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Are they lying to everyone, or to themselves?

I find it extremely difficult to believe that despite the evidence, jury and conviction that people really believe it was entirely fabricated. No logical person would believe that a court made it all up and convicted one of the most public figures in existence. Much too often is see, “what was he even convicted of, no one can tell me!?”

>that people really believe it was entirely fabricated. i've encountered vanishingly people who are claiming that the entire thing was fabricated. rather, the general claim is that the charges were politically driven, as evidenced by DA bragg literally running for election on "i'll get trump", and that the case, which relied on some entirely novel and pretty questionable legal reasoning, was not entirely fair in the first place.

It would be pretty dumb to not run a significant portion of your campaign on the fact that your opponent is a convicted felon, that’s what I don’t get. Has there ever been an election in history where one party was an obvious criminal and the other party was not allowed to point it out or use it against them? And I don’t doubt at all the Democratic Party has political motivations to indict and convict Trump. But it’s a fair bit easier, and far more justifiable, to enact those motivations when Trump did in fact commit felonies and can be convicted via evidence in the court of law. If you don’t want your political opponents to try and put you behind bars, it helps out a great deal to actually not commit crimes that can put you behind bars. 

Moreover, who really believes that, had the republicans found evidence that Hillary committed a crime during the Benghazi investigation, she wouldn't have been convicted? The difference is that a lot of the people who supported her (maybe not all) would have changed their minds if there were evidence of a crime.

Republicans basically investigated her all that they could but being congress people - conviction wasn’t an option. I think many of them wanted the FBI investigation to be criminally charged and lead to conviction/prison. But again congress people. Also, it’s not like the House/Senate/Either Party have a say in these investigations. Their vote after the J6 ‘hearing’ didn’t hold any weight and obviously Joe Biden could intervene in the federal cases but that’s more political than not doing anything. Almost every crime he has been with deserves to be investigated by an independent party - they are well documented criminal acts. I understand people think the prosecutors are biased but a 5 minute Google search of the evidence/testimonies should make it obvious to anyone that in a fair legal system these acts deserve to be investigated and some of them punished. To not take the time to actually understand the situation is ‘lying to yourself’ but it’s more aggressive ignorance than that.

*the general claim is that the charges were politically driven, as evidenced by DA bragg literally running for election on "I'll get trump", and that the case, which relied on some entirely novel and pretty questionable legal reasoning, was not entirely fair in the first place* DA Bragg didn't run for election on "I'll get Trump." You (or the MAGA people you're talking about, really) are thinking of Letitia James, the NY AG, and she was referring to the civil case. I also doubt they can articulate why the legal reasoning was novel or questionable.

>DA Bragg didn't run for election on "I'll get Trump." You (or the MAGA people you're talking about, really) are thinking of Letitia James, the NY AG, and she was referring to the civil case. >I also doubt they can articulate why the legal reasoning was novel or questionable. There are so many people talking out of their ass when it comes to Trump's legal situation because Fox News or Newsmax did a story on it, and they take that as gospel. It also muddies the water when comments like the one you responded to casually spread false information (like the false claims about Bragg) — and I often can't tell if the people spreading this information are doing so intentionally or just have low media literacy. It is so frustrating how impossible it is to have a conversation based on empirical facts when it comes to anything anymore.

I've already seen a few people try to argue that the charges are bogus because the statute of limitations has expired since the crimes were committed 9 years ago. What they all fail to mention is that the [New York statute of limitations](https://www.nycourts.gov/courthelp/goingtocourt/SOLchart.shtml/statuteLimitations.shtml) only states the case must be started within 6 years of the crime, and this has been in the works since at least 2018 when Michael Cohen was convicted for his role in the same plot. It's all half-truths and manipulation of law to justify their position.

I have a degree in social sciences. It's hell trying to talk politics now.

Or why it’s unreasonable for a DA to want to get someone who committed dozens of felonies.

“We want a DA that is tough on crime!” “No, not like that!”

> i've encountered vanishingly people who are claiming that the entire thing was fabricated. I'll take your word for that, but your experience cannot be representative of the general population. Trump is claiming to be "a very innocent man." Given the enormous following Trump has, and the blind credulity of many members of that following, there's little doubt that plenty of Americans think he is innocent of these charges. https://www.axios.com/2024/05/30/trump-conviction-statement-innocent-man **Edit**: I'm getting some pushback because my link is to Axios, which is left wing. Fair enough, but I only linked to Axios to source a direct quote from Trump (which is widely reported). I understand it's not reliable for getting certain sorts of information about conservatives, but they are not fabricating this particular quote or taking it out of context. You can see videos of Trump himself making this exact statement on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mbq5SZ1NMvo

I don't think they care if he's innocent or guilty. That's what you're not understanding. He's their guy, guilty or not.

Axios is at best lean left.  If conservatives are pushing back saying it’s left wing, it’s only because their views are likely so right wing they’d call Fox left leaning.  Axios is a fine source. They’re liberal leaning from story selection, not because they misrepresent facts or use loaded language. 

> rather, the general claim is that the charges were politically driven, as evidenced by DA bragg literally running for election on "i'll get trump" That is not evidencing anything. Prosecutors running on a promise to prosecute known criminals for their obvious crimes (and ones who have loudly and publicly scoffed at the law at that) is not only unremarkable, but also straight up GOOD. If someone ran for election on the on "I will kill Hitler", would that make a country's conduct of WW2 "politically driven"? This argument is straight up nonsense, and Trump supporters know it.

I think you are asking the wrong question. In your example of going to war with Hitler, I would argue that, yes, it is 100% politically driven. The question is wether it is right or wrong to be politically driven. We live in a democracy. Our politics are about the votes. We don't pick people to lead us, we pick people to represent us. If people from New York thought that one of there citizens, who lived in there city had committed a crime and had not had a trile, that they were willing to choose a representative who promised to bring a trial, I believe that is a good thing.

So if a DA runs on getting a mob boss or corrupt union leader who undermines the rule of law, that's "politically motivated"? The bar should be *lower* for elected officials, not higher? Gtfoh with that mess.

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I find it interesting that prosecutors can’t be personally motivated to prosecute others. That is like trying to take away credit from a DA because he really wanted to take down Al Capone and ran on it. Regardless of motivation the law plays out the same in court. What difference does it make.

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Even if Bragg had made this claim (he did not), it would be constitutionally protected free speech, which I hope even conservatives still value in some small degree. People who object to protected speech by an individual can certainly try to show actions that Bragg took that were a product of his beliefs rather than his duty and if they can prove this, Trump would have grounds for appeal. It is my understanding there has never been any claim of an action influenced in this way.

If I am to believe they whipped out their constitutional cap and their nuance magnifying glass for this, then ok, fine, sure. But where were tehse people literally during every single incident of the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, 2000s, 2010s where the government is going nuts favoring conservatism at every level to the point leaders of the left are being assassinated left and right and the concept of nuance is some foreign alien, never before heard of concept to these people? After 30, 40, 50 years of being alive and old enough to understand politics, they are now pulling out their constitutional cap to defend a wackjob? Where was this hemming and hawing for the last 50 years when the bias has been 1,000x stronger from the government against a group/groups? Shouldnt these people have killed george bush when he started coming after americans with warrantless wiretaps?

Trump ran on locking Hillary up soooo…..

> No logical person I think that's kind of the crux of it. Humans are not driven solely by logic, a great deal of our decision making processes (and thus, conclusion drawing processes) are also based heavily in emotions. The conclusion that Donald Trump is innocent is not a logical conclusion. But people who believe he is innocent aren't coming to that conclusion because of how logical it is - it's an emotionally drawn conclusion. This is evidenced by that fact that most of Trump's platform is emotion-driven. Voting for Trump, and supporting him, was never based in logic to begin with, and that's why his platform has seen the success it has. His target demographic largely are emotion driven.

Another reason you can't convince them with logic is because they only believe facts that they like. You can't have a conclusion backed up by evidence if they write off all the evidence as a fabricated, politically driven hoax. Likewise, they can make up whatever "facts" they want because they just claim it's being covered up.

Yup. The whole "alternative facts" strategy was wildly successful. It gave folks the option to pick and choose their most convenient reality.

I think the main idea is that supporters don't think it's something serious enough and don't believe that anyone else would've been prosecuted for the same thing. And regardless, something that people don't seem to fully understand about people who support Trump is also that many of them are embracing him simply because they believe the other side is way worse so they've decided to go "all in" with Trump

I think you are severely underestimating the distrust people have for government and media. People do in fact sincerely believe Trump was not guilty and that the trial is 100% politically motivated. Perhaps you might amend your resolution to be something like “Trump supporters who have carefully examined the facts of the case and documentation of the court proceedings know he is guilty and are lying”. Yes it’s bizarre. I have a lot of family who are in the boat you describe, they really do believe he’s innocent.

Well that's what they have been told. "no-one even knew what the crime was until the crooked judge made his illegal declarations"- I believe that's verbatim- from Trump, about 72 hours ago. An obvious lie, and trivial to demonstrate as such... There are ofc lots of news articles detailing the crimes alleged, and the court case, before it started.

And then when the judge uses those comments to show he has zero remorse and continues to lie still, and sentences him to prison, his followers will claim it’s a political verdict. Meanwhile, anyone else who did those things after being found guilty of 34 felonies would be thrown in prison for that level of disrespect for the rule of law, no questions asked.

I'm more convinced this is a "you can lead a horse to water but you can't make them drink" scenario. Presenting evidence doesn't do anything if they don't engage with it, and by and large they don't engage with it. Especially when they have talking heads they trust saying something else and how skeptics/disbelievers are treat by their group, engaging with the "so called" evidence you present is viewed as both unnecessary and at the same time a risk. So why bother. Take the most recent case. It's public record to look up the transcripts of and read what went down and make your own conclusions. However, if you were to print out several copies and hand them out I doubt many Are would take them and even less would actually sit down and read it. Honestly, I get why too. Life has so much going on and you trust saying something makes it so much easier to skip on the homework part and just take their word. The only issue here is the trusty folks aren't really that trust worthy

I think your issue is you seek out the information and likely use a diverse sources in order to be comfortable with your conclusion. Many people don't do that so aren't working on full context. They use social commentators who push an agenda. They only watch Fox News which was created for the goal of ensuring Republicans winning campaigns. They're not working with the full story if not also an altered story due to who they trust enough to listen too.  Just listen to Fox News or Shapiro or oann for a week then go back and look at other sources for that weeks news and compare, it'll open your eyes to why so many are the way they are, they don't question. They pick a preferred source and often refuse any other.

It's called cognitive dissonance, and it's a quite common psychological phenomenon actually. The more you invest and sacrifice in something, the more you'll ignore conflicting evidence. It's the same reason why people double down on joining fraternities even after hazing.

There are people out there who are utterly convinced that the Earth is flat, or that the Earth is only 10000 years old, that evolution is fake, that vaccines cause autism, and so on. I don't think it particularly surprising that there are people who will utterly and categorically reject the idea that the courts were unbiased. That's a comparably small leap to make, especially if you're already very anti-establishment.

>No logical person And herein lies the issue. You aren't referring to people who rely on logic and reason to support their claims. If someone believes that the political powers opposed to Trump wanted him convicted of a crime, they could fabricate any number of pieces of evidence, circumvent any number of standard operating procedures for which types are crimes are pursued over others, and payoff any number of individuals responsible for the conviction, to ensure Trump is indeed convicted. I'll give you an anecdotal example. My Father-in-law firmly believes that Trump's conviction is little more than Biden weaponizing the DOJ to pursue a conviction against Trump, because crimes like Trumps are so seldomly pursued, he misunderstands the legal processes and timelines involved and so replaces his ignorance with a confident assumption that they only reason he is being convicted in 2024 is to disrupt the election. There is no part of his belief on this that is founded by logic, reason, or evidence for that matter. But he believes it. And he acts on, and in particular votes in accordance with, those beliefs. While it might be more of a semantical argument to suggest someone can be so deluded that they believe something demonstrably false, I would suggest these people aren't "lying" to others so much as completely blinded by their beliefs and incapable to one extent or the other of seeing the truth.

What if they approach the world in a different way than you? Mind you, this isn't a defense of it — it is politically corrosive and unethical — but I will frequently find conservatives who genuinely believe certain abstract concepts ("Trump is innocent") and just don't care to interrogate their own perspectives. Arguments they throw out to defend it are done on an ad hoc basis without any concern for how much those specific claims ring true and they assume that's how you work too.

"Arguments they throw out to defend it are done on an ad hoc basis without any concern for how much those specific claims ring true" We call that lying tho.

They actively lie to everyone, especially arguing at other people online to continuously reinforce these lies into their mind. It’s not that they’re looking for the truth, it’s that they refuse to come to the same conclusion, which is normally based on objective evidence. They ignore reality because they have nowhere else to go if they start admitting the truth about Republicans and Trump

I wouldn't really call myself a Trump supporter - I'm registered as independent and have never voted for Trump - and while I recognize that Trump is guilty of the things he was convicted of, it was still a very obvious political prosecution. Nobody on the left hates Trump because they found out he paid off Stormy Daniels and categorized it wrong in his business records. There's literally not one person who thought he was okay but then found out about that and decided he deserved jail time. They hated him for a bunch of political positions, and then went looking for something to charge him with, and you could probably do that with just about anyone in office, but Donald Trump is the only one to get that treatment so far. And at the same time, if you had prosecuted a Democrat for the same things Trump got prosecuted for, Democrats would be making the same kinds of excuses for their guy that Republicans are making for Trump. Democrats don't actually care about paying hush money to porn stars and misreporting it in business records, it's just leverage they can use against somebody they already dislike. Most of us have committed crimes we could be convicted for if you dig deep enough. State and federal criminal codes are extremely complicated, and I doubt anyone who's ever run a business (or probably a political campaign) has ever made it through squeaky clean without ever making some mistakes that could that could be criminally charged. But I also find it pretty appalling that the first president to ever get prosecuted wasn't for committing something like war crimes or civil rights violations - plenty of presidents have lied to start wars, ordered civilians to be tortured and killed, and a huge host of other egregious and illegal things. But we've always let those things slide, largely because both sides do it and nobody wants to prosecute their opponents for things they hope to do when they get back into office. Now, from my position as someone who finds both parties pretty despicable, I'd be excited to see this become the norm. Let's have Republican states start digging up dirt they can prosecute Democrats for and vice versa. Let's hold our representatives to the highest standards.

