s worst crimes and abuses — from the “unconstitutional” appointment of his crony Matthew Whitaker as acting attorney general, to the abduction of children at the U.S.-Mexico border, to the fake furor over the migrant “caravan.”
The truth is that this once-distinguished military man should never have been appointed to the top political job in the White House — and deserves to have been fired from it long ago.
FOCUS: Trump 2020 Shaping Up to Be a Campaign to Stay Out of Prison
Written by <a href="index.php?option=com_comprofiler&task=userProfile&user=38755"><span class="small">Eric Levitz, New York Magazine</span></a>
Sunday, 09 December 2018 11:52
Levitz writes: "In 2016, Donald Trump claimed that America's presidential election would determine nothing less than whether a proven criminal would be sent to jail - or the Oval Office. In 2020, that might actually be the case."
Paul Manafort and Michael Cohen. (photo: Lauren Joseph/Wired)
Trump 2020 Shaping Up to Be a Campaign to Stay Out of Prison
By Eric Levitz, New York Magazine
09 December 18
n 2016, Donald Trump claimed that America’s presidential election would determine nothing less than whether a proven criminal would be sent to jail — or the Oval Office. In 2020, that might actually be the case.
On Friday, federal prosecutors released a sentencing recommendation for Trump’s longtime lawyer Michael Cohen — and, in so doing, implicated the president in a federal crime, and suggested that he might well be implicated in several more.
In August, Cohen pleaded guilty to multiple campaign-finance violations, saying that he had been involved in an illicit scheme to aid Donald Trump’s presidential campaign by providing hush payments to two of the GOP nominee’s alleged ex-lovers in fall 2016 (such hush payments would have constituted undisclosed, illegally large “in-kind” contributions to the Trump campaign). Cohen also claimed that Trump had been the mastermind behind said illicit scheme.
In the sentencing memo Friday, prosecutors formally endorsed Cohen’s story, writing, “Cohen himself has now admitted, with respect to both payments, he acted in coordination with and at the direction of Individual-1” — a.k.a. the president.
Thus, it’s quite plausible that the only reason Donald Trump has not been indicted on federal charges is because he is the president. The conventional wisdom among legal scholars holds that the commander-in-chief cannot be indicted so long as he or she remains in office. That means that if Trump loses in 2020, he could promptly find himself in legal jeopardy. If he wins, he could forever escape all legal liability for his part in Cohen’s crimes — the statute of limitations on a campaign-finance violation committed in 2016 would likely expire in 2022.
Granted, even if Trump were a private citizen, convicting him of violating campaign-finance law would be difficult, as prosecutors would have to prove that the mogul intended the hush-money payments to benefit him politically (as opposed to just maritally). But there is some reason to think that prosecutors have evidence that speaks to Trump’s intent. And it appears more likely than not that prosecutors will implicate “Individual-1” in additional crimes. As Barry Berke, Noah Bookbinder, and Norman Eisen explain in the New York Times:
The special counsel focuses [in his sentencing memo] on Mr. Cohen’s contacts with people connected to the White House in 2017 and 2018, possibly further implicating the president and others in his orbit in conspiracy to obstruct justice or to suborn perjury. Mr. Mueller specifically mentions that Mr. Cohen provided invaluable insight into the “preparing and circulating” of his testimony to Congress — and if others, including the president, knew about the false testimony or encouraged it in any way, they would be at substantial legal risk.
Mr. Trump’s legal woes do not end there. The special counsel also advanced the president’s potential exposure under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act for activities relating to a potential Trump Tower Moscow. Mr. Mueller noted that the Moscow project was a lucrative business opportunity that actively sought Russian government approval, and that the unnamed Russian told Mr. Cohen that there was “no bigger warranty in any project than the consent” of Mr. Putin.
And this says nothing of the new evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian government that’s sprinkled throughout Mueller’s memo. These lines of inquiry may not bear prosecutable fruit, but Cohen’s conviction alone should be sufficient for putting the fear of a post-presidential indictment into Trump.
