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  1. #51
    Thailand Expat Saint Willy's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by HuangLao View Post
    well into next year.
    Nexxt 4 years.

    +

  2. #52
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    Quote Originally Posted by TheRealKW View Post
    Nexxt 4 years.
    Hopefully he croaks before that.

  3. #53
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by bsnub View Post
    Hopefully he croaks before that.
    Hopefully he croaks in prison.

    Otherwise let him wreck the Republican presidential election again.

  4. #54
    Thailand Expat helge's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by HuangLao View Post
    Expect this loon to be front and centre spotlight for some time to come.
    Nothing short of silly and insane distractions.
    Comes in handy for the other side of the aisle.

    Makes them look like grown ups


    And:

  5. #55
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    From the Seattle Times.....

    NEW YORK – A state judge dealt a loss to the Trump Organization on Tuesday, ordering the president’s company to turn over records related to a property that is the subject of a civil investigation by the New York attorney general’s office.

    “We will immediately move to ensure that the Trump Organization complies with the court’s order and submits records related to our investigation,” Attorney General Letitia James, a Democrat, said in a statement after the ruling.
    The documents and communications at issue could help investigators answer questions about a conservation easement that was granted several years ago at the Seven Springs estate in suburban New York’s Westchester County, a move that netted President Donald Trump’s company a $21 million tax deduction. The materials, which Trump’s lawyers had sought to shield, include messages exchanged between an engineer and a land-use lawyer who worked on Trump’s behalf.
    The company’s lawyers argued unsuccessfully that those records were covered by attorney-client privilege. The Trump Organization was ordered to provide the documents by Friday, though New York Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron said he would consider an extension.
    Trump has been accused of inflating the value of assets to get favorable loan rates and undercutting property values for tax benefits. James’s wide-ranging investigation is scrutinizing the Trump Organization’s dealings involving various properties, and whether the company lied to banks and regulators for financial gain.
    Representatives for Trump’s business organization have said it operates aboveboard and follows all applicable laws. They have dismissed James’s investigation as politically motivated.
    You Make Your Own Luck

  6. #56
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by thailazer View Post
    The company’s lawyers argued unsuccessfully that those records were covered by attorney-client privilege.
    "The crime-fraud exception can render the privilege moot when communications between an attorney and client are themselves used to further a crime, tort, or fraud. In Clark v. United States, the U.S. Supreme Court stated that "A client who consults an attorney for advice that will serve him in the commission of a fraud will have no help from the law. He must let the truth be told".

  7. #57
    Thailand Expat misskit's Avatar
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    President Trump’s Post-Election Conduct and ‘Threats’ Violated the Ku Klux Klan Act, Civil Rights Groups Allege

    Outgoing President Donald Trump’s post-election campaign of “intimidation and coercion of election officials and volunteers” targets Black voters in violation of the Ku Klux Klan Act of the early Jim Crow era, civil right groups claim in a new complaint.


    Joining a lawsuit originally brought by the Detroit-based Michigan Welfare Rights Organization last month, the NAACP and three Black voters from the Motor City — Maureen Taylor, Nicole L. Hill and Teasha K. Jones — likened Trump and his campaign’s tactics to those of the white supremacist group. The original complaint only went so far as to accuse Trump of violating the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

    Republican National Committee, whose counsel did not immediately return an email requesting comment, also has been added as a defendant.


    “Under the specter of preventing ‘fraud,’ defendants engaged in a conspiracy, executed through a coordinated effort, to disenfranchise voters by disrupting vote counting efforts, lodging groundless challenges during recounts, and attempting to block certification of election results through intimidation and coercion of election officials and volunteers,” their new complaint filed late on Monday states. “These systematic efforts – violations of the [Voting Rights Act] and the Ku Klux Klan Act – have largely been directed at major metropolitan areas with large Black voter populations. These include Detroit, Milwaukee, Atlanta, Philadelphia, and others. Defendants have not directed these efforts at predominantly white areas.”


    In 1871, Congress passed the Ku Klux Klan Act aimed to clamp down on attempts to terrorize and disenfranchise formerly enslaved people. The then-nascent Klan engaged in open threats, economic coercion, and physical violence to prevent free Black people from participating in the nation’s electoral process.