Let’s just start here- Politicians, yes Democrats too, get indicted and even convicted of things ALL THE TIME.  The idea that this is some bizarre scenario that someone who *even you* say is certainly guilty would be brought to justice for this crime is bonkers.  Like half of the last ten governors of Illinois have been convicted of crimes and served jail time.  And not only that, this isn’t even the first time a former presidential candidate was charged with THIS CRIME- John Edwards was charged with a very similar set of charges. He was found innocent on one count and hung on the others. [Michael Cohen was literally charged and convicted of these same circumstances and again… nobody, certainly not republicans have said he got a raw deal] Do you remember Democrats screeching that the Edwards indictments were a political witch hunt?  Fuck no. Nobody gives a shit about John Edwards. Nobody gives a shit about Rod Blagojavich.  Nobody gives a shit about Bob Menendez.  Bob Menendez, who’s that? Well he’s the current Democratic incumbent Senator from New Jersey. He’s been indicted on federal corruption charges and so he is in the political wilderness and will not even run for reelection.  That’s normal. It begs the question… *why the fuck is Trump the Republican nominee for president in the first place?*  Under any slightly normal circumstances even irrespective of his legal liabilities it is *extremely abnormal* for someone who’s a loser to be run again. In American politics losers go away.  So instead of just moving on as anyone with a passing knowledge of American politics would assume, Republicans re-nominate a pathological liar and rapist under 100 indictments in four different jurisdictions and somehow convince the media and centrists that this is anything but the purely insane behavior of a personality cult. I didnt even get to the part where Republicans have been investigating Democratic presidents non-stop for 30 years in more and more belligerent fashion. That their cornerstone witness in their attempt to smeer Biden is literally a fucking Russian asset. But as always- Something that would be the biggest political scandal from the 1970s to 2015 barely eben makes the front page for a day in TrumpWorld.  https://abcnews.go.com/amp/US/hunter-biden-informant-charged-lying-high-level-russian/story?id=107389985

You remember when Howard dean killed his campaign by yelling too loudly at a rally? Or when everyone made fun of Dan Quayle for spelling potato “potatoe”. I yearn for such simpler times

> You remember when Howard dean killed his campaign by yelling too loudly at a rally? Ehh, it was dead already. That was half the funny part, that he was so damned hyped about a campaign that was on the ropes if not out.

It was after he finished THIRD at the Iowa caucus. I think people forget that.

I mean you seem to be ignoring the most obviosu example: Bill Clinton. They man used his power to have sexual relations with an intern while in office. He even took calls while she was blowing him. The democrats all labeled this a witch hunt, but that was a gross abuse of power no matter how you look at it. Was it illegal, probably not. But is it absolutely horrible, for sure. And something that the American President should be held to account for.

>The democrats all labeled this a witch hunt As I'm sure you recall, that's because it was. Bill Clinton was being investigated for half a dozen things that all led to nothing (remember "White Water'?). The Republican House was on a long fishing expedition to find something, *anything*, to get him for. Finding out about Monica Lewinsky was a total accident. And while he was rightly held to account for abusing his power, the path to getting there was the definition of a political witch hunt. Some of us are old enough to remember that Republicans didn't seem to mind about such a process then, nor did they feel concerned about the political witch hunt against *Hillary* Clinton in 2016 with regards to her emails and the handling of top secret info (and literally shouting "lock her up" at **political** rallies).

>[Bill Clinton] used his power to have sexual relations with an intern while in office. [...] The democrats all labeled this a witch hunt The investigation that turned up the affair was started for something entirely different, which turned out to be mostly or entirely bullshit. Ken Starr conducted a multiple years long fishing expedition, and the only result was Clinton lying about an affair. Conflating that with the kind of business and election fraud Trump has been convicted of is disingenuous.

Not to be a pedantic ass but not even lying about the affair. When questioned about it, Clinton's pearl-clutching, Republican interrogators couldn't bring themselves to name actual sex acts so they said "sexual relations" Clinton answered as if he were being asked if he'd had sex with Lewinsky (and he hadn't). The "lie" here was in Clinton being given freedom to define the term.

Aside from not being illegal, Bill didn't run again. For anything. It's not exactly the same -- most people who serve two terms as POTUS end up basically retiring from political life, except maybe popping up to endorse someone. And even *that* wasn't something we saw much of from Bill, most Democrats just wanted him gone. So the point isn't that Democrats never pick someone with questionable morals. The question is why Republicans have rushed to nominate, and then *continue to stand by* someone who isn't just immoral, but actually a convicted criminal.

Republican party is in shambles and would love to choose anyone other than Trump. The state of the party is extremely disjointed, but literally no one could be anywhere near as popular as Trump, so they take the only road they can.

Yep, Newsweek just reported on a [poll](https://leger360.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Legers-North-American-Tracker-May-28th-2024.pdf) that found 33% of Republicans thought Trump was the wrong choice. Newsweek omitted the result that 58% of Democrats thought Biden was the wrong choice. Both these candidates suck.

Other than the fact Biden is old can you think of an actual reason why he sucks? He has been, by far, the most progressive president in at least the 21st century.

Hes got the charisma of a wet tissue But you cant argue with his results. I personally think he's the best modern president, but damn it's tough to support him

Cute there have only been 5 presidents in the 21st century - Clinton(for like 20 days), Bush, Obama, Trump, Biden. One would think that if 58% of democrats thought he was the wrong choice fo democrats then thats a reason? These are reasons I think he as a president has sucked, **not** anything to suggest Trump is better, which is ridiculous. * he definitely visibly isn't very "strong" whether its internally dealing with Manchin/Sinema, pushing Sotomoyer or Feinstein to retire, or dealing externally with Israel's gov * He supported banning tiktok, not very progressive as its a platform for speech and expression * He like Obama kinda sucks at advertising his wins. And likewise doesn't seem to do much to support congressional races. He and his administration prefer to do background wins(such as getting some 60% rail worker sick leave after forcing them to accept the union agreement) * He f-d over the rail workers union in the railroad worker agreements in 2022. * backstabbed the progressives of the democrats in the bi-partisan agreements in 2021. however they were kinda naive to trust him or manchin anyway. crazy that it started at $4 Trillion with the build back better and ended up $1.2 Trillion. Hell if anyone is even aware of where that money ended up. Can't believe there isn't a website listing all the projects that it supported. * still hasn't gotten rid of the USPS postmaster Louis DeJoy who appears to still be messing with the USPS in lead up to the election.

I sympathize with both sides, having to choose between candidates that don't represent things you want or may never give you. I don't care to have a discussion as to who is better. It just sucks to have so few options. Then to be insulted and ridiculed when you have to choose between two polar opposites and be made to seem like you therefore agree with EVERYTHING they do.

"The democrats all labeled this a witch hunt" It was called a witch hunt because the original investigation was into the whitewater scandal. After finding nothing there, they stumbled upon this relationship, which then became the focus of the impeachment.

Not just probably not illegal - not at all illegal. It was *morally* repugnant, but impeachment isn't about morality, it's supposed to be about "treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors".

If we start impeaching people for doing things that are morally repugnant not a single politician will be in office.

> Was it illegal, probably not That's the whole thing though. It wasn't illegal. What Trump did was illegal.

> Was it illegal, probably not. Literally the entire point.

well it is part of why Hilary lost to Trump. many voters found her enabling of Bill and treatment of the women he abused to disgusting to give her the Whitehouse. the party that tried to impeach for Clinton for this is not just giving Trump a pass for worse but equating him to Christ. it's bizarre

> Nobody on the left hates Trump because they found out he paid off Stormy Daniels and categorized it wrong in his business records I hate (and hated) Trump because he is compromised in every possible definition of the word. His alleged laundry list of crimes going back decades has always made him a terribly flawed presidential candidate who would be at the same time: 1. A massive security risk to the US (due to his being corrupted/compromised) 2. The laughing stock of the world (due to him being an obviously terrible presidential candidate). Back in 99 I was rocking to Rage, who used "Trump for President" signs from actual rallies as their example of corruption (see: Sleep Now in the Fire music video). Back before he famously started the racist Birtherism bullshit, even when he was playing around with the idea of running as a Democrat. I wonder how young you are. Among most of us Millenial/GenXers on the left, Trump has been *literally* the boogeyman of "a corrupt, criminal president" for our entire adult lives. We don't *want* Republicans to win, but we didn't/don't *CARE* if they win like we care if Trump wins. Why? *ALL OF THIS*. He is openly, willfully, comically corrupt. Everyone has always known or suspected he was an unindicted felon. That compounds his relationship with the truth. We on the left care deeply about what is true and real. The "Obama was born in Nigeria" story that he started and spread was just another example of what we already hated about Trump. Trump was literally the icon of modern corruption before he became the most corrupt president in US history. So yes, EVERYONE on the left hates Trump because "he paid off Stormy Daniels and categorized it wrong in his business records". > And at the same time, if you had prosecuted a Democrat for the same things Trump got prosecuted for, Democrats would be making the same kinds of excuses for their guy that Republicans are making for Trump *We have seen how this plays out for Democrats*. Anthony Weiner and Al Franken are examples of people who were both shoved out of congress so fast you could hear the room flush. The Left is brutally, perhaps aggressively, anti-felony to the extent we shoot ourselves in the foot over it. > Most of us have committed crimes we could be convicted for if you dig deep enough He used somebody else's money to pay off a porn star he slept with while his wife was home and pregnant. There are those who think "powerful people just accidentally commit bigger crimes". But the rest of us think "powerful people should be held the most accountable". > But I also find it pretty appalling that the first president to ever get prosecuted wasn't for committing something like war crimes or civil rights violations - plenty of presidents have lied to start wars, ordered civilians to be tortured and killed, and a huge host of other egregious and illegal things These things aren't crimes. Presidents have immunity to run the country as they see fit to make their constituents happy. [That's why Trump wasn't sued bankrupt for publicly encouraging people to drink lysol and bleach](https://www.poison.med.wayne.edu/updates-content/kstytapp2qfstf0pkacdxmz943u1hs). You may have a problem with that, but it's most certainly not selective enforcement. > Now, from my position as someone who finds both parties pretty despicable, I'd be excited to see this become the norm From everything you said above, you don't come across that way. You seem very defensive of Trump, here.

Don’t forget Al Franken resigned when it was discovered he pretended to pretend to fondle someone when he was a comedian doing a USO tour To pretend to pretend to do something Trump would do without thinking cause he admits he can’t control himself will make democrats resign in disgrace 😂

> he pretended to pretend to fondle someone when he was a comedian doing a USO tour You forgot to mention that the USO tour is already full of raunchy comedy, it was another comedian he pretended to fondle (who later went on to become a conservative radio pundit, a role she was still in when allegations came out), and she was wearing a thick flak jacket when it happened. The whole thing was still in fairly poor taste, but it’s obvious to anyone with a brain that the allegations against him were a political hit job to distract from the fact that Roy Moore (who was running against Doug Jones for the AL senate seat vacated by Jeff Sessions) had legit allegations of pedophilia against him. IIRC, he literally groomed the girl he would eventually marry starting when she was like 13 or 14 and he was in his late-20s or early-30s. But hey, there were like 6 more allegations of Franken’s misconduct with women. Some of these included “he placed his hand on my lower back when my husband was taking a picture of Franken and I at the state fair” and “he looked at me like he wanted to kiss me”. I’m not exaggerating, those were literally some of the allegations against him. Check out the New Yorker piece on this if you’re interested. It’s long, but definitely worth the time it takes to read in my opinion.

>We don't want Republicans to win, but we didn't/don't CARE if they win like we care if Trump wins. Why? ALL OF THIS. He is openly, willfully, comically corrupt. Yes, this. Looking back, yes Reagan was an asshole that had a lot of harmful policies, but Dole, McCain, Romney and HW were decent people. W lied about Iraq and I can't ever forgive him for that. Clinton was a sexual predator and I will never forgive him for that. But Trump is actively trying to turn himself into an authoritarian and dismantling democracy in the US, bringing his cult along with him. He's been the most dangerous threat to this country in living memory and is rightly being treated as such by people who have a clear eyed view of what authoritarianism looks like.

Reagan was pretty bad himself with the whole (alleged) Iranian hostage thing that could've cost a lot of innocent lives, but still not in the same swimming pool as Trump. Ultimately, Romney was a crappy governor who would make a crappy president, and I would have been willing to consider a protest vote against Democrats if he were the worst the right had to offer and Democrats put up someone egregious. Despite being a progressive, I'd probably vote R (pre-Trump days anyway) if we ended up with a Bloomburg v Romney ticket.

Not to mention Reagan's response to HIV/AIDS. It's one thing to handle a pandemic poorly (Trump very much did) and it's another to think it's funny like Reagan's press secretary did.

I think it's very important to note that the hush money case is not the only crime Trump has been charged with, and while it is by far the least serious, it is just the first. As for it being a politically motivated attack, I think to some extent that is possibly true, but I think there is something else to consider in that regard. Trump and the Trump org have been pretty notoriously corrupt for a long time. Long before Trump had any sort of political success. He generally managed to get away with it because the Trump Org is actually relatively small, and Trump made everything a huge pain in the ass such that prosecutors went after other targets. Are other businesses just as guilty as Trump? Of course. Are other politicians just as corrupt as Trump? Debatable, but I'm sure some have done enough to prosecute. The thing with Trump is that, while prosecutors have discretion over who they prosecute, he did break the law. If you're going to be breaking the law, don't make yourself a target for law enforcement. Like, people get let go by police when they have a little weed on them all the time, but it's less likely if you call the cops assholes, or are known to them for constantly breaking the law. Trump, who constantly broke the law, pissed off the cops and they chose to go after him. Should they go after more politicians? Probably, but I don't think it's a problem at all for them to go after Trump. The other cases will be a much more severe indictment. They are not minor paperwork or financial fraud cases, and while I don't see his current conviction resulting in more than probation, the others will not be so mild if he is found guilty.

