Ex-Prosecutors Dismayed Biden DOJ Working To Defend Trump In Accuser’s Defamation Suit

The Biden administration filed a defense on Monday of ex-President Donald Trump’s claim that he was working in his official capacity as president when he smeared writer E. Jean Carroll, who has accused Trump of raping her. Trump claimed Carroll was lying, and said she wasn’t his “type,” in 2019.


This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1376684

Can you say “This is patent bullshit”? I knew you could.

The DOJ defending any goddamned thing for T**** is an abomination. And taxpayers are footing the fucking bill! So much for being rid of the scourge.

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Welp that trump comment doesn’t strike me as being in his “official capacity” as POTUS when he said it.
Is every off the cuff comment by that former office holder … “official”? Or is it just “offal”.

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Trump is in the Ex-President Club. Biden is going to quietly protect him whenever doing so doesn’t damage him politically to too great a degree. Because one day he’ll also be in the Ex-President Club.

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The thing about bad faith case filings is that it’s really hard to back down from them when your position gets shot to shit. As nice as it would have been for DOJ to just admit that the intervention was bullshit all along, they’re not really built for that as an institution. So the Second Circuit will just laugh at the appeal and Trump can go back to stiffing his own attorneys.

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I am not expecting Biden to be accused of rape.

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Biden didn’t have anything to do with this. It’s purely internal to DOJ, particularly the attorneys who put their names on the legal filings seeking to intervene on behalf of Trump and any other career people who approved that bad faith move. Having taken the bad faith position in the first place, you can’t really expect them to be all “My bad! Please sanction me for my frivolous case filing!”

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I guess I don’t understand why this DoJ can’t just say, look, we don’t agree with the position of the DoJ under its former leaders, therefore we can’t defend this. Why is that so hard to say? I would hate to think they’re going to defend all or most of Barr’s grotesque positions using inverted logic because they want to defend the institution at all costs.

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Because Caucasian men in power or formerly in power must be protected from penalties for past bad behavior. It’s a centuries old tradition.

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Unfortunately, you’re not wrong about that, but frankly, I expected a helluva lot more from Garland. I’m hoping I’m not seeing the full picture, otherwise, deeply disappointed.

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Some people have some opinions. Story at 11.

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Garland is the same race and gender of the scofflaw that’s getting free legal representation for an alleged sex crime, at the expense of the taxpayers.

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Because the institution is built around the fallacy that it is impartially serving the American people and the interests of justice. It is exceedingly rare for an incoming administration to change positions in pre-existing litigation, and there is little reason for it to do so here because the appeal is doomed anyway. Indeed, it will be refreshing and clarifying when the Second Circuit issues its opinion holding that the federal government cannot substitute itself for the president when he’s being sued in his individual capacity. Don’t think for a moment that President Ted Cruz would hold back from trying that shit.

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When it inevitably lands at SCOTUS on appeal, will they take the case, and if they do will they rule for the DOJ?

Highly unlikely SCOTUS would grant review, and I doubt that DOJ would even attempt a cert. petition after the Second Circuit pours them out.

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That makes sense and is the kind of information I appreciate, as a layman, but, man, I wish they could just say, oops, my bad. I get the law doesn’t seem to allow for that.

Because the institution is built around the fallacy that it is impartially serving the American people and the interests of justice.

You really burst my bubble with that one. The Department of Justice is not about justice.

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So the DOJ isn’t continuing the defense as a carry over from the last admin based on any hope of success, to the degree they’ll fight for that right to the last venue possible. They’ll bail once any court offers the least bit of push back, providing them the excuse to throw in the towel. It’s not a defense based on an important principle, it’s just for show.

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Isn’t this exactly what the DOJ did when a similar case was brought against President Clinton? I mean, same thing, right? DOJ to the rescue of Slick Willy. Do I have this right or is that one initial in parenthesis after the POTUS’s name making a difference?

Cynical as the statement that this is because men in power must be protected is, it’s probably basically right in this case. The DoJ tends to exempt the president from a lot, legally speaking, and any president would probably be happy to have one more protection from being subject to the law that everyone else has to adhere to.

I don’t think we’ve had a president in recent memory who actually gave up some kind of executive power or privilege, despite sometimes saying they would during their campaign. This isn’t about protecting Trump, then, it’s about protecting the privileges of the office. And that sucks.

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It’s a reply on an appeal where the government’s opening brief was filed months ago, before Trump left office. That makes it functionally a zombie appeal left over from the previous administration, and everybody knows that and will undoubtedly treat it as such.

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