    Trump’s efforts for discredit the 2020 election has also featured threats of violence, the rights groups note.


    MORE President Trump Accused of Violating Ku Klux Klan Act | Law & Crime

  8. #58
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    How real is the threat of prosecution for Donald Trump post-presidency?

    At noon on 20 January, presuming he doesn’t have to be dragged out of the White House as a trespasser, Donald Trump will make one last walk across the South Lawn, take his seat inside Marine One, and be gone.

    From that moment, Trump’s rambunctious term as president of the United States will be over. But in one important aspect, the challenge presented by his presidency will have only just begun: the possibility that he will face prosecution for crimes committed before he took office or while in the Oval Office.

    “You’ve never had a president before who has invited so much scrutiny,” said Bob Bauer, White House counsel under Barack Obama. “This has been a very eventful presidency that raises hard questions about what happens when Trump leaves office.”

    For the past four years Trump has been shielded from legal jeopardy by a justice department memo that rules out criminal prosecution of a sitting president. But the second he boards that presidential helicopter and fades into the horizon, all bets are off.

    The Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus Vance, is actively investigating Trump’s business dealings. The focus described in court documents is “extensive and protracted criminal conduct at the Trump Organization” including possible bank fraud.

    A second major investigation by the fearsome federal prosecutors of the southern district of New York has already led to the conviction of Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen. He pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations relating to the “hush money” paid to Stormy Daniels, the adult film actor who alleged an affair with Trump during the 2016 presidential campaign.

    During the course of the prosecution, Cohen implicated a certain “Individual 1” – Trump – as the mastermind behind the felony. Though the investigation was technically closed last year, charges could be revisited once Trump’s effective immunity is lifted.

    It all points to a momentous and fiendishly difficult legal challenge, fraught with political danger for the incoming Biden administration. Should Trump be investigated and possibly prosecuted for crimes committed before and during his presidency?

    “It looks like the incoming administration will have to confront some form of these issues,” said Bauer, who is co-author of After Trump: Reconstructing the Presidency. “The government is going to have decisions to make about how to respond, given the potential that it becomes a source of division.”

    Any attempt to hold Trump criminally liable in a federal prosecution would be a first in US history. No exiting president has ever been pursued in such a way by his successor (Richard Nixon was spared the ordeal by Gerald Ford’s contentious presidential pardon).

    Previous presidents have tended to take the view that it is better to look forwards in the name of national healing than backwards at the failings of their predecessor. And for good reasons – any prosecution would probably be long and difficult, act as a huge distraction, and expose the incoming president to accusations that they were acting like a tinpot dictator hounding their political enemy.

    That a possible Trump prosecution is being discussed at all is a sign of the exceptional nature of the past four years. Those who argue in favor of legal action accept that there are powerful objections to going after Trump but urge people to think about the alternative – the dangers of inaction.

    “If you do nothing you are saying that though the president of the United States is not above the law, in fact he is. And that would set a terrible precedent for the country and send a message to any future president that there is no effective check on their power,” said Andrew Weissmann, who was a lead prosecutor in the Mueller investigation looking into coordination between Russia and Trump’s 2016 campaign.

    As head of one of the three main teams answering to the special counsel Robert Mueller, Weissmann had a ringside seat on what he calls Trump’s “lawless White House”. In his new book, Where Law Ends, he argues that the prevailing view of the 45th president is that “following the rules is optional and that breaking them comes at minimal, if not zero, cost”.

    Weissmann told the Guardian that there would be a price to be paid if that attitude went unchallenged once Trump leaves office. “One of the things we learnt from this presidency was that our system of checks and balances is not as strong as we thought, and that would be exacerbated by not holding him to account.”

    Bauer, who was an adviser to Biden during the presidential campaign but has no role in the transition team, is also worried that a sort of double immunity would be established. Presidents cannot be prosecuted while in office under justice department rules, but under such a double immunity nor could they be prosecuted once leaving the White House in the interests of “national healing”.

    “And so the president is immune coming and going, and I think that would be very difficult to square with the idea that he or she is not above the law.”

    Biden has made clear his lack of enthusiasm for prosecuting Trump, saying it would be “probably not very good for democracy”. But he has also made clear that he would leave the decision to his appointed attorney general, following the norm of justice department independence that Trump has repeatedly shattered.