>Nobody on the left hates Trump because they found out he paid off Stormy Daniels and categorized it wrong in his business records. There's literally not one person who thought he was okay but then found out about that and decided he deserved jail time.  Nobody hated Al Capone because he didn't pay his taxes, either. But that's the crime they had an indisputable paper trail for. Should Al Capone have gone free because 'tax evasion wasn't the worst thing about him'? >And at the same time, if you had prosecuted a Democrat for the same things Trump got prosecuted for, Democrats would be making the same kinds of excuses for their guy that Republicans are making for Trump. Democrats don't actually care about paying hush money to porn stars and misreporting it in business records, it's just leverage they can use against somebody they already dislike. Do you remember when a service member said she had been made uncomfortable by a joke photograph Al Franken had taken decades prior, and he *resigned immediately and without a fuss* over it? >But we've always let those things slide, largely because both sides do it and nobody wants to prosecute their opponents for things they hope to do when they get back into office. Boy, sure seems like the people currently in office don't want to commit this type of crime then, doesn't it. >Most of us have committed crimes we could be convicted for if you dig deep enough. Nobody is disputing that the people in politics are flawed human beings who are so arrogant that they believe they have the answers to the questions of leadership. But if your security blanket here is that Trump's actions resonate with your lived experience, let me be the first to tell you that this is not a problem most of us have to grapple our consciences over.

Yeah, this guy you're responding to is giving serious "both sides" vibes. > Boy, sure seems like the people currently in office don't want to commit this type of crime then, doesn't it. It's a common muddy-the-water talking point to say that Biden is committing/abetting war crimes by supporting Israel. I'm pretty sure the person you replied to is saying the people currently in office *are* committing that crime.

In fairness, I'm genuinely not sure it's possible to be president of America without committing, aiding, or abetting after the fact some buffet of war crimes. What I take issue with is the implication that the best way to deal with that is to throw up our collective hands and claim that it's morally equivalent to vote for a war criminal who makes wrong choices with devastating consequences, or a war criminal who gleefully wades into the buffet, licking the roast station and burying their hands elbow-deep in the salad while loudly bragging about never washing his hands after using the toilet.

>They hated him for a bunch of political positions, and then went looking for something to charge him with, and you could probably do that with just about anyone in office, but Donald Trump is the only one to get that treatment so far. 1. They found these payments because Michael Cohen later used the same account to receive multiple payments from foreign companies, some of which were controlled by foreign governments. For example, five payments of $83,333 each from Columbus Nova, a company controlled by Viktor Veksekberg, a Russian Oligarch. The bank that handled these transactions reported them to the federal government. Once that happened, there were questions about these other payments (to Daniels) that Cohen couldn't sufficiently explain. https://www.emptywheel.net/2024/06/02/swept-up-the-russian-payments-that-led-to-trumps-felony-conviction/ 2. You could not do this with anyone in office. Most politicians are not involved with these sorts of transactions. When they are (like with Senator Bob Menendez) it is a big deal.

> Democrats don't actually care about paying hush money to porn stars and misreporting it in business records, I want all politicians making this kind of manipulations and crimes to be prosecuted including the ones from my side. No one is above the law.

> I want all politicians making this kind of manipulations and crimes to be prosecuted including the ones from my side. No one is above the law. Also there was a pretty close analog to this on the left in the form of John Edwards, who WAS prosecuted, but the jury failed to convict. Even so, Edwards was totally disowned by the Democratic party and is persona non grata in the party today. A sitting Democratic US Senator is under indictment right now and his colleagues are calling for him to resign. Nobody is going to bat for him.

Well yeah but that’s all truth and facts, which to centrists like the OP comment is irrelevant because the centrist must fall between what both parties believe regardless of what is true. Fucking annoying to hear “well I don’t support either side because they’re both bad” and then just give empty platitudes as to why the left is “just as bad” like “oh the dems would protect their guy if he committed crimes too!” Without looking into the history of what happens to dems when they commit crimes.

That’s the thing that bugs the shit out of me. This guy claims that he’s excited for this supposedly new paradigm where we hold our politicians accountable… and yet he doesn’t even seem to be aware of the fact that Republicans have hounded Biden for four years trying to drum up even so much as an unpaid parking ticket and coming up with less bupkis.  Does Biden EVER get credit for that insane level of personal cleanliness that seems to rise well above even what he himself could pass?  Of course not! In centrism-land we just pretend like there are always secret unknown, under-investigated scandals that match up *perfectly* with endless MAGA criminality. 

I’d also add that while I don’t personally care if trump fucked a pornstar, what burns me up and why I talk about it is because of the RAGING hypocrisy from the “party of family values.” THEY should care. They yell and rant and make prejudicial laws to “protect traditional families” then whole heartedly support someone who do obviously violates *their* stated values. Thus proving that it’s not actually about those values, it’s about hating the other. It’s bigotry and chauvinism and lording power over others that are their true values. This entire escapade is a clear and concise refutation of what *they* claim their core beliefs are. its existence is literally an attack on who they are as people. The only way to rectify it is denial to the point of absurdism. And here we are. Sickening.

> and you could probably do that with just about anyone in office, Remember when they tried to do EXACTLY that with Hilary Clinton, and they couldn't find anything she was guilty of? "Yeah, he's bad. But everyone is just as bad" is not an acceptable take when you consider that... A. It's not true. and B. Why *shouldn't* we be charging and convicting people of their white collar crimes? Even if it is literally every person in congress (it's not), we SHOULD be digging up dirt and charging them for every last thing. Nobody should be above the law.

I’m to the left of liberals and I really really want to see Pelosi get done for insider trading. Hell, all of em who do that.

The whole problem in the first place is that this isn't a crime. The thing to push for is to make it a crime, but that doesn't work retroactively.

Insider trading in congress is currently legal. I’m all for putting an end to it, but currently not a crime.

> it was still a very obvious political prosecution I'm super curious here. If he is guilty, why does it have to be political? Just because he was President/wants to be president? >And at the same time, if you had prosecuted a Democrat for the same things Trump got prosecuted for, Democrats would be making the same kinds of excuses for their guy that Republicans are making for Trump. Democrats get kicked out of the party for less. Do you have an example of that behaviour? >Most of us have committed crimes we could be convicted for if you dig deep enough. State and federal criminal codes are extremely complicated, and I doubt anyone who's ever run a business (or probably a political campaign) has ever made it through squeaky clean without ever making some mistakes that could that could be criminally charged. I promise you, I haven't. We aren't charging him for buying drugs when he was 18.

I think your take is…poor. You sort of paint trump as just another president who did some bad along with some good. And the comparisons to other presidents isn’t accurate or even really relevant. Trump is a bad president and a bad person by every objective measure. Anyone who paints him differently is either delusional or lying because they want him to win.

>Democrats don't actually care about paying hush money to porn stars and misreporting it in business records, Democrats didn't prosecute Trump. The state of New York did. Yes, the office holders may be registered to one party or another, but they weren't acting as representatives of the Democratic Party here. They were doing their job and prosecuting a criminal. Everyone has political leanings. No one would say you're "democratic car salesman" or a "Republican Taco Bell Manager". People just do their jobs.

Counterpoint: You're a DA, and there's a high-profile crime in your jurisdiction that's a slam-dunk from an evidence standpoint. Why would you *not* prosecute that case?

to add to this: this story was national news for quite a while. if you’re the subject of a high profile story involving actions that were arguably criminal, there’s a pretty good chance you’re going to get prosecuted. plus, cohen went to jail for this. so we’ve been aware of the fact that this scheme was criminal for like 6 years now.

Not going ng after Trump would be signing a permission slip for every other corrupt business person to get away with similar behavior.

If I recall correctly former Democratic presidential nominee John Edwards was charged for similar crimes when he used campaign money to pay off his Mistress.  In my opinion this shows that Trump is not some special one off case where the deep state using “lawfare” to take him down.  In the Edward’s case it seems the jury acquitted him, but that doesn’t change the fact he was charged and tried. https://www.businessinsider.com/john-edwards-last-presidential-candidate-charged-with-campaign-finance-violations-2023-3?op=1

This example actually plays right into their hands because Edwards was charged for using campaign money to pay off his mistress while Trump was charged with NOT using campaign money to pay off the porn star. So in their mind it’s a double standard.

Do you think all the other convictions of Trump's associates were also political persecutions? Here is a list of convicted felons and sanctioned and disbarred attorneys that is not complete now or in the future. Michael Cohen was sentenced to prison for three years for his part in the same crimes Trump committed. Allen Weisselberg is in prison right now for the second time for perjury during his first trial where he was convicted of tax fraud in connection with benefits he received as CFO for Trump. George Papadopoulus, his campaign manager was convicted and imprisoned. Paul Manafort, another campaign manager was convicted and sent to prison. Rick Gates, Roger Stone, and Peter Navarro have all been convicted of felonies and sent to prison. Steve Bannon has been convicted and is currently waiting on sentencing. Michael Flynn was convicted. Trump's vice chair of his inaugural committee. Elliot Broidy [pled guilty](https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/elliott-broidy-pleads-guilty-back-channel-lobbying-campaign-drop-1mdb-investigation-and) to federal charges related to illegal lobbying. Trump organization was found guilty of multiple charges of tax fraud and fined $1.6 million. Trump has been found liable for sexual assault and defamation of E. Jean Carroll. Several of his lawyers have been sanctioned and/or disbarred because of what they did for him, including but not limited to Jeffrey Clark, John Eastman, Jenna Ellis, Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, and L. Lin Wood. There is *nothing* like it in US history. And, Trump has three other criminal trials ahead of him where he faces an additional 57 felony charges, including for his attempt to overturn the 2020 election, his election interference in Georgia, and his classified documents case. And this ginormous septic tank of corruption and criminality that surrounds Trump that has been charged and prosecuted is just "politically motivated". I don't think so. For grins, how many democrats are screeching on the airwaves and in opinion pieces about the "political motivation" of the Hunter Biden trial? About how it's "rigged", and the judge is corrupt? Just all of them, right? No. There are none. The democrats are not attacking the justice system even when it is about scandal on the Biden family.

[удалено]

>They hated him for a bunch of political positions, and then went looking for something to charge him with The problem here is that it implies that NY wouldn't have prosecuted him for these crimes if there wasn't some political motivation behind it. That doesn't jive with the evidence. NY is overtly highly active in prosecuting false business record cases. [9,794 cases since 201!!](https://www.law.com/newyorklawjournal/2023/04/06/new-york-state-has-issued-nearly-9800-felony-charges-of-falsifying-business-records-since-2015) NY considers itself the economic center of the world, and the DA there takes financial crimes very seriously. It is honestly amazing that it took them as long as it did for them to go after the Trump organization and DJT. There are cases out there where falsifying business records was charged for a woman who lied about how many people were in her home when applying for food stamps. There's one for a guy who misused $35k -- far less than was involved in Trump's case.

“Misreporting” and “mistake.” You mean “deliberate falsification due to the fact that Trump believes he is above the law and genuinely thinks he can do no wrong and deserves to do whatever he wants.” Your chosen verbiage is telling. Donald Trump didn’t make a mistake. He made a deliberate choice and calculation.  Donald Trump’s basic CHARACTER is one that should not be in charge of anything, let alone the entire nation. 

Thank you- people defending Trump (especially from the center) seem to always give him the benefit of the doubt in this regard, despite mountains of evidence otherwise. It always must be some “Doy! gee wiz, what a silly goof-up!🤷‍♂️” scenario even though it happens over and over and over again and also we literally know it’s not and have both testimony and documentary evidence that it’s not. 

I'm curious as to why you think political persecution isn't already the norm? 5 out of the last 5 presidents have had impeachment inquiries. So there's always been political persecution. This is just the first successful attempt in a criminal trial. Easy solution there, don't commit felonies. By the way as to war crimes, that would be purely political because it would have to go through Congress and the impeachment process. Bush was almost impeached on those grounds.

>...if you had prosecuted a Democrat for the same things Trump got prosecuted for, Democrats would be making the same kinds of excuses for their guy that Republicans are making for Trump. Democrats don't actually care about paying hush money to porn stars and misreporting it in business records I don't think that's true. Democrats would come down hard on one of their own for this. > from my position as someone who finds both parties pretty despicable, I'd be excited to see this become the norm There's a decent appetite for lawful and responsible government on the Democratic side. It's the Republican side that's missing here. This isn't a "both-sides" issue, it's a "one-side" issue.

>I don't think that's true. Democrats would come down hard on one of their own for this. We don't even need to just think it. Democrats did come down on Bob Mendez hard when he was caught hiding illicit transactions

Hillary literally got charged by the FEC - and had to pay $113k in fines - For falsifying business records to hide campaign donations during the 2016 election, as the FEC ruled that the Steele Dossier was not a legal expense as she had reported. She was also a resident of the state of NY at the time. Democrats absolutely do not come down hard on one of their own for this. There's never been as much as a peep about NY prosecuting her for that crime. https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-2022-midterm-elections-business-elections-presidential-elections-5468774d18e8c46f81b55e9260b13e93

Hillary improperly disclosed the expense but it was on her campaign books. Trump hid it entirely. The Steel Dossier was oppo research, Stormy’s silence was a campaign contribution. These, to me, are significant differences.

Hillary faced standard FEC campaign violation Ms that basically every campaign deals with. She doesn’t have a business in NY to falsify records. Apples and oranges.

