Originally published at: Judge Orders Sanctions Against Blanche, Says Trump Tried to ‘Manipulate the Judicial Process’ With IRS Settlement
A judge has reached the same conclusion as many others about President Trump’s attempt to loot the Treasury to line the pockets of his supporters and political allies. Her findings were outlined in a scathing new decision Monday. U.S. District Judge Kathleen Williams — an Obama appointee in Miami — voided Trump’s settlement agreement with…
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Sanctions Against Blanche**
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Would that the committee would take this into account while they consider him for an appointment as AG for the nation. They won’t. They’ll tap dance around everything this guy has done and approve him to the full Senate for confirmation.
This is almost a fait accompli.
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So when Turd Blanche appears for his confirmation hearing, are the R senators going to treat this business like it is news to them (I know Speaker Tiny Johnson would, but he doesn’t get to put his beak in)?
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I’m confused. The NYT reports, “The decision by Judge Williams, who sits in Federal District Court in Miami, did not explicitly kill the deal that Mr. Trump had worked out with his own government to receive what amounted to amnesty from I.R.S. investigations.” This story says she “voided” it. Did she kill it or didn’t she?
Not just this suit, but the entire Trump regime, is dedicated to an “improper purpose”.
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I should let the lawyers weigh in, but I think when it became clear the case was a loser, the Dotard and his lawyer criminals tried to get the entire thing wiped clean so that the court would not probe his obvious malfeasance. Judge said not so fast, you lose but we’re not done here.
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If Blanche got disbarred. could he still become AG?
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When you void a check, that check is ‘killed’ and no longer good. From what I read from her 56 page decision, she killed everything in that so called ‘settlement’.
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My question as well. And.. how long before the bar makes their decision?
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There is no constitutional requirement that the AG be a lawyer. So in theory an AG could be a disbarred or ex-lawyer. He or she would have to have barred deputies do the work.
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"the credulous exercise of divorcing President Trump’s current job title from an understanding of what happened here”
You can’t. You can’t separate the person from the title.
That’s the whole point of giving the president complete license to break any law for any purpose and be completely immune from prosecution because the president always acts in the nation’s security interests. Always. Round the clock. Every day. Even on Twitter.
I expect Republicans will be eager to change that when we re-elect Joe Biden.
Blanche’s apparent capacity to speak for both Plaintiffs and Defendants
Blanche is not qualified to be AG. At least until we resolve the issue of his self-proclaimed capacity.
The apparent coming release of these documents…
Epstein who?
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When Trump did this in 2017 it was illegal. Guess what, it is still illegal. The Federal Land Policy and Management Act (FLPMA) requires an act of Congress to modify national monuments. This time, he wants to cut the size of Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante NMs by 90 percent.
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Manipulating the judicial process for his own personal gain… sounds like an impeachable offense to me.
This judge refers multiple attorneys to their state bars for sanctions, why not refer this case to congress (judicary committees) for possible impeachment?
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Did that decision also affect Trump and Sons’ full eternal amnesty from any IRS audit, ever again?
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I was wondering about that. Are National Monuments not fixed by law? They’re just like National Parks, set by Congress and signed into law by a real President.
This asshole can’t just rewrite laws by executive order, he isn’t a dictator, right?
Follow-up question. Does that mean an ex-lawyer AG could not sign court documents like indictments? Normally that wouldn’t be a problem, but hasn’t Blanche been the sole signature on controversial stuff where it seems no one else would sign?
If Trump is on both sides of this lawsuit, and Blanche ‘speaks for both sides’, who gets to appeal Judge Williams decision?
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It wasn’t illegal then and it isn’t now. It isn’t legal, either.
President Bill Clinton, a Democrat, established Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in 1996, and President Barack Obama, also a Democrat, created Bears Ears National Monument in 2016 under the Antiquities Act. The 1906 law gives presidents the powers to protect sites considered historic, archaeologically significant or culturally important.
The Antiquities Act does say powers to protect, so they can create but there is nothing explicitly or implicitly in the Act regarding reducing the size. The normal way to resolve such an issue would be for a lawsuit to end up in front of the Supreme Court. I think the odds are pretty much in his favor should that happen.
The mention that Mitch was dealing with pneumonia does not eliminate the possibility that he is also in a coma. Pneumonia is common for ventilated comatose patients. https://www.mdpi.com/2079-6382/15/6/622
Even more interesting is that Mitch McConnell could cement his reputation in American history as the Master of Running Out the Clock by dragging out Bashear’s opportunity for calling an election by August 3 while deceased or permanently incompetent. That’s a boss move, Mitch.
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The awl bidniss is a long-term game. Granting the superpower of market manipulation to the nation’s president carries a great risk that that executive tool would be abused. It was no coincidence that an Exxon CEO was Trump’s first secretary of state. In Trump 2.0, however, the market manipulation lever gets pulled weekly (often during the weekend) and sometimes more often than that. It also often gets put back in reset mode on Tuesdays (TACO). Almost all growth in domestic US oil production has come from the Permian basin in recent years. Exxon, which has a GDP larger than Norway’s, is the biggest player, followed by Chevron. You need an oil price of about $60 a barrel to make money in conventional oil production in the Permian. Last year, a lot of smaller companies faced hardship, particularly the non-conventional shale guys.. No fear, we have a president who can wiggle his lever.
Hooray! He wiggled his lever again this week. WTI back at $80 a barrel. Of course, rather than starting a war with Iran, we could have just given Exxon and Chevron, as well as all the other drillers in the Permian basin the $130 billion spent on a war to nowhere. But then defense contractors wouldn’t get a taste, so here we are. It seems like an incredibly narrow group of interests have sufficient political mojo to affect prices and ask for executive intervention. So what happens when nobody else is left capable of paying those prices? It’s time somebody locked down the president’s lever access.
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