    Other prominent Democrats have taken a more bullish position, adding pressure on the incoming attorney general to be aggressive. During the Democratic primary debates, Elizabeth Warren called for an independent taskforce to be set up to investigate any Trump corruption or other criminal acts in office.

    Kamala Harris also took a stance that may come to haunt the new administration. The vice president-elect, asked by NPR last year whether she would want to see charges brought by the Department of Justice, replied: “I believe that they would have no choice and that they should, yes.”

    There are several possible ways in which the justice department could be forced to confront the issue of whether or not to take on Trump. One would be through a revelation as yet unknown, following the emergence of new information.

    Weissmann points out that the Biden administration will have access to a wealth of documents that were previously withheld from Congress during the impeachment inquiry, including intelligence agency and state department files. Official communications sent by Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump through their personal emails and messaging apps – an ironic move given the flak Hillary Clinton endured from the Trump family in 2016 for using her personal email server – may also become available for scrutiny.

    But the two most likely avenues for the pursuit of any criminal investigation would relate to Trump’s use of his presidential pardon power and alleged obstruction of justice. “Trump issued a series of pardons largely characterized by political self-interest,” Weissmann said.

    Though the presidential pardon power is extensive, it is not, as Trump has claimed, absolute – including the “absolute right” to pardon himself. He is not immune from bribery charges if he were found to have offered somebody a pardon in exchange for their silence in a judicial case.

    For Weissmann, the way Trump continually teased his associates – including Roger Stone and Paul Manafort – with the promise of pardons in the middle of federal prosecutions was especially egregious. “There may be a legitimate reason to give somebody a pardon, but what’s the legitimate reason for dangling a pardon other than to thwart that person from cooperating with the government?”

    Perhaps the most solid evidence of criminal wrongdoing compiled against Trump concerns obstruction of justice. John Bolton, the former national security adviser, went so far as to say that for Trump, obstruction of justice to further his own political interests was a “way of life”.

    In his final report on the Russia investigation, Mueller laid out 10 examples of Trump’s behavior that could be legally construed as obstruction. Though Mueller declined to say whether they met the standard for charges – the US attorney general, Bill Barr, suggested they did not, but gave no explanation for his thinking – he did leave them in plain sight for any future federal prosecutor to revisit.

    In one of the starkest of those incidents, Trump tried to scupper the special counsel inquiry itself by ordering his White House counsel, Don McGahn, to fire Mueller. When that became public he compounded the abuse by ordering McGahn to deny the truth in an attempt at cover-up.

    Weissmann, who played a key role in gathering the evidence against Trump in the Mueller report, said that such obstruction goes to the heart of why Trump should face prosecution.

    “When the president, no matter who it is, obstructs a special counsel investigation there have to be consequences. If you can obstruct an investigation criminally, but you don’t have to worry about ever being prosecuted, well then, there’s no point in ever appointing a special counsel.”

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...ost-presidency

  9. #59
    Guest Member S Landreth's Avatar
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    Manhattan DA brings in forensic accounting specialists for Trump probe

    The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office has brought in forensic accounting specialists to assist its criminal investigation into President Trump and his businesses, The Washington Post reported Tuesday.

    People familiar with the matter confirmed the plans to the Post. One source with knowledge of the investigation said that District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. has hired FTI Consulting to investigate property deals and to advise Vance on whether the Trump Organization altered the value of certain assets in order to get tax breaks and better interest rates.

    The probe, which first began in 2018 to look into alleged hush-money payments given to two women who claimed to have had affairs with Trump, has now expanded to include potential wrongdoings by Trump’s larger businesses activities, the Post reported.

    The sources spoke to the news outlet on the condition of anonymity because the investigation, which is believed to encompass several years of activities, is highly sensitive.

    Spokespeople for both Vance and FTI Consulting declined to comment when contacted by the Post, and Trump Organization representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

    Trump and company officials have repeatedly condemned the district attorney’s investigation, claiming that it is a “witch hunt” that is politically motivated.

    According to an FTI corporate brochure, the company provides “the industry's most complete range of forensic, investigative, data analytic and litigation services,” and has “extensive experience serving leading corporations, governments and law firms around the globe.”