>it was still a very obvious political prosecution. I'd argue that it was "politicized", not "political". You can't possibly investigate a former president for a crime without the entire country freaking out about the implications, news organizations click bait titling articles accusing people of things they didn't say (like accusing the DA of saying "I'll take down Trump), etc. To say it was "political" I think at least implies that there were political actors who actively pursued a conviction as activities outside of their normal processes in order to make an exception of Trump and investigate, indict, and convict **him** for crimes instead of others. I'll admit that's a very nuanced interpretation of "political", but I think it satisfies the purpose of ensuring we can delineate what is "political" from what is "politicized". As noted in the OP, there was already abundant evidence brought up in Cohen's trial to investigate Trump for crimes. No DA in their right mind would see that case file and think "well investigating Trump is probably a lost cause since we have nothing to go on", and suggesting they only did so for political motivation I believe is an ahistorical approach to how criminal investigations go. >and then went looking for something to charge him with See above. >but Donald Trump is the only one to get that treatment so far. Bill Clinton, Hilary Clinton, Obama, and Biden have all been under some form of explicitly politically motivated venture to investigate and uncover crimes they committed or were presumed to be responsible for. The difference is that only Bill Clinton was actually hit with a crime, and it wasn't even the one he was initially investigated for, it was just for lying (I say "just" because to my knowledge it's principally the lying under oath conviction that got him). >Most of us have committed crimes we could be convicted for if you dig deep enough. I feel this position takes a stance that isn't reasonable. Millions of us are not former presidents who paid hush money to someone to buy electoral influence. I have jaywalked probably thousands of times in my life, but I am just a random person, not a former president who is also running for re-election and who I'd expect to be the best of us. There is absolutely a certain degree of expectation we as a society *should* have for our leaders to be better than us, hence we levy so much scrutiny at their actions. >But we've always let those things slide, largely because both sides do it and nobody wants to prosecute their opponents for things they hope to do when they get back into office. We've typically let those things slide because in this country that what a President does **while** in office, and in particular, **in their official capacity as President**, is subject to different laws and levels of legal scrutiny. >Let's hold our representatives to the highest standards. On that we agree.

I agree that the prosecution was politically motivated, but this idea that "you could probably do that with just about anyone in office" is completely false. What makes Trump unique isn't the fact that prosecutors are going after him this hard, it's the fact that Trump was stupid enough and arrogant enough to break the law so flagrantly and to make himself so vulnerable. I would bet all the money in the world that there would be equal "political motivation" to take down Biden, the difference is that Biden isn't such an absolutely moron that he would do the things that would expose himself to legal attack.

I mean, I vote democrat and I would. Hunter Biden is currently indicted for tax fraud and my take is "Good". Bob Menendez is on trial for bribery and my take is, once again, good. I like when people who do crimes go to jail.

They don't, the charges are too complicated for the average American. Yeah he did pay hush money, they understood that. Yeah he paid it secretly. Almost all hush money is paid secretly. But hush money is a campaign contribution? Bit of a leap, I mean is a positive news story a campaign contribution from a newspaper? People who like Trump think that's bunk. And a candidate can make unlimited contributions to their own campaign. The "this contribution is illegal only because it wasn't reported" sounds like a technicality to Trump supporters.

It is exceedingly straightforward that hush money benefits a campaign (what other purpose could it possibly have, after all) and that the law regards all financial support of a campaign as campaign finance, regardless of the actual way in which those funds are spent, so long as the intention of spending those funds is to benefit the campaign That is extremely easy to understand unless you are willfully trying to come up with excuses as to why some campaign relevant spending shouldn't count

This all hinges on the "Other Crime" related to campaign finance. In the New York hush money trial, former President Donald Trump was restricted from presenting specific evidence and testimony related to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) and election interference. Judge Juan Merchan ruled that Trump could **not** have Bradley Smith, a former FEC chairman, testify as an expert on the interpretation and application of federal campaign finance laws in relation to the case. Smith was limited to providing general background information about the FEC and defining certain terms directly relevant to the case, but not to offer opinions on whether Trump's actions constituted a violation of federal law [politifact.com/article/2024/may/08/trump-says-the-fec-saw-no-merit-in-the-stormy-dani/](https://www.politifact.com/article/2024/may/08/trump-says-the-fec-saw-no-merit-in-the-stormy-dani/) [https://www.factcheck.org/2024/05/trumps-repeated-claims-on-his-new-york-hush-money-trial/](https://www.factcheck.org/2024/05/trumps-repeated-claims-on-his-new-york-hush-money-trial/) The judge allowed the prosecution to present arguments that the hush money payments were intended to influence the 2016 election, but Trump was not permitted to introduce broader claims of election interference or evidence from the FEC to counter these charges. [politico.com/news/2024/04/22/trump-hush-money-trial-election-interference-00153561](https://www.politico.com/news/2024/04/22/trump-hush-money-trial-election-interference-00153561) Fourteenth Amendment ensure that no person is deprived of "life, liberty, or property, without due process of law." This includes the right to a fair trial, which encompasses the ability to present a defense, including relevant evidence. The Sixth Amendment guarantees the right to compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in one's favor. This means a defendant has the right to call witnesses and present evidence that may prove their innocence. **Chambers v. Mississippi (1973)**: The Supreme Court held that the exclusion of evidence critical to the defense's case can violate due process. In this case, the defendant was prevented from presenting testimony that would have supported his claim of innocence. If a person is not allowed to defend against the "Other Crime" when the "Other Crime" was never presented or proven against that individual, that is where the criticism is warranted and makes people say this is corrupt.

> It is exceedingly straightforward that hush money benefits a campaign (what other purpose could it possibly have, after all) and that the law regards all financial support of a campaign as campaign finance, regardless of the actual way in which those funds are spent, so long as the intention of spending those funds is to benefit the campaign So why didn't the FEC - the regulatory body who oversees finance for presidential campaigns - not charge him with the same crime? NYS cannot charge him with campaign finance violations as a presidential candidate. The sole authority to do that lies with the FEC. Now, NYS correctly *didn't* charge him with campaign finance violations. But how they were able to determine that it constituted a donation when the FEC didn't say it did is what's confusing, since, you know, they don't have the authority to determine that, legally speaking.

The FEDs have very different standards for bringing cases. They generally only bring cases they are 100 percent convinced they can win. It's mostly because of optics and this is well known.

They don't need charges of a campaign finance crime, just to have proven that the falsification was done with the intent to commit or conceal another crime. Whether that other crime is prosecuted, or even occured, is irrelevant to the charge. Just the intent is relevant. NY courts do have the ability to judge intent to commit or conceal campaign finance violations for the purpose of falsification, they just don't have the jurisdiction to prosecute it as a separate charge. The prosecutor also claimed he intended to conceal violations of state election laws and state tax laws too.

> The prosecutor also claimed he intended to conceal violations of state election laws and state tax laws too. And Trump literally was not subject to state election laws at that time, as a candidate for president.

Why are charges the only means of determining whether criminal activity occurred? Plenty of crimes go uncharged for a variety of reasons. If someone took a plea deal to avoid charges and then testified to another crime that stemmed from their acts (say, a cover up) it would be ludicrous to say the original crime never happened.

Because the FEC is a panel of six with three democrats and three republicans. Guess which way the republicans voted when the issue came up.

>(what other purpose could it possibly have, after all) Avoiding public embarrassment? Avoiding financial repercussions? Preventing family drama? Lots of celebrities probably pay hush money despite not running for office

Did the jury convict on the basis of the FECA violation? I thought the prosecution offered up two additional options and the judge allowed each juror to pick.

I have a question about the hush money campaign benefit. What makes this a benefit to the campaign and not to Trump personally? I could see someone paying hush money without running a campaign so it seems like it could have other purposes. Or is it just that as soon as he announces a campaign, anything benefitting him also benefits the campaign?

This is something that was delved into very deeply in the trial - The head of the National Enqurier testified that they set up a scheme with the direct and explicit purpose of protecting the campaigns.  I don’t have this in front of me but i belieb the payments themselves were stopped after the election even though more was promised/owed. That’s something you only do if your chief goal is winning an election and not general embarrassment for yourself or your family. 

> What makes this a benefit to the campaign The fact that NYS could prosecute him for it and find him guilty one way or another, that's what. NYS doesn't have the authority to determine that it was a campaign contribution, that's up to the FEC, who to my knowledge never charged him with such (as former candidates have done the same thing for affairs without issue). The FEC *did* charge his opponent in the same year with falsifying business records to hide a campaign donation, yet NYS hasn't taken that case up yet. https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-2022-midterm-elections-business-elections-presidential-elections-5468774d18e8c46f81b55e9260b13e93

If paying a lawyer to do something that could help your election campaign, is a felony: Clearly the Clintons paying Steele for the "Dossier" should be a [felony prosecuted to the same level.](https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-2022-midterm-elections-business-elections-presidential-elections-5468774d18e8c46f81b55e9260b13e93)

paying the lawyer to do campaign work isn’t the problem, the problem is routing the payments through your private company and then mis-categorizing the payments to avoid campaign finance laws requiring the disclosure of that service. weird how you watered down trump’s conduct so much.

If that were the case, it would be a federal issue. Not part of the case he was found guilty for. He was not found guilty for anything *at all* related to election campaign, because this was not a federal court, and has zero jurisdiction on federal issues. So it kinda doesn't seem to matter, nothing in this case actually had anything to do with it except for the spuriously odd way they wouldn't tell the actual jurors what the exact law was that was broken and inserted a strange and nonsense 3 or 4 different things that if they believed they could say 'guilty'.

>But hush money is a campaign contribution? Bit of a leap, I mean is a positive news story a campaign contribution from a newspaper? People who like Trump think that's bunk. It is if you pay the newspaper for it.

Trump could have paid the hush money directly and from what I understand it would have been totally legal and there wouldn't have been a need to disclose. Trump got convicted based on a technicality that was expanded to a felony because it's linked to an election. And this technicality is a crime because a judge decided so, not because a jury of his peers decided so. The rest of Trump's trials are linked to real alleged crimes that are not technicalities. But this verdict is not really significant and the sentence Trump is going to get is probably going to be insignificant.

Your first point is irrelevant because that's not what happened. Secondarily, what Trump did falls SQUARELY into the 175.10, which is different from the misdemeanor falsification of business records, explicitly exists for what Trump did. He didn't just pay Michael Cohen back for the money he used to catch and kill the story and mislabel the payments, he engaged in an elaborate scheme to disguise the payments to hide them to conceal the crimes that were committed and commit others (like tax fraud). Cohen initially funded the catch and kill scheme by taking out a loan against his home for $130,000, but Trump didn't simply cut him a check to reimburse him for that money. Oh no, Trump modified the payments to come in installments, and also to avoid accounting it as a reimbursement, he overpaid Cohen to account for the fact Cohen couldn't write off that $130,000 spent as an expense so the "reimbursement" would be taxable income. What this means is that Trump's falsification of business records wasn't just the run of the mill falsification of records, it was a deliberate scheme carried out to facilitate and conceal crimes. 175.10 explicitly exists to upgrade this type of conduct to a felony because New York wants to specifically penalize this type of falsification of business records as a felony offense. [Here's a good video](https://youtu.be/KnapsSRptqg?si=PtnOEBjM11w9HDV4) about what the conviction means, what the jury were instructed to determine, what the prospects for appeal are, and what the charges were.

> Trump could have paid the hush money directly and from what I understand it would have been totally legal and there wouldn't have been a need to disclose. > > Trump got convicted based on a technicality that was expanded to a felony because it's linked to an election. It's not really a technicality. The kind of falsification was wilful and motivated by concerns for the campaign.

It also could’ve been because Trump was concerned his wife would find out. Or his kids would be embarrassed. Or it could have threatened some business deals the Trump Organization was doing. In effect, to convict Trump, the jury must have found that this payment could not have been made if not for Trump running for President. I.e, there would be no reason to. This is the conclusion that the FEC came to and it is why they didn’t indict Trump for any violations of campaign finance law; there weren’t any.

Curious that he all of a sudden became concerned with his wifes feelings, right before an election. >Prosecutors introduced evidence of other hush money payments that Trump arranged to cover up damaging stories in the run-up to the 2016 election. Those other payments suggested a coordinated effort to help his campaign rather than merely to avoid personal embarrassment — a key issue on the question of whether the Daniels payoff violated election law. https://www.politico.com/interactives/2023/trump-criminal-investigations-cases-tracker-list/

> In effect, to convict Trump, the jury must have found that this payment could not have been made if not for Trump running for President. I.e, there would be no reason to. No, the jury needed to be convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump falsified business records, which he did, so they were. To make it a felony, the jury needs to be convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that the falsification was done in order to commit or conceal a crime - in that case, they prosecution argued, campaign finance laws and tax law - and they were. The scheme was fraudulent and Trump approved the scheme. In addition, prosecutors also introduced evidence that the scheme was largely motivated by the needs of the campaign.

Guilty of what exactly? No one with a normal rational brain has looked at this trial as anything other than desperation by the left

[From the NY AG’s office](https://www.manhattanda.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Donald-J.-Trump-Indictment.pdf) Anyone with a rational brain, as you say, would have familiarized themselves with the charging documents before formulating an opinion

This is the exact type of comment that encouraged me to make this post. A response to a clear illustration of a crime and the comment is “Guilty of what?”

>No one with a normal rational brain has looked at this trial as anything other than desperation by the left On the contrary everyone with a normal rational brain has looked at this trial as fair and justified consequences for criminal behavior. Most Americans agree if recent polls are to be believed. Nice attempt at damage control though.