It is true that the president could still be impeached instead of indicted. But even if Mueller’s investigation ultimately links the president to more crimes — and demonstrates that his 2016 campaign had illicit ties to Russia — it is hard to imagine a critical mass of Republican senators voting to remove Trump from office. There aren’t many things that this president has done with diligence and discipline, but delegitimizing the Mueller probe in the eyes of his base is one. And given how many blatant abuses of power that base has already witnessed — and how unwavering the Trumpen proletariat’s support for their dear leader has been through it all — it’s hard to see the president’s approval rating dropping to Nixonian levels, no matter what Mueller’s “WITCH HUNT” yields.
All of which is to say: There is a significant chance that in 2020, Donald Trump will be running for a second-term — and from the law — simultaneously. And if that proves to be the case, the consequences for American political life could be dire.
For Trump, the costs of losing the 2016 election were largely superficial — by most accounts, the original aim of the reality television star’s campaign was publicity, not the presidency. And yet, the mere threat of narcissistic injury was enough to inspire Trump to sow distrust in the legitimacy of the election. In July 2016, the GOP nominee told a crowd in Pennsylvania that “the only way we can lose, in my opinion … is if cheating goes on.” One month later, he told supporters in North Carolina that if the state’s voter-ID law remained suspended, Clinton voters would go to the polls “15 times” each. Shortly thereafter, Trump’s first general-election ad hit the airwaves — this was its opening image:
Trump never stopped disputing the integrity of the election, even after he had won. Instead, the president-elect claimed, repeatedly, that millions of illegal ballots had robbed him of his rightful popular vote victory.
In this year’s elections, Trump had far less at stake. He wasn’t on the ballot himself, and a Democratic takeover of the House was already close to a foregone conclusion by midsummer. And yet, to boost his party’s 2018 prospects, the president proved willing to fabricate an impending “invasion” by migrant terrorists and gangsters; suggest that said invasion was being organized by the Democratic Party as part of an elaborate bid to steal the midterm elections; persist in fomenting such incendiary conspiracy theories even after they inspired one of his supporters to attempt the assassination of many leading Democrats; and deploy thousands of U.S. troops to the southern border, so as to give his big lie an extra measure of credibility.
Even before Mueller’s latest revelations, this behavior was sufficient to prompt widespread anxiety about what Trump would be willing to do to win reelection, and/or what he might incite “Second Amendment people” to do should he lose it. If the president’s personal freedom ends up on the ballot in 2020, a lot of worse-case-scenarios become more plausible.
Some progressives have worried that Trump might actually be able to turn the threat of a postelection indictment into a source of electoral strength. The idea being: If the sitting president can (somewhat credibly) campaign against a deep-state plot to “lock him up,” then the Democratic nominee will struggle to focus attention on Trump’s policy failures and substantive betrayals of working people, where he is arguably most vulnerable. But that particular fear seems unfounded. Trump’s myriad scandals haven’t alienated the GOP base, but they appear to have damaged him with just about everyone else. And anyhow, there are plenty of ways to insert policy arguments into a campaign dominated by an incumbent’s corruption scandals (simply pointing out the president appears too consumed by his own problems to worry about yours could suffice).
Should the Mueller probe continue to implicate the president in unsavory and illegal activities, the Democratic Party’s 2020 prospects will improve; but America’s prospects of averting a democratic crisis and/or heightened levels of political violence won’t.
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he Mueller sentencing document for Michael Cohen, Trump’s former personal attorney and fixer, is not nearly as important as that from the office of the 
ichard Nicoletti is not a murderer.
n a recent Saturday afternoon, in an estuary near Tampa Bay, Florida, I watched airboats move up and down the river banks, spraying massive plumes of weedkiller on to the vegetation. The state of Florida was trying to control and kill off scores of plant species. Nearby, children were lying out in the sun, though they knew better than to swim in the water, which has recently been blooming with toxic algae. Mists of weedkiller drifted downwind toward them.
oodbye, John Kelly.
n 2016, Donald Trump claimed that America’s presidential election would 
