You get 'em Patty!!! I kind of LOVE this…
This article is somewhat confusing when it says, “public pension funds in several states had paid millions to an investment fund that owns a Trump hotel.” Firstly, I presume that by “paid millions to an investment fund”, the writer means to say that the pension funds bought shares in the investment fund. Secondly, if the pension fund owns the hotel, does Trump also own it or did he sell it to the fund? If he sold the hotel to the fund, Trump doesn’t benefit from these payments unless he’s a principal in the pension fund, and the article doesn’t say one way or the other. If a writer is going to imply that Trump is violating the emoluments clause, she needs to be more precise.
That’s not hard law. Its a legal theory. This was raised to SCOTUS during the Nixon times, but he resigned before they issued a ruling.
During Clinton’s time, the issue of a sitting President being the defendant in a civil trial was raised and it was ruled he can, thus opening the door to the “President is not above the law” theory even more.
The concern for the theory you are stating, is that detaining a President would interfere with his ability to do his Constitutional duty. And that is a compelling argument from a Constitutional standpoint. However, there is nothing preventing the President from resigning or invoking the 25th Amendment upon himself. So even with that theory, its possible that the SCOTUS would decide “you have options” and tell him to take one of those paths and let a criminal indictment proceed.
The second theory is highly suspect. The President is Commander in Chief, yes, but he is not active duty and is not subject to military law or rules of conduct…ie, he can’t be court martialed for example because obviously no military tribunal could remove him from his position, nor can the promote someone to refill it. Indeed, this theory flies in the face of the entire reason that the CiC IS a civilian, to prevent a military coup. If you made the President subject to military law and rules of conduct, you are actively encouraging the military to launch a coup.
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False.
The Commander-In-Chief is the civilian head of the US military. Under no circumstances whatsoever can he be referred to as active-duty military.
That’s why Presidents are not supposed to salute military—Reagan started doing it because he liked the Hollywood theatricality of the action, and other presidents have unfortunately followed suit.
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This ethics angle is a one-sided battle. Its like going after him for being physically unfit or mentally incompetent.
If whomsoever it is that is responsible for such violations cared about any of this in the first place, then not a single Trumpp family member nor Kushner would ever have been allowed into the jobs that they now hold.
The whole game that they are playing is a sham and a slap to collective America’s face.
If ethics really meant something, I think that the whole cabal would’ve already melted and washed away.
In the end, it will be the money/greed/RICO related stuff that will nail Donnie and the Desperados.
Wasn’t this yet another thing that was predicted when Trump ran for the office and yet he shrugged it off as did his loving and blind supporters? He has so many financial tentacles and many of them are unethical if not illegal. Who will investigate this since he basically controls the Justice Department with his enabler Sessions? We are screwed unless the Congress and the Office of Ethics get after these things.
Trump and his people just keep finding ways to screw the American people. Now he’s reaching into the cities, small towns, communities to take more. Everything, everything has a dollar sign. Is there nothing sacred? Or safe? Or just off limits?
I dare Republicans to vote no on that. I can see the political ad already.
So in addition to the emoluments problem he then has a fresh violation of a felony statute. That helps.
As a person who is going to retire on a teacher retirement plan, it gives me chills to think that any public pension fund has invested in anything that is even distantly connected to that man. Does anyone think that he would hesitate for even a minute before doing something underhanded that bankrupted a pension fund and allowed him to profit by $1.32? He would do it in a heartbeat.
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But there’s lots of talk about the foreign emoluments clause, and about investigations of Trump’s campaign, and other things that Republicans would rather not discuss.
CIM may face prudent investor suits from pension stakeholders for investment in Soho. May drag Trump Org into it