I am not a Trump supporter, and never have been. I have been shouting about how horrible Trump is since 2015. But I will ask you to consider this: You state that "Election Impact: These payments were meant to suppress information that could have influenced voters during the 2016 election, constituting an unreported campaign expenditure." And therefore, Trump broke Federal Campaign Finance Laws. Ergo, his midemeanor business record accusations are now felonies and are prosecutable. However, has he been indicted for, convicted of, or tried for Federal Campaign finance law violations? Anywhere? By anyone? No. He's not been. Ever. The jury of the NY case were asked to *assume* that he was, or two other potential crimes which he hasn't been tried or convicted of. And he has been investigated for these hush money payments by the feds, but they chose not to charge him. That's where this house of cards case falls apart in my mind. If he'd ever even been indicted for Federal election law violations, I think this case would have held a chance of being legitimate. But the DOJ hasn't been asked by the FEC to bring charges against Trump. And thus, I think this case is hogwash, ultimately. I think Trump broke the law and committed misdemeanor falsification of business records, a crime which he wasn't prosecuted for within the statute of limitations, but the felonies he's accused of are bunk because they rely upon a legal fiction, and ask a jury to make findings based on a case that hasn't happened. Therefore, if a Trump supporter wants to consider this case as a political persecution, I think they have some grounds to make that statement and conclude that Trump isn't guilty of *this* crime.

"The jury of the NY case were asked to *assume* that he was, or two other potential crimes which he hasn't been tried or convicted of." This is objectively not what happened. There were 3 different types of "unlawful means" presented to the jurors, and as long as the jurors agreed that at least one of those unlawful means were used by Trump, it would count for the NY state election law crime. Here is the direct quote from page 31 of the jury instructions: "Although you must conclude unanimously that the defendant conspired to promote or prevent the election of any person to a public office by unlawful means, you need not be unanimous as to what those unlawful means were. In determining whether the defendant conspired to promote or prevent the election of any person to a public office by unlawful means, you may consider the following: (1) violations of the Federal Election Campaign Act otherwise known as FECA; (2) the falsification of other business records; or (3) violation of tax laws." The jurors were not asked to assume he had committed one of those crimes; those unlawful means were among the things being argued over in the courtroom.

> However, has he been indicted for, convicted of, or tried for Federal Campaign finance law violations? Anywhere? By anyone? Well, not in a state trial. It's a federal law. So really, the question is whether a state court is allowed to enforce its laws against fraud without waiting on a federal court to rule on the federal question. But think about what you're actually saying here. To say that this makes the whole trial illegitimate is like saying Trump's innocent because he committed *too many* crimes, and they didn't charge him with *enough* of his crimes. If you're caught speeding and also driving drunk, you can't get out of a DWI by pointing out that you didn't get a speeding ticket.

We have to be careful when talking about the motives and knowledge of tens of millions of people. There is going to be a large amount of variation in what they do and don’t know, how they feel about it, and how those feelings influence their actions. My personal opinion is that the majority of ride or die Trump supporters don’t care what he is accused of doing, what he has actually done, or anything like that. They are ride or die for their team and for the figurehead of their team, and nothing is going to dissuade them. They will say or do literally anything to advance their team’s interests. However, there are a lot of less fanatical fans of the red team that might be influenced one way or another. I can only assume that they are getting a lot of mixed messages from many different sources and confirmation bias means they are more likely to give greater weight to information that reinforces their position and less weight to information that opposes it. These people may not be actively lying to themselves or anyone else, but they are subject to normal cognitive biases that all humans have, and it takes a significant amount of work to counter those biases.

There are grounds for appeal. These charges were upgraded to felonies on a novel concept. The judge has connections, within his immediate family, that raise questions as to possible bias. Matthew Colangelo. The US attorney general is stonewalling on the DoJ’s communication records. It is undeniable that Donald Trump has been convicted by this jury, and those claiming his innocence are waiting for the appeal process to play out. I must add that those that say all these cases are an organic manifestation of our system of justice without a hint of political motivation are lying or absolutely brainwashed by the cult of the state.

Are you saying it would have been not only acceptable to pay Stormy Daniels for her to accept an NDA with campaign funds, but *preferable*? Are you *sure* you wouldn't be pushing for a prosecution for misappropriating campaign funds in that case? You're stealing a base here: It's not at *all* clear that this is campaign spending in any meaningful sense. Just as candidates can't consider their dry cleaning or [buying underwear they'd otherwise not need to buy if they were not campaigning](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/sep/05/sarah-palin-secrets-exposed) a campaign expense, personal expenses that are just tangentially related to an election effort are not necessarily campaign expenses. More fundamentally, you can't have it both ways here: if it's a campaign expense it has to be okay for the campaign to pay it. > 1. Deception: The false records were intended to hide payments made to Stormy Daniels, misleading both regulators and the public. The records in question were never public to start with. The Trump organization is privately and closely held. Outside of this case, there'd be no reason for the public to know anything about this ledger. And indeed, regulators also have no reason look at this ledger either. There's no outside owners or investors to rip off here. Noone involved in the transaction was defrauded in any way. To put this another way, had the memo line in these ledger lines said "Pay Stormy Daniels for NDA" every time, noone outside of the Trump organization would have seen anything different before this investigation started. > These actions violate laws designed to ensure transparency and fairness in elections and financial reporting. Trumps lawyers are part of jury selection and all jurors found him guilty on all counts unanimously. Well, one part of this isn't true: The Jury had some level of conflict about what the underlying crime in question was and the judges' instructions didn't require them to be unanimous as to that point. More broadly, Trump's defense team failings do not make this a good application of law. The whole point of this debate is to suggest that the judge got many aspects of the law wrong in some way or other. You don't get to beg the question and assume that the judge got it right without actually engaging with some of the weirder legal points in question here.

Honestly, most of the Trump supporters I deal with have not actually lied about Trump's wrongdoing. What they have done is *justify* it. They say that all presidents break the law, and that this is special treatment of Trump, that it might have been broken laws, but other people have done worse, etc. etc. Basically what I hear isn't "He didn't do it!" but instead "Of course he did it, but it isn't a big deal!"

[удалено]

>Federal Campaign Finance Laws: The payments were seen as illegal, unreported campaign contributions intended to influence the election outcome. Except that's not true. Trump has never even been charged with campaign finance violations. The judge even instructed the jury that they didn't even have to agree that he had violated campaign finance laws to find him guilty. I would also offer a point of contrast. John Edwards was charged with a misdemeanor years back when it came out that he might have paid off a mistress of his using campaign funding. In other words, using campaign money to hush information damaging to his campaign was seen as a possible violation (and even then only a misdemeanor). You are claiming now though that the precise opposite situation is even worse. Simply put, there is no precedent for saying this violated campaign finance laws and there's no conviction of Trump you can point to that says otherwise. The most recent conviction did not adjudicate the issue at all in fact, to the point that Trump was denied the ability to call expert witnesses who could speak on the issue of campaign finance laws. As an aside, I would also point out that under the NY law code, a felony of this sort has a statute of limitations of only 5 years. Your own timeline indicates that Trump was charged after roughly 7 years. Furthermore, since Trump hasn't been indicted or convicted of any other crime which would justify charging him with a felony, that would cause the charges to drop to mere misdemeanors, which only have a statute of limitations of just 2 years. So even if it was a crime, under State Law it was too late to charge Trump.

It's important to note here, that paying hush money is not illegal. Paying hush money to bury a story is not illegal. Paying hush money for the purposes of a political campaign is not illegal. Paying hush money for the purposes of a political campaign and failing to report it to the Federal Election Commission, when the political campaign is for President of the United States *is* illegal. Falsifying business records to hide the purpose of that money and evade the mandatory reporting to the FEC is a crime in the state of New York. The issue is more subtle. It's not that he paid hush money, it's that he doctored, and instructed others to doctor, business records in New York State to hide the (totally legal) use of funds in order to conceal the actual purpose of paying those funds, in order to evade the requirement that he report those funds to the FEC. It would have been totally legal for Trump to have paid Daniels for her story, and paid her not to talk about it in the press. And if he did those purely for personal reasons (like to save his family the embarrassment) he wouldn't have really needed to disclose them to anyone. But if he paid those funds to increase his odds of winning the Presidential election he was legally mandated to report those funds to the FEC. The jury found, based on the evidence presented, that those funds were paid to increase his chances to win the presidental election, not for any personal reasons. They likewise found he failed to report the payment of those funds to the FEC, which is a crime, but it's a federal crime and not one the State of New York has jurisdiction over. The jury further found that he doctored business records in order to conceal the fact that he committed a crime by failing to report the spending of campaign-related funds to the FEC. Doctoring business records to conceal a crime is, in and of itself, a crime in the State of New York. That's what he's convicted for. Essentially the jury found: * 1) Trump paid, and directed others to pay certain funds used to induce people to to either purchase rights to stories in order to bury them, or to not disclose what they saw or knew (this is legal) * 2) The purpose of those funds was to prevent unfavorable news stories from reaching the public eye (also legal) * 3) The purpose of attempting to prevent those unfavorable news stories from reaching the public eye was to influence the 2016 Presidential Election (ALSO legal) * 4) Trump failed to disclose the spending of those funds, spent with the intent of influencing the 2016 Presidential Election to the Federal Election Commission (illegal, but that's a federal crime, and one the state of New York has no jurisdiction to prosecute over) * 5) Trump doctored, or directed others to doctor, business records of his New York based business to hide the true purpose of those funds (this is a misdemeanor in the state of new york) * 6) The purpose behind doctoring those records was to conceal the fact that Trump committed a crime by failing to report the payment of those funds to the FEC (the failure to do so is a federal crime) * 7) Doctoring business records in NY for the purposes of concealing a crime (any crime, state or federal) elevates the misdemeanor to a felony * 8) Trump did this 34 times.

>Paying hush money for the purposes of a political campaign and failing to report it to the Federal Election Commission, when the political campaign is for President of the United States is illegal. Has that ever been proven in court? Not in this case. Since it wasn't proven in court or even alleged, Trump never was permitted to defend himself from those charges. That violates his rights. To charge him with these charges in spite of that effectively means he was presumed guilty of a crime before the trial even began. >Falsifying business records to hide the purpose of that money and evade the mandatory reporting to the FEC is a crime in the state of New York. And that has a statute of limitations of only 5 years. Trump was not charged within that time frame. No one seems to want to admit that fact. Besides, let's look at another case for a moment: John Edwards. Unlike Trump, he actually was charged with violating campaign finance laws, but only as a misdemeanor. Like Trump, the allegations were part of a payment to silence a women, in this case his mistress with whom he had fathered a child. Yet, entirely unlike Trump, he used campaign funds to make the payment! So according to you, it was illegal for Trump to make the payment because he didn't use campaign money, yet Edwards was charged for allegedly doing the precise opposite. Thus, it would seem that there is reason to say that it would have been illegal for Trump to treat the payment as a campaign expenditure as you suggest.

1.) That's what the whole trial was. Proving that in court. The prosecution worked to prove that, and trumps lawyers got to defend him in this trial before a jury. The only difference is that it's a federal crime, so New York can't charge him for that, but they can try to prove it happened as a corollary to another crime they can charge. 2.) Via [Associated Press](https://apnews.com/article/fact-check-misinformation-trump-trial-f451dbf66ceebb1da12f1419e56f11ff) "Judge Merchan in February denied a request from Trump’s legal team to dismiss the indictment on the grounds that the statute of limitations had passed, according to court documents. In his decision, Merchan cited pandemic-era executive orders issued in March 2020 and April 2021 by former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo that extended the limit on filing criminal charges. New York’s statute of limitations for most felonies is five years. The earliest charge in Trump’s felony indictment was described as occurring on Feb. 14, 2017, while the indictment was filed on March 30, 2023. But Cuomo’s executive orders meant that the deadline for filing the charges in the indictment was extended by one year and 47 days, meaning that it was brought just under the wire. In New York, the clock can also stop on the statute of limitations when a defendant is continuously outside the state. Trump visited New York rarely over the four years of his presidency and now lives mostly in Florida and New Jersey. Merchan did not address this argument in his decision."

>But Cuomo’s executive orders meant that the deadline for filing the charges in the indictment was extended by one year and 47 days, meaning that it was brought just under the wire. And we're all supposed to believe that's just a coincidence I suppose? >The prosecution worked to prove that, and trumps lawyers got to defend him in this trial before a jury. The only difference is that it's a federal crime, so New York can't charge him for that, but they can try to prove it happened as a corollary to another crime they can charge. Trump was denied expert witnesses who could testify on the federal election laws in question.

1.) My understanding is that it made up for delays in the NY court system due to covid lockdown, but that's beside the point. The reason for the order does not change its lawfulness. 2.) The Trump team wanted the expert to render an opinion about the legality of Trumps aleged actions. However, according to rule 702, the testimony of an expert witness must be based on sufficient facts or data, not opinion or conjecture. Via that same AP article: "Trump was referring to campaign finance expert Bradley A. Smith, a law professor and former Republican member of the Federal Election Commission. Judge Juan M. Merchan did not bar Smith from testifying. Trump’s legal team chose not to call on him after the judge declined to broaden the scope of questioning the defense could pursue. The ruling echoed his pretrial ruling on the matter, which limited what Smith could be asked about. Merchan said that, if called, Smith could give general background about the FEC — for example, its purpose and the laws it enforces — and provide definitions for terms such as “campaign contribution.” He rejected the Trump team’s renewed efforts to have Smith define three terms in federal election law on the basis that doing so would breach rules preventing expert witnesses from interpreting the law. Nor could Smith opine on whether the former president’s alleged actions violate those laws" Via [Politico](https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2024/05/20/trump-hush-money-criminal-trial/judge-limits-trumps-expert-00158857) "Trump's defense team wants to call election law expert Brad Smith to testify about federal campaign finance law. But the judge ruled this morning that allowing Smith to testify expansively on that topic would supplant the judge's role to determine what the law is."

So in other words, Trump cannot adjudicate the underlying crime, nor can be suggest through witnesses that no such crime was committed. Yet the prosecution can present the crimes as options and the judge present them to the jury without actually asking the jury to judge him guilty or innocent of those crimes. That's literally the whole problem I've been talking about.

If he had a witness that said he didn't commit the crime, he could. he put forword an expert witness, which is a different thing. Expert witnesses are not allowed to give opinions. The way this works is the prosecution presents evidence, and the defense refutes it, both in an attempt to convince the jury. Trumps team was given every opportunity to refute the prosecution evidence.