    This comes as Vance and Trump's lawyers have been fighting in court over prosecutors' subpoena to Trump's accounting firm, Mazars USA, for the president's personal and business tax returns. A federal appeals court ruled in October that Trump cannot block enforcement of the subpoena, after which Trump's lawyers filed a motion to stay with the Supreme Court that has yet to be decided.

    The district attorney's office has indicated in court filings that it is investigating potentially extensive criminal conduct at the Trump Organization. Prosecutors have suggested that Trump and his businesses could be investigated for tax and insurance fraud.

    Earlier this month, The New York Times reported that the district attorney’s office had interviewed employees of Deutsche Bank and insurance brokerage Aon in connection with the investigation into Trump.

    The newspaper also reported that Trump has discussed with advisers whether to issue preemptive pardons to his children. The president has also claimed he can pardon himself, though it is unclear whether he has the legal authority to do so.

    Additionally, Trump's pardon power only applies to federal crimes, and not state crimes.: Manhattan DA brings in forensic accounting specialists for Trump probe: report | TheHill

    I do hope the people who will be serving the multitude of subpoenas to the crime family will be wearing body cams.
    Keep your friends close and your enemies closer.

  10. #60
    Thailand Expat Saint Willy's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by S Landreth View Post
    The sources spoke to the news outlet on the condition of anonymity because the investigation, which is believed to encompass several years of activities, is highly sensitive.
    So why the heck speak up now??? Wait till Jan 20

  11. #61
    Thailand Expat raycarey's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by S Landreth View Post
    Manhattan DA brings in forensic accounting specialists for Trump probe
    i've read this is a somewhat unusual move by the DA's office....they have people on the payroll who do this job quite well.....the reason for it is because trump is going to continue to claim that it's a personal and/or partisan attack.

    DA vance is getting out in front of that by hiring the reputable firm which worked on the bernie madoff case and lehman bros. bankruptcy...FTI Consulting....and apparently they specialize in valuation.

    one of the allegations against trump is that he increased the value of his properties on loan applications to get lower interest rates.....and decreased the value on his tax forms for deductions.....both of which are crimes.

    he's in deep shit...and he knows it.

    tax fraud barbie is probably also sweating.

  12. #62
    Thailand Expat Saint Willy's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by raycarey View Post
    he's in deep shit...and he knows it.
    Completely self inflected so not an iota of sympathy. They only surprise is why it took so long.

  13. #63
    Guest Member S Landreth's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by raycarey View Post
    one of the allegations against trump is that he increased the value of his properties on loan applications to get lower interest rates.....and decreased the value on his tax forms for deductions.....both of which are crimes.

    he's in deep shit...and he knows it.
    Hefty fines, maybe prison time, attorney’s fees, pardon proof and constantly on his mind.

    Hope they’ll drag it out for a couple years.

    Should look good on his résumé when he runs again in 2024

  14. #64
    Guest Member S Landreth's Avatar
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    Impeached again…

    President Trump directly asked Georgia's top elections officials to overturn his defeat to President-elect Joe Biden in the state during a Saturday phone call, according to audio posted Sunday by The Washington Post.

    During the conversation, the president repeatedly asked Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) to "find" more than 11,000 ballots he would need to overcome a gap between him and Biden in the state, thereby flipping the state in his favor.

    “You have a big election coming up and because of what you’ve done to the president...you know, the people of Georgia know that this was a scam. Because of what you’ve done to the president, a lot of people aren’t going out to vote, and a lot of Republicans are going to vote negative, because they hate what you did to the president," the president told Raffensperger, before adding that the Republican official would be "respected, really respected, if this can be straightened out before the election.”

    The audio is the first actual evidence of the president's attempts to directly pressure a state official to overturn the results of the 2020 election, though he has called for Georgia officials including Gov. Brian Kemp (R) to call a special legislative session for the purpose of overturning the state's results on Twitter in recent weeks. He has also publicly called for Kemp to resign.

    So little time: Trump asked Georgia secretary of state to 'find' 11.7k ballots, 'recalculate' election result | TheHill

    edit below.

    • The loser knows how serious this is.......