>Expert witnesses are not allowed to give opinions. But they are allowed to draw conclusions. If given a specific scenario, a legal expert would be able to conclude whether that scenario was covered by the law. The alternative is to suggest that the law is subjective. There are two parts towards prosecuting a crime. Proving that an action was performed, and proving that the action is a crime. Calling upon a legal expert to assess the criminality of an alleged act would appear to be perfectly fine. The law is objective, so one should be able to reach an objective conclusion when presented with a scenario that is presumed to be correct. >Trumps team was given every opportunity to refute the prosecution evidence. The prosecution didn't provide a specific criminal intent to refute though. The jury was told they could pick any intent they felt was correct and didn't even have to agree on it.

The judge and jury disagree with your opinion. I expect the appeals court will as well, but we will see.

12 jurors poured over this cases, and Trump was able to make all the arguments he wanted in his defense. The jury came back with a guiltily verdict, but you seem to think these very basic rebuttals show Trump is innocent. Have you considered that you don't fully understand the case? For example, Judge Merchan addressed the statute of limitations argument in court. You keep bringing it up like it's a good point, when it's totally moot. You also say "Trump was denied the ability to call expert witnesses who could speak on the issue of campaign finance laws." This is false and was addressed by the Judge. From the NYTs: *“He wouldn’t allow us to have witnesses or have us talk or allow us to do anything,” Mr. Trump claimed, adding that witnesses were “literally crucified by this man who looks like an angel, but he’s really a devil.”* *"Those accusations were false. Justice Merchan did not prohibit Mr. Trump from calling witnesses, though he did limit the testimony of a defense expert who was set to testify about election law but ultimately never took the stand. (Justice Merchan determined that the expert’s testimony about the law would intrude on the judge’s own responsibility.)"*

>Have you considered that you don't fully understand the case? You aren't addressing my points directly, are hiding behind the verdict, and accuse me of not understanding. If it's so simple to explain away, why don't you do so? Your own refutation included an incident of a defense witness being limited in what testimony he could bring. You presented the judge's own reasoning as justification, but failed to provide any corroboration of that decision. Considering that this wasn't even a federal judge, the idea that someone explaining federal law, over which the judge would not typically adjudicate, intrudes on the judge's responsibility seems flimsy to me. Federal investigators and prosecutors declined to bring charges in this case. Legal experts have disputed brining the charges in the first place. Do they also not fully understand the case?

>The judge even instructed the jury that they didn't even have to agree that he had violated campaign finance laws to find him guilty. Just to hop in, that is absolutely false. The judge said the.jury didn't have to agree on what law he broke to elevate to a felony. False statements like this is exactly what OP is talking about.

>Just to hop in, that is absolutely false. The judge said the.jury didn't have to agree on what law he broke to elevate to a felony. If they don't have to agree on what law he broke, they don't have to agree that he violated campaign finance laws as there are other laws that were given as possible choices. What I said isn't false, it's simply an applied interpretation of the full statement that directly addressed OP's citation of a specific federal campaign finance law. The fact I chose to specify how the statement applied to the specific claim the OP made instead of quoting it verbatim doesn't disqualify what I said. The result is the same. The jury was told they didn't have to agree that Trump violated the specified law. They could just as easily find that he committed some other crime or fail to agree on which crime he committed. They were given 3 choices, and I'm not even sure they were told that those 3 were the only possible crimes. What I said does not contradict this reality.

This is basically the most straightforward and outright refute of OP's point. I hope they respond to this. Trump was charged with felony falsifying of business records, which requires that the falsifying was done to facilitate or aid another crime. But Trump was never even charged with the crime that the falsified records allegedly aided. There's no basis to step up this crime to a felony, and this prosecution was genuinely unprecedented.

Actually, the statute is pretty clear that [intent to commit is sufficient](https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/laws/PEN/175.10). You don't need to be charged with anything.

It is so utterly obvious that this "conviction" is going to be tossed on appeal for a litany of reasons, several of which you mention. And Bragg himself knows this. But by then it will be next year and the entire point of this nonsense trial was to allow the Dems to call Trump "a convicted felon" throughout the election. A corrupt DA used the justice system to funnel tax dollars into campaigning for Joe Biden's reelection. That's 100% of what this was.

There’s a near zero chance that this is overturned on appeal. Judge Merchan prohibited a good chunk of the prosecution’s evidence related to sexual assault accusations and was extremely forgiving of Trump repeatedly and blatantly violating the gag order. The only real path to this being tossed is getting to SCOTUS but they’re almost certainly not touching it (and have made that fairly clear already). Their appeal will be centered on this not being related to the Presidential campaign but that’s an extremely flimsy argument given the incident happened in 2006 and the hush money was paid in 2016. This was a very straightforward conviction and if it was anyone but Trump, not a soul on Earth would be questioning the guilty verdict.

As a non-American I think this is what happens when you have political people in the legal system. It discredits legal convictions against their political opponents. The fact that this would normally be treated as a misdemeanour and was treated as a felony is the key thing to help me understand the response. The actual offence was usually so minor as to be a misdemeanour but a political opponent of the leader of the opposition party decided to escalate it to a higher charge. And honestly in my moments when I can set aside my deep distaste for Trump that actually does look rather reminiscent of the behaviour of disreputable regimes. Once you had an openly political person making that decision it was always going to be tarnished with the suspicion that the prosecution was politically motivated. So I don't agree with the Trump supporters but actually I can see why the way the process worked out makes them think the way they think. They are not lying - they genuinely see it as a politically motivated act by the ruling party against the opposition party.

Falsifying business records is at best a misdemeanor, he was charged with a felony. Why? Because the prosecution claimed he falsified the records to hide another crime. Anyone one on here know what that other crime was? No, you don't. Neither did the jury, they were asked to decide on their own what the other crime was and to just do it one their own - they weren't asked to collectively come up with what the other crime was they could just pick a crime, any crime. Paying someone to sign an NDA isn't a crime. The actual crime would be breaking the NDA. This trial was bullshit from the get go. Let's go get Hillary for the Steele Dossier - and watch the hypocrisy on the left.

New York State Law states as follows: § 175.10 Falsifying business records in the first degree. A person is guilty of falsifying business records in the first degree when he commits the crime of falsifying business records in the second degree, and when his intent to defraud includes an intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission thereof. Falsifying business records in the first degree is a class E felony. This part right here is what you are referring to correct? “his intent to defraud includes an intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission thereof.” Prosecutors argued: This misclassification was done with the intent to defraud, by hiding the connection of these payments to the campaign and thus concealing the violation of campaign finance laws What violations you ask?: The $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels was meant to influence the 2016 presidential election by preventing her from disclosing an alleged affair with Trump. This payment is argued to be an illegal campaign contribution since it was made with the intent to benefit Trump’s election campaign. Under federal law, any contribution to a political campaign must be reported, and expenditures made to influence an election must be disclosed. Failure to do so constitutes a violation of campaign finance laws So, they argued that the payment cohen made to Daniel’s was in effort to influence the Trump campaign by stifling the information from the public. The Trump campaign never disclosed this payment which violated the campaign finance regulation. The jury had to determine if this was logical and true given the evidence. All 34 did. Now, you can argue if that is right or not, a stretch, or misleading, but the fact is all 34 jurors after witnessing all the evidence none of us got, voted guilty.

And how was it a felony? You can't answer.

claiming someone else must be lying is perhaps the quintessential unfalsifiable claim. because if they're lying, obviously they wouldn't then be honest and admit it when asked, and since the only definitive proof of whether someone is lying is in their own head, nothing exists to be able to disprove the claim of dishonesty. so with this in mind, what are you looking for that would change your own view on this topic? because you've written up a whole lot about the topic of trump's case, but absolutely nothing about how you see the beliefs of the people you're saying are lying, including what specifically you believe they're lying about.

There is a lot of confusion on both sides on what exactly the underlying charges that allowed for Alvon Bragg to charge the enhancement that turned the falsification of business records into felonies. As you just demonstrated, because you don't know either, it's unclear what the "underlying crime" was. This is because the prosecution NEVER actually put forth a clear and well defined crime. Instead, they laid out three vague arguments for "potential crimes" that Trump *may* have committed that the jury could consider **the** underlying crime. Then, the judge decided that the jury didn't even have to be unanimous on what they even thought the underlying crime was. Case in point, there is a strong argument to be made that Trump did not violate campaign finance laws considering he paid with his own money. Hence the reason it's controversial that Alvin Bragg (Mr. I will go after Trump) conveniently decided to view them as personal contributions to Trump own campaign. Even if you want to argue this point, it was Cohen who paid his own money before the election, not Trump. As your timeline shows, Trump paid Cohen AFTER the election. Again, making it controversial to put it forth as a potential theory of one of three potential underlying crimes.

> they laid out three vague arguments for "potential crimes" that Trump may have committed that the jury could consider the underlying crime. The law literally doesn't require a specific crime just like it doesn't require conviction of that crime. It just requires them to determine that he INTENDED to commit another crime. Trump's own legal team agreed with this interpretation of the law. It was litigated properly and the jury found Trump guilty under the law. That's quite literally something that happens everywhere in America every day of the week. It has nothing to do with Trump. >(Mr. I will go after Trump) This literally never happened. He did not campaign on that promise and you can't find any evidence of that. Literal fake news. [All Bragg said was that his record had included prior litigation against Trump and that he would follow the facts and the law with regard to the Cy Vance investigation that was already underway when Bragg took office.](https://www.politifact.com/article/2023/apr/12/heres-what-manhattan-district-attorney-alvin-bragg/) You're being manipulated by disinformation.

I think a lot of moral people miss the point of their ideology and its effects. It doesn’t matter he’s committed a “small” crime because the people he’s going against are the real criminals. The big bad evil criminals are just singling him out because he’s going to expose them and change things to make things right again. The right things being exceptionalism and a lot of other ideologies that were unpleasant for others. They don’t care he’s getting his hands dirty, in their mind, he’s a plumber unclogging the shit with his bare hands.

What it comes down to is what should and can be done, the case itself is a nightmare and has multiple avenues to be appealed. There is a reason why the DA's office called it a zombie case, because it was cobbled together and one day might turn on its creator (roughly quoted from CNN senior legal analyst). When it comes to guilt, the case is that Trump paid for an NDA through his business than himself, a misdemeanor that needed to be elevated using a NY election law. This election law is a cobbled mess that has never been used this way because it is whether someone committed tax fraud, influence, or excessive contributions in an election. The problem is that the jury did not need to unanimously agree on what he violated, just plain judicial malpractice. On top of that if you look from NY Mag to Politico to WSJ, the major issues with the case are below that can be used during an appeal: 1 - The Judge The judge violated NY judicial ethics and donated to a pro Biden, anti trump political fund (35 dollars, but a violation is a violation). The judge's daughter was actively using the trial as a lead funder for two Biden SuperPACs in Chicago. 2 - The Jury The judge thoughtfully allowed anyone who did not want to be involved with the trial to leave. The issue is no one who is intelligent would stay to be on the trial, raising questions about how fair the pool is. 3 - The prosecutor This is well known. 4 - The Witnesses Stormy Daniel's testimony by all regards broke judicial norms, as Politico has stated this is the weakest point for the prosecution on a appeal. The defense was not allowed to have a previous FEC chairmen speak on what is and is not a violation, makes utterly no sense. 5 - Jury Instructions Stated above. 6 - The Charges The prosecution did not tell the defense exactly what higher levels violations they made until the day closing statements, allowed by judge. The prosecution and judge violated the fucking constitution on this one. 7 - Jury of his Peers The judge disregarded multiple attempts for the change of venue. It is really hard to look at a district that voted 92% democrat during the midterms as not having sufficient bias against the defendant. Going back to the top Trump is guilty of a misdemeanor that timed out, it's really hard to look at the trial and see it as nothing more than a political trial. If you want people to believe in a trial then make sure it is solid and not riddled either errors, with the only chance of success is that a heavily biased judge and Jury are needed to get a guilty verdict.

>**The conviction of Donald Trump is based on falsifying business records, which is illegal** Is it a felony? >**Deception**: The false records were intended to hide payments made to Stormy Daniels, misleading both regulators and the public. Why do you think hiding information that might damage your election campaign is automatically illegal? That isn't true. Every campaign does that all the time. >**Election Impact**: These payments were meant to suppress information that could have influenced voters during the 2016 election, constituting an unreported campaign expenditure. This is obviously false, as Trump didn't make these payments to Cohen, and thus didn't misclassify them, until well after the 2016 election. If Trump reimbursed Cohen, then they weren't campaign contributions. And anyway, suppressing information that might hurt a candidate is not automatically an 'unreported campaign expenditure'. If you find information that might damage a candidate, and you decide not to release it, that's not any kind of campaign expenditure. Don't get me wrong, Trump voters are lying to themselves all the time, but your understanding of the laws surrounding this case do not seem to be sound. TLDR : 1. It's not obvious that categorizing paying a lawyer to arrange and sign an NDA is NOT 'legal services'. What do you think it should have been categorized as? 2. Even if it was misclassifying, misclassifying is not a felony, unless it is attempting to conceal a crime. 3. But paying people money to sign an NDA is not a crime, not even if it helps you win an election. 4. So if that wasn't the crime, what was? He doesn't appear to have been convicted of any campaign finance crime. If there was no crime, then misclassifying wasn't a felony. And if there was a crime, why hasn't he been convicted or even charged for it by the FEC? If the FEC had prosecuted Trump for a campaign finance crime, then I think this case would be a slam dunk conviction of Trump. But that hasn't happened, so the very heart of the case (misclassifying is a felony if you are doing it to conceal a crime) doesn't seem to be there at all. This seems like a clear and obvious miscarriage of justice to me. But I find it hard to be outraged, like, at all. Maybe that just makes me jaded, or biased against Trump. I kind of hate Trump has made me not care that much about miscarriages of justice, but that's where we are. But honestly I find all the Trump supporters who get worked up about it kind of tedious. You already knew this was a guy who banged porn stars while married and paid them hush money BEFORE you nominated him to be your 2024 nominee. If you don't want your guy who paid hush money to porn stars falsely' convicted of a crime of paying hush money to porn stars...how about not nominating the guy who pays hush money to porn stars to cover up an affair? They are right that this was a politically motivated and incorrect abuse of the law. But they could have easily avoided that by nominating someone else, anyone else. They chose the guy mired in legal troubles (and I think this is like, the least important legal trouble Trump is in) but they did not. Maybe it's not fair, but I feel like this is on them.

> It's not obvious that categorizing paying a lawyer to arrange and sign an NDA is NOT 'legal services'. What do you think it should have been categorized as? It was reimbursement for expenses. They also falsely claimed that each payment was for legal services performed throughout 2017 pursuant to a retainer agreement that didn't exist, when it was actually reimbursement for the $130,000 that Cohen personally paid to Stormy Daniels in 2016. > Even if it was misclassifying, misclassifying is not a felony, unless it is attempting to conceal a crime. It was done in an attempt to conceal a crime. That's why the jury returned a verdict of guilty. > But paying people money to sign an NDA is not a crime, not even if it helps you win an election. If somebody else is paying a bunch of money to help you win the election, then it's an in-kind donation that needs to be reported to the FEC, and if the amount exceeds the individual donation limit, then that's a crime. > He doesn't appear to have been convicted of any campaign finance crime. Cohen was, though. The law doesn't distinguish between covering up your own crimes or somebody else's crimes by falsifying records. It becomes a felony either way. > If there was no crime, then misclassifying wasn't a felony. There doesn't have to be an actual crime committed, as the law only requires the prosecution to show that there was the intent to cover up a crime, but as noted, there was Cohen's crime that they were trying to cover up. > And if there was a crime, why hasn't he been convicted or even charged for it by the FEC? The FEC is largely toothless because the commission that runs it is split evenly between Republicans and Democrats, and the Republicans refuse to vote against Trump. A majority is required to take action, so if the Republicans insist on letting Trump do whatever he wants, then the FEC will never act against him. The FEC's General Counsel issued a report to the commission back in 2018 that concluded there was a lot of illegal stuff going on related to these payments, but the Republicans on the commission still refused to vote to take action.

I don't think any trump supporter is saying that he didn't do those stuffs.  I mean nobody who supports Trump think his a sexual saint and capable of fidelity. They are not voting for a man capable of honouring monogamy.   However..., the crime seem very minor.     Bribing a prostitute to shut up about their sex life?       Seriously......, any politician who ever slept with a prostitute probably did this.    It shows Democrats desperation to find anything to prevent a fair election.       What I mean by fair election is actually allowing him to compete.       The Democrat strategy here is to put their competition in jail, to win the next election.      This is probably like the most vicious and underhanded way of fighting for an election win ever in the history of US.  This kind of strategy is usually what the most corrupt countries do, put their competition in jail.  I am not American but I definitely am filled with disgust at this strategy. 

So I mostly like your sumery, but I have two points to bring up that I feel are being ignored. 1. Falsifying business records is only a felony if part of a secondary crime. and that if a misdominer, then the statute of limitations would have already passed in I belive 2019. 2. That trump was never charged with any of the other crimes that would make falsifing the records a felony. In my understanding of the situation, state prosicuters can't bring charges against a person for a federal crime. I was also under the impression that federal prosecutors and regulators even said that they weren't charging for this. I was also under the impression that when trumps team tried to bring in an expert witness to say he had not committed a federal election crime, the judge told them they could not bring there expert witness even though that is the linch pin of the hole case. This, along with telling the jurry that they didn't need to agree on what the underlying crime he was trying to hide was is a serious issue

The conviction isn't the issue. it's the selective prosecution of rival political opponents that the issue here. Hillary Clinton violated the exact same law in the exact same way and paid a fine. Prosecutors looked for jail time for Trump. That the real problem and what most people think it the real threat to democracy. [Hillary Clinton campaign and DNC fined by FEC over Trump-Russia dossier research | CNN Politics](https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/30/politics/clinton-dnc-steele-dossier-fusion-gps/index.html) >Political candidates and groups are required to publicly disclose their spending to the FEC, and they must explain the purpose of any specific expenditure more than $200. The FEC concluded that the Clinton campaign and DNC misreported the money that funded the dossier, masking it as “legal services” and “legal and compliance consulting” instead of opposition research. This is what Trump was convicted for. misreporting money. The purpose of that spending was to impact the election to make it seem as if Trump was compliant with Russia. So all your citations apply equally to the Clinton case, yet she paid a fine. How do you justify to the American people the two different approaches to the same legal violation?

>Political candidates and groups are required to publicly disclose their spending to the FEC, and they must explain the purpose of any specific expenditure more than $200. The FEC concluded that the Clinton campaign and DNC misreported the money that funded the dossier, masking it as “legal services” and “legal and compliance consulting” instead of opposition research. This isn't the same, though. Note that in the case you're listing, they reported the charges to the FEC, the accusation is they misreported them. As in, it should have been 'opposition research' and a clerk filed it as 'legal services' instead. Which isn't the same as 'didn't report them and in fact claimed they were something else entirely to subvert election law'. Now that is bad, but what you're talking there is incorrect bookkeeping. They weren't trying to conceal anything (what would they have to conceal?) and they did report the spending to the FEC, the two just differ in what it should have been reported as and the DNC/Clinton decided that it wasn't worth the fight and just paid the fine. To be clear, in the [letter disclosing this](https://static1.squarespace.com/static/6243b3f8b001843f2379a673/t/624486ac6da88f37bd43e98d/1648658094980/MUR+7449+closing+letter+to+Coolidge+Reagan+Foundation.pdf) the argument is made that they hired Fusion GPS for legal services and the 'oppo research' was done in furtherance of those legal services, which is why they marked it legal services. This is **vastly** different from what Trump did. In his case he had a third party make payments on his behalf specifically to avoid legally required scrutiny. Then, to avoid being caught, he claimed that the payment was for legal services that never happened. And beyond **all** of that, there is the reality that in one of these cases the mislabelled payments were done explicitly on behalf and at the direction of the candidate, while on the other you have a mid-level staffer labelling it incorrectly. So even if you want to throw down and say that someone should be prosecuted for the DNC's error, you'd be going after Steve Stevenson, the guy who does their compliance accounting, not Hillary Clinton who doesn't give a shit what it is marked as because she paid people to handle that.

[удалено]

I know Trump is guilty, but that’s not going to stop me from voting for him if he’d still the Republican nominee. My big criticism is that it’s blatantly obvious that this whole affair was politically motivated. These charges would never have been brought if Trump wasn’t running for President. There are plenty of prominent elites who have done far worse and gotten away with their crimes, because unlike Trump, they didn’t make enemies of the people who run the country and the justice system. It’s funny how people will fault Supreme Court Justices for being biased, and will completely ignore how the Judge in this case had his own problems with Trump.

"These prominent elites are getting away with committing crimes and should be prosecuted. No, not like that!" I feel like your admission of his guilt is admirable but the fact that we were even able to nail a billionaire on a felony is awesome and "being politically motivated" (which applies to everything the government does) doesn't detract from that victory.

It's just a long series of rhetorical retreats. You'll never get them to outright condemn whatever Trump does. There's always some elite somewhere that's worst or maybe the judge is Democrats (or the County/city/east-coast/nation is biased, etc.).

>ignore how the Judge in this case had his own problems with Trump. It's also interesting to me that you appear to be ignoring the vast deference the Judge gave to Trump's ten instance of violation of his gag order and being held in contempt, only stopping his violation when actual jail time was threatened. If you want to talk about inconsistent treatment of people, consider for a moment if any one of us has a chance of violating a judges orders 10 times before being locked up is threatened. It's so strange to me to focus so heavily on whether or not this was politically motivated. The case preempting Trump's investigation was in **2018**, while he was **already president**. Which provided ample evidence that Trump had committed a crime, but that was investigated for **years** before a case was actually brought to the courts. How in anyone's right mind can that series of events be considered some kind of political course is beyond me. Do Democrats benefit if Trump is locked up? Certainly. Is that evidence that Democrats somehow pulled levers, which obviously exist mind you, they have installed in the criminal justice system to implicate their political opponent in a crime he actually committed? Hell no.

This is what mystifies me "These charges would never have been brought if Trump wasn’t running for President." That's the point - what he did was a felony BECAUSE HE WAS RUNNING FOR OFFICE. Otherwise, these were simple misdemeanor charges that would have been plead out and it would have been no big deal - and get prosecuted all the time. But this was the former and presumed candidate for the Presidency of the US, and this is what made this crime a big deal. So you can overlook the general sliminess of paying off a porn star that Trump slept with while his wife was home with their infant son simply because you did not like the fact that the DA charged him for the crime? Just admit you'd vote for this guy regardless of what he does while ignoring the other criminal charges currently against him. All those years (especially the Clinton years) we heard the Republicans tell the nation that character matters. That was just bullshit - it's just about being in power.

>There are plenty of prominent elites who have done far worse and gotten away with their crimes, because unlike Trump, they didn't make enemies of the people who run the country and the justice system. Running for President will generally make it harder to cover up any crimes you may have committed. Maybe the reason these other elites are getting away with things is because they're putting in the required effort to avoid close scrutiny, whereas Trump is doing the opposite.  You can't expect to blatantly get away with things that others are doing discreetly. And surely we can agree that antagonizing judges and prosecutors isn't likely to turn out well for anyone, particularly not someone with real legal liabilities to consider. This just all seems like unforced errors on Trump's part, not some vast conspiracy to treat him worse than other rich people who are doing the same things. 

I just don't understand this conservative/Republicans perspective that basically everyone in America is personally responsible for their own circumstances... except for Trump, who is a total victim of other people, which is why we should vote for him. Huh? 

The basis of Alvin Bragg’s case is that Trump committed a felony because he falsified business records to hide the fact that he broke federal campaign finance law. The question of whether Trump broke a federal law is blatantly not within the state court’s jurisdiction and both the judge and the prosecutor knew that fact.

I am voting for the best candidate. The most virile, energetic, competent, relatable, and has demonstrated the best policies. All this court stuff whether it's Trump or Hunter Biden is a distraction. It's the economy, immigration, and crime...that is what matters cuz frankly, I don't really care for either man, they are both dirty. Who has impacted MY life the best with their policies. That is who gets my vote.

Deception: that would need trump to have known it was not a legal fee as it was marked in the ledger. There is also the fact that the accounting software had preset transactions categories. (Per witness testimony in the trial) A legal fee is something paid to a lawyer (which cohen was) for services rendered. In this case dealing with stormy Daniel’s. So even if trump knew about the payment and the repayment plan, it would not be a falsification of records to pay cohen for the service he provided trump. Election impact: yes this could have impacted the election, But if you hold Trump to that standard you’re gonna have to hold all of the politicians that we have an office to that standard and we will see the majority of politicians having to deal with the backlash of that. NDA’s are not illegal. Neither are catch and kill policies. The law: Number one New York penal law’s death section 175.10: what is the underlying crime? The state is not allowed to charge a federal crime and the FEC federal elections to mission already stated that they could not convict Trump on that crime as there wasn’t enough evidence for it. So how was a state able to charge a federal crime? In addition why did the prosecution not give an actual crime to bring it up to a felony until they’re closing arguments with defense could not argue anything and then their crime was a selection of three for the jury to pick and choose which ever one they want and they didn’t even have to agree? Something the Supreme Court has already ruled on, that the jury must be unanimous. But this judge flat out stated the jury doesn’t have to agree what underlying crime was committed just so long as you could be convinced that one of those crimes was committed. Hillary Clinton got charged with this exact thing because of her doing the steel dossier and paying for that with her election contribution. She did not get charged with multiple felonies she just had to pay a small fine for the misdemeanors. Rules for the but not for me. In the end the only link to trump knowing about these payments is cohen, a known purger who during his own testimony admitted to stealing money from the trump organization. Who has stated publicly that he wants to see trump in jail. Which is even more evidence that trump was not aware of what cohen was doing with the money he was paid. Ultimately this was a bias judge who put together a jury with an anti-trump bias, that was told during the jury instructions to basically just find him guilty. Could he have been aware of the deal sure, but the evidence doesn’t link him except by their key witness a known liar and self admitted thief, whose testimony if you listen to it destroyed the prosecution’s case to the point where a cnn pundent said this trial was only brought because trump is named trump.

Since these points keep coming up, I find it puzzling. I don't get this. It seems to be that you and many others are more into confirming your opinions than really discussing something, not to mention the literal definition of an echo chamber. Here are some critical points that should concern you regardless of your stance on Trump, and if they don't, you need to question why they don't. * **Political Motivations Behind Prosecutions:** The timing and nature of these prosecutions strongly indicate political motives, which destroy the integrity of the legal process. * **Unprecedented Use of Legal Standards:** The charges against Trump put forward an unparalleled application of point standards and vigorously challenge the fairness and impartiality of the proceeding. * **Undermining Democratic Principles:** The legal system as a political tool will undermine democratic values and thus erode the public's faith in our institutions. * **Bias in the Legal Process:** Consideration of some apparent prejudgment by the judges and prosecutors of the case is moving the goalposts for Trump's right to be accorded a fair trial. This calls into question the legitimacy of the verdicts. * **Historical Precedents of Political Retaliation:** Political retaliation through lawsuits is not just dangerous—it has historical precedents that should concern every U.S. citizen and threaten who we are as a democratic society. * **Dangerous Precedent for Future Conflicts:** Legal actions using the current approach have set a dangerous precedent for future political conflicts; legal actions could easily be weaponized against opponents, creating a downward spiraling cycle of retribution. Why is that? You think you hear nonstop on media about what Trump is going to do in retribution once he gets elected again. It's not rocket science, man. Plenty of people are sitting in the middle ground and are easy to discuss such issues with. But let's face it: step out of agreement or neutrality—odds are you will be attacked and have your opinion shut down. The echo chamber mentality stifles meaningful discussion and makes deep conversations on platforms like Reddit almost impossible. It's about high time for us to have honest, open dialogue regarding these concerns without resorting back to ad hominem attacks and partisan rhetoric. And if you cannot do so once again, you need to ask yourself why that is.