    David Shafer - President @realDonaldTrump has filed two lawsuits - federal and state – against @GaSecofState. The telephone conference call @GaSecofState secretly recorded was a “confidential settlement discussion” of that litigation, which is still pending.: https://twitter.com/DavidShafer/stat...68002026205184

    2nd edit

    Be smart: The fact that someone taped a conversation between a secretary of state and the president of the United States, both from the same political party, speaks to the mistrust and legal fears that have followed Trump’s frantic efforts to overturn the results.




    https://www.axios.com/trump-georgia-...e3fe6ebbc.html

    Last edited by S Landreth; 04-01-2021 at 01:39 PM.

  15. #65
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    Maybe trump will be getting an invitation to talk with the fine law enforcement officials in Georgia soon. Do you supposed Florida will allow extradition from Trump-A-Lago after Jan 20?

  16. #66
    I'm in Jail

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    Wow you all really think Trump we be charged.

    If he was jeez imagine the shit the USA would find itself in,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

  17. #67
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    Quote Originally Posted by Chico View Post
    Wow
    Yea

    Quote Originally Posted by Chico View Post
    If he was jeez imagine the shit the USA would find itself in,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
    Jeez, imagine if he wasn't . . . imagine. ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

    Quote Originally Posted by Chico View Post
    Wow
    Yea

  18. #68
    I'm in Jail

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    ^ sad stalker

  19. #69
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    Quote Originally Posted by Chico View Post
    ^ sad stalker
    . . . just
    Quote Originally Posted by Chico View Post
    Wow

  20. #70
    Guest Member S Landreth's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Topper View Post
    Do you supposed Florida will allow extradition from Trump-A-Lago after Jan 20?
    I do believe Florida does have an extradition treaty with all of its neighbors. Georgia being one of them.

    Marc E. Elias – I am certain his criminal defense lawyers will tell him not to go to the Georgia rally tomorrow night.

    Michael R. Bromwich (former DOJ IG; Asst US Attorney, SDNY) - Unless there are portions of the tape that somehow negate criminal intent, "I just want to find 11,780 votes" and his threats against Raffensperger and his counsel violate 52 U.S. Code § 20511. His best defense would be insanity.: https://twitter.com/marceelias/statu...92532350283776

  21. #71
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    ^that would be fun. State officials trying to arrest a sitting president in front of the secret service. Oh my.

  22. #72
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by nidhogg View Post
    ^that would be fun. State officials trying to arrest a sitting president in front of the secret service. Oh my.
    Nah, they've only got to wait a couple of weeks.
    Last edited by harrybarracuda; 05-01-2021 at 12:39 AM.

  23. #73
    กงเกวียนกำเกวียน HuangLao's Avatar
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    That might present quite the dilemma and complexities for the Secret Service attachment that is assigned [5 year mandate] to an outgoing Prez/VP.
    Are they authorized to protect and serve the kunt - technically, being federal Treasury Agents - and therefore over ride any possibility of actually being arrested by any such local or federal law enforcement?

    Don't believe these types of scenarios have ever been tested as applying to former Presidents.
    Yet, most Presidents haven't been viewed as being insane.....and certainly a different story with this guy.

    Quite perplexing.

  24. #74
    Thailand Expat harrybarracuda's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by HuangLao View Post
    technically, being federal Treasury Agents

    Quite perplexing.
    What's perplexing is that you think the Secret Service still comes under Treasury.



    Added: Imagine if this bloke was the one to facilitate baldy orange loser's expulsion from the WH, or even better, his arrest!

    President-elect Joe Biden will nominate Cuban refugee Alejandro Mayorkas to be his Homeland Security secretary

  25. #75
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    From Heather Cox Richardson's daily brief regarding that call to Georgia:

    University of Georgia Law Professor Anthony Michael Kreis told Politico reporters Allie Bice, Kyle Cheney, Anita Kumar, and Zach Montellaro that it is against the law in Georgia for anyone to “solicit” or “request” election fraud. “There’s just no way that… he has not violated this law,” Kreis said. Michael R. Bromwich, former inspector gneral of the Department of Justice, tweeted that “unless there are portions of the tape that somehow negate criminal intent,” Trump’s “best defense would be insanity.”

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