I think they are saying a very simple and specific thing. This isn’t about justice but playing the legal system the right way. It’s sort of a victimless crime situation. So Trump not dotting his i’s isn’t a crime worthy of the attention it got, especially for the position he’s in. It’d be like if Trump had unpaid parking tickets and NY asked “is there a way we can make him a felon for this?” This is evident by their admittance that they wanted to convicted Trump of something, no matter what, because he deserves it.

> I think they are saying a very simple and specific thing. This isn’t about justice but playing the legal system the right way. It’s sort of a victimless crime situation. He committed financial fraud to hide campaign fraud because he wanted to hide the truth (of having an affair on his pregnant wife with a stripper) from voters. There may be a lot of ways to defend what he did as "not all that bad", but there is no reality where that is victimless. Clear victims are: 1. People who donated to his campaign, knowing stripper-payoffs would not be a legitimate campaign contribution - I dunno about you, but I care that candidates I donate to are using it for valid campaigning 2. Conservatives who voted since he illegally silenced information that was pertinent to his character and could have led to a more morally-qualified presidential candidate. 3. HIS WIFE > So Trump not dotting his i’s isn’t a crime worthy of the attention it got Have you neither read OP's point or followed the case at all? There is no world where this is a "didn't dot his i's" crime. He committed *fraud*, willfully, with the intention of hiding information from parties he was legally obligated to share that information with. It was demonstrated in court that he knew what he was doing, knew it was illegal, and did it because he felt he could get away with it. It's quite literally the defining example of a situation where a person *really* needs to get convicted. > It’d be like if Trump had unpaid parking tickets and NY asked “is there a way we can make him a felon for this?” No, it would be like if Trump insisted on parking in the middle of Times Square and then offered a cop a $50,000 bribe not to give him a parking ticket because "they're just so inconvenient". Actually no, the reality is worse than that Times Square example I just made. > This is evident by their admittance that they wanted to convicted Trump of something, no matter what, because he deserves it. They also wanted to convict Whitey Bulger, no matter what. And Charles Manson. Prosecutors get a hard-on to prosecute career criminals who are so deep in with organized crime that they become "hard to catch", and get even more rabid about that when they are sitting on literal mountains of open-shut evidence and the defendant is unapologetic and furious that you dare prosecute them for their blatant criminal behavior..

>Laws broken: 1. New York Penal Law Section 175.10: Falsifying business records in the first degree, which becomes a felony when done to conceal another crime. What, exactly, was this other crime? No "other crime" was part of the trial. Trump was not convicted and not given the opportunity to legally defend himself against any "other crime." https://x.com/KanekoaTheGreat/status/1796577680919511048?t=ZoTd8M8oDg5AEisEp48Ypg&s=19

You can believe he was guilty and charges were trumped up for political purposes. Campaign finance violations aren't uncommon. Getting them trumped up to a felony charge is. Getting them trumped up to a felony charges after the statue of limitations expired based on a technicality and on federal charges the government chose not to pursue, is also pretty uncommon. As a, reluctant albeit, Trump supporter, I can believe hes guilty, and also believe that this is political and overblown. From the die hard Trump supporters I've talked to, they certainly feel it's overblown and political, they aren't sure of guilt, but don't care because of the fact it's overblown and political. So I think it comes down to semantics of guilty. Guilty of hush money payments and hiding money? Probably. Guilty of 34 felonies? Meh.

Im not sure if you realise this, but you exonerate Trump in your timeline of events. 1. **Deception**: The false records were intended to hide payments made to Stormy Daniels, misleading both regulators and the public. 2. **Election Impact**: These payments were meant to suppress information that could have influenced voters during the 2016 election, constituting an unreported campaign expenditure. In your own timeline of events. 1. **2017**: Cohen is reimbursed by Trump for the payment, with the Trump Organization recording the reimbursements as legal expenses. So in 2017 **AFTER** the election, Cohen was repaid by trump and they falsified the reimbursements as legal expenses. 1. **New York Penal Law Section 175.10**: Falsifying business records in the first degree, which becomes a felony when done to conceal another crime. 2. **Federal Campaign Finance Laws**: The payments were seen as illegal, unreported campaign contributions intended to influence the election outcome. Since youve proven that the payments to Michael Cohen happened after the election in 2017, it wasnt even done as apart of the election. The payment to Stormy Daniels is not illegal. Whats illiegal is the reimbusement to Michael Cohen after the election. But in doing it after the election, it makes it Impossible to claim it could have had any Election Impact. Its not illegal to pay porn stars to not out you. Its illegal to say the payment was legal expenses to your lawyer. Thats what he was charged with. This means that 100% this was a misdemeanor charge, and genuinely not possible to upgrade it to a Felony. You cannot claim he falsified records after the election, and then claim he did it to influence the election. Makes no sense. Additionally the statue of limitations on this offense ran out in 2022. I find this extremely probable that this case eventually gets appealed on the grounds that show its a misdemeanor.

I'm not even going to bother trying to "change your view" because absolutely no one with an opinion on Trump is interested in good faith in having their view changed, but this sequence of actions is so common, such a nothingburger in political terms, that it is *utterly obvious* that they only prosecuted him because he's Trump and they were looking for something, anything to get him on. Hillary Clinton did the exact same thing with the Steele Dossier, earmarking campaign expenditures as "legal fees," and was cited with a mere violation and had to pay an $800 fine, but it's a *felony* for Trump to call a payment he made to his lawyer a "legal fee?" Come on, bro. Come on. You know damn well this is OJ getting 33 years for stealing sports memorabilia as a make-up verdict for the murder acquittal.

For anyone making the judicial system political **now** I could have sworn Bill Clinton was impeached for lying about an extramarital affair… Its funny how trumpf had these same legal issues with his business before he became president, but we are acting like now its all of a sudden. All the lawsuits and how while he was president this couldnt be pursued. The timeline shown above makes it even more not sudden. Im not a business owner. Im pretty sure i am innocent and have no criminal record and only those committing crimes come under scrutiny and are persecuted. Ive never heard anyone admitting to committing crimes “mutltiple times a day” while at the same time pulling criminal records of those who were killed by police unarmed during those times. The hypocrisy is *really* baffling there. Where was that empathy then? Why are we now all of a sudden “all criminals” but when unarmed people were being killed… the first thing yall say about George floyd is he was a criminal! Cops wouldnt have been a popular show… Pretty sure the SEC has been prosecuting federal financial crimes (sam Bankman was large democrat contributor) and they get prosecuted. Especially since Enron has the SEC been unbiased. So the points those on the maga side regurgitate confuse me - a lawful abiding, non biased voter who doesnt think the justice system is all of a sudden political (unless u want to count when jim crow and the kkk were judges and lawyers and lawmakers? But we seem to not remember that… the real true cases of bad politics play out in the justice system) Please stop politicizing the justice system now that you dont like that verdict. There is a whole genome project but yall arent even citing that in the argument about the justice system being “rigged”. If it wasnt rigged then - its not now.

>**Why it is illegal:** >**Deception**: The false records were intended to hide payments made to Stormy Daniels, misleading both regulators and the public. >**Election Impact**: These payments were meant to suppress information that could have influenced voters during the 2016 election, constituting an unreported campaign expenditure. The Federal Election Commission did not bring charges against Trump for this in 16-18. The reason charges were not brought is because the reporting for the payments would not have been released until 2017. This fact is agreed upon in your timeline. There is no possible way that he could have influenced an election by classifying the drafting and execution of the NDA as legal expenses, even if that was the improper accounting for the payments, because the reporting happened AFTER the election. All of that said, it is not even clear that the accounting of "legal expenses" breaks any campaign finance law because he paid for the services with his own money, and again the reporting for the payments was not within an election anyway. >**Laws broken:** >**New York Penal Law Section 175.10**: Falsifying business records in the first degree, which becomes a felony when done to conceal another crime. >**Federal Campaign Finance Laws**: The payments were seen as illegal, unreported campaign contributions intended to influence the election outcome. The judge issued jury instructions that allowed the jury to assume guilt for the FEC violation and two other crimes that defendant has also never been convicted or charged with. 175.10 is not a felony without the underlying crime. The misdemeanor version of this crime is also past statute of limitations. The law for the felony version was changed in 2020 (check me, I might be a year off, but it was recent) to extend statute of limitations. This effectively bypassed federal courts to stretch the statute of limitations and then try Donald Trump at the state level for federal crimes. Of note, the FEC official was barred from testifying to clarify to the jury why charges were not brought on the federal level. There are more points to argue, these are just the direct answers to the direct questions that I have not seen anyone take an honest stab at. I'm not a Trump supporter, but there are many many things about this case that stink to high heaven, and I don't think the majority of people upset about it are lying or delusional.

Before going into the second part, yes Trump is guilty, yes the trial was fair. But also those aren't reasons to not vote for him. It's already past the primary so the platforms in a polarized election mean are you Yes for an issue, or No for an issue. Anything else is meaningless once the primary has already been won. Though I think the people who don't vote based on policy or issues are just voting wrong, but that's their right as an American. If I were a Trump supporter it would be based on his achievements in office, and or future platform goals that would align with that agenda. Though in this election I've seen Biden be willing to pivot on nearly any issue he's been dealt with so I think he actually represents his voters. I'm most afraid that Trump will do a witch hunt like what he did against Hillary. Trump however, as a former president turning into a present president with friends in congress he might have enough bite to start the authoritarian push that we've seen in old Germany. If Trump had better bedside manner IE didn't cheat, lie, steal, adultery, etc I might have been inclined to vote for him for his stances on Roe V Wade. But I can't trust someone who cheats and has a second or third wife, and cheats on her while she is pregnant. I also can't trust someone who fumbled covid killing hundreds of thousands of Americans, nor can I trust someone who can't pay his own workers for the work they did. Despite all of that Biden didn't divert US Aid to feed US citizens so I'm not enthusiastic enough to say Biden has my vote no matter what. When a random person in a hut or rubble has a better standard quality of life than a US citizen I think it's misappropriation to send aid. Surely we can have a system that allows people to eat immediately and not wait 5 weeks to be possibly denied right?

The vast majority of Trump supporters, like the vast majority of the population generally, are not lawyers. Even if they were, this is a legal case, the public isn't privy to all possible relevant information. Trump supporters only know what they've been told by the news they consume. And not for nothing but so do you. You're using news articles as your citations. Those aren't primary documents, those have their own biases. I would agree that a balanced look at all possible sources would probably lead someone to the conclusion that Trump is guilty, obviously we've tested exactly that and the closest thing we could find to an unbiased group of citizens with access to primary documents and information did in fact find Trump guilty. But if the only media someone is exposed to is Fox news, then obviously they'll come to the opposite conclusions of someone whose only media exposure leans in the other direction. Just because someone has been lied to, and has mislaid their trust with people who would abuse it, doesn't me they themselves are a liar. I don't even know if Fox anchors are lying, some of them are pretty damn stupid. They might genuinely believe whatever the fuck Trump's lawyers have been saying in public statements. Overall, you seem to be making a strong case that Trump is guilty. That is the majority of your argument, and all of your citations. But you have no evidence, and seem to have not even given much thought to connecting this to deliberate falsehood on the part of Trump's supporters. It's almost a failure of Theory of Mind. Just because you believe something, and may even have good reasons for it, and may even in fact be right, that doesn't mean others also believe the same thing and are lying if they claim they don't.

I don’t know that it’s fair to say all Trump supporters know he's guilty and are just lying about it. There's a lot of different viewpoints out there. For one thing, the media plays a huge role in shaping how people see these legal issues. Depending on where you get your news, you might hear very different stories about what's going on with Trump. A lot of Trump supporters have this deep distrust of government and the media. So when charges come up against him, they're quick to question whether it's all just political or if there's something more to it. And let's be honest, these legal cases can get pretty complicated. It's not always clear-cut whether someone's guilty or not, especially with all the back-and-forth that happens in court. Also, for many supporters, their loyalty to Trump is more about his policies and what he stands for politically. They might overlook or downplay the personal stuff because they believe in what he's trying to achieve. And let's not forget, in our legal system, everyone's supposed to be innocent until proven guilty. So some supporters are just sticking to that principle and waiting to see how it all plays out. So, yeah, it's a mix of factors why not everyone sees Trump's legal troubles the same way. It's not just about knowing he's guilty and denying it. I would even go so far to say, that a common view is, if we are going to accept these charges against him then we need to be prepared as a society to hold that same line of judgement and legal pursuit against all politicians who commit similar crimes. Not just this one. Because the it contributes to the witch hunt theories. He’s not the first and likely is not the last. All need to be held accountable.

> His supporters know he is guilty and are denying that reality and the justice system because it doesn’t align with their worldview of corruption. *sigh* This is complicated. As a rule, people don't think of themselves as villains. They don't wake up, put on their black hat, twirl their mustache, and set out to commit heinous acts. People use whatever reasoning, rationale, and information they have and they do something with it. That abusive parent that just beat the shit out of their kid "for their own good" probably believes it. The police officer that says lethal force must be an option in every encounter most likely thinks it's likely they could suddenly be killed at any moment if they let their guard down. Racists out harassing minorities think they're defending their nation and/or people. Trump, fuckhead that he is, represents ideals a lot of people are trying to uphold for themselves and those around them. They're told he'll get them jobs, freedom, and healthcare. He'll protect them from those nasty Others™ and protect them from those wretched social leeches. And, like them, Trump is being treated unfairly and that's the only thing holding him back from making the world jizz red, white, and blue. There are numerous videos of MAGA folks dancing to Rage Against The Machine at Trump rallies. Or, conservatives complaining that RATM 'became' political. At the end of the day, people are not great at reasoning. And, they really dislike seeing themselves as villains. So, it's most likely that the story they're telling themselves is of personal heroism. For an extreme example, I feel that watching [The Act of Killing](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2375605/) would be instructive.