The effort to replace President Biden as the Democratic Party's 2024 nominee has lost all momentum and is essentially "over" following the assassination attempt against former President Trump, allies of the president say, according to a new report. //

As I wrote shortly after the event, this is the image that changed everything. This couldn't be more powerful if it had been deliberate, planned, and posed: Trump, bloodied but defiant, fist raised, calling out to the crowd. The American flag behind him, seemingly upside-down, which is a sign of a nation in distress. The Secret Service agents formed a wall of bodies around the former president to take a bullet for him if necessary. This, folks, is Pulitzer Prize-level photography. And this image, an image of defiance in the face of an attempted assassination, couldn't present a more stark contrast when set alongside tired, pale, befuddled old Joe Biden. //

They should concentrate on team-building, on finding candidates that have appeal beyond the urban cohorts, the coastal elites, and the radical left "progressives."

Maybe they could even take their party back to something Harry Truman would recognize. //

Steprock
9 hours ago
Look at your president, now look at mine.
Your president is a befuddled old man.
Mine is a heroic champion.
If it looks posed, that's because lesser people wish they had the power and nerve of my president. //

tanner
10 hours ago
I thought it was incredibly heroic of Trump to signal to the crowd that he was ok, like a father to a child. Then I realized he was being a father, husband first, letting his family know he was ok. //

Jennifer Van Laar tanner
9 hours ago
Same. I was watching the coverage with RedState writer Brittany Sheehan and we had tears in our eyes, thinking that. How selfless, and in a moment like that it was an instinctive reaction and not scripted. It showed who he is. //

Steve351C
10 hours ago
I don't mean any disrespect to our WW II veterans, but that picture at the top has a "Marines raising the flag at Iwo Jima" feel. It's definitely an iconic image that I would like to have on a T-shirt. No words, just the picture.

Steve Guest @SteveGuest
·
Joe Biden on 7.8.2024: "We’re done talking about the debate, it’s time to put Trump in a bullseye."
6:43 PM · Jul 13, 2024 //

Jeremy Kauffman 🦔 @jeremykauffman
·
FLASHBACK: when Congresswoman Gabby Giffords was shot in 2011, it was a widespread and mainstream story that Sarah Palin was to blame because she put crosshairs on a map
8:39 PM · Jul 13, 2024 //

Yet, here's USA Today's take when it applies to the language of Joe Biden. They even used the classic "Republicans pounced."

Republicans pounced on Biden's remarks after the shooting, even though there is no evidence tying those comments to the attack on Trump or the shooter's motivation. //

The bullseye comment is not just "one (bad night) comment' -- the problem is how Biden and the left have continually targeted Trump as the devil, Hitler, not worthy of respect or being treated like a normal opponent, dehumanizing him, calling him an existential "threat to democracy." //

anon-055q
6 hours ago
"It's time to put Trump in a bullseye." - Joe Biden

"Will no one rid me of this troublesome priest?"

Corey Comperatore, 50, who served as the fire chief for Buffalo Township, was shot and killed by Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, at the rally, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro said Sunday. //

He was the best dad a girl could ever ask for. My sister and I never needed for anything. You call, he would answer, and he would do whatever it is you needed, and if he didn't know he would figure out how. He could talk and make friends with anyone, which he was doing all day yesterday and loved every minute of it. //

Allyson also wrote about her dad's faith: "He was a man of God, loved Jesus, and also looked after our church and members as family." //

The media will not tell you that he died a real-life super hero. They are not going to tell you how quickly he threw mom and I to the ground. They are not going to tell you that he shielded my body from the bullet that came at us.

He loved his family. He truly loved us enough to take a real bullet for us. And I want nothing more than to cry on him and tell him thank you. I want nothing more than to wake up and for this to not be reality for me and my family.

GBenton
5 hours ago edited
Why do we assume they screwed up? Far as I'm concerned, an error like that should be considered planned until proven otherwise. No one is that stupid, no operation is that sloppy. The roof was left unguarded and the shooter knew that would be the case or he wouldn't have been there.

Occam's Razor, this was intentional.

Online leftists are saying the screw up was the shooter missed.

Believe them.

Not giving these monsters the benefit of the doubt with "incompetence" when the week before Biden said it was time to put a a bullseye on Trump.

When they tell you who they are, believe them. //

JWAmerican Snowblind
5 hours ago
Leaving an elevated platform within easy rifle range is willful malice, not stupidity. Like he said, when they tell you who they are, believe them. //

The Original John Doe Snowblind
4 hours ago
"Never assume malice where simple stupidity will suffice."

NO! When dealing with evil always assume to worst most twisted thing you can think of. Then reality will reveal it was even more twisted.

Most conservatives, are too loving, caring and moral to comprehend pure evil that has zero ounces of love, care or morality at any time. Not even simply stupidity explains how a gunman got inside the secret service perimeter which should have extended well BEYOND the building the shooter was on top of. //

GBenton BeeInMyBonnet
5 hours ago
I have no idea but that's what it looks like. The top of the USS denied requested increases in protection. Biden said put a bullseye on him. The counter sniper was looking in the exact direction of the shooter and didn't have to move to fire. So it's possible the roof was left open, the counter sniper was looking somewhere else and ignored the obvious elevated position, and the police decided an eye witness pointing to a man on the roof wasn't worth exploring all by coincidence, but I think that sounds unbelievable.

How would that shooter have known the roof would be unguarded? Why would USS leadership be more incompetent than a toddler and not post anyone on that rooftop or at least scan it constantly with the counter sniper team?

I don't know. Is it possible a large collection of people were all that incompetent OR it was a plan to take Trump out and take out the shooter so he couldn't talk.

Which is more believable? //

GBenton BeeInMyBonnet
4 hours ago
My guess is the plan came from the top and those at the ground level were deceived or mislead somehow. I too don't believe everyone on the ground was involved. But if the security plan had a hole and the regime had a patsy, then maybe that's how this happened.

I don't believe everyone there was corrupt. I also don't believe the ones who drew up the security plan were all incompetent and stupid.

This window of opportunity was filled with a disposable shooter and to quote Biden, the idea that was an accident is hard to believe. Too many people had to be absolute morons for that to be true.

smagar
2 hours ago
I am seeing, in today's coverage on TV and online, this theme emerging that "both sides do it, so both sides need to tone down their language."

Did any crazy Republican shoot up the Democrat Congressional baseball team?

Did any crazy Republican tackle a Democrat Senator and break his ribs?

Did any Republican Senate leader threaten SCOTUS justices, as Chuck Schumer did?

Did any Republican Congressional leader urge his/her supporters to find Democrat legislators in public and harass them, as Maxine Waters did.

Did any Republican lead political operative volunteer to do "wetwork" (rhetorically, of course) against Joe Biden, as James Carville offered to do against Donald Trump?

Did any Republican-run cities allow Antifa and anti-Israel protesters to run wild?

If Republican leaders, by their silence, acquiesce as the left builds a public perception that both sides do it, then the public will conclude that both sides really do do it, so both sides are equally guilty.

Based on what I know so far, I reject that. IMO we should, too.

With unwavering love for her husband and her country, Melania Trump set a shining example of strength, resolve, and love with these powerful words:

I am thinking of you, now, my fellow Americans.

We have always been a unique union. America, the fabric of our gentle nation is tattered, but our courage and common sense must ascend and bring us back together as one.

When I watched that violent bullet strike my husband, Donald, I realized my life, and Barron’s life were on the brink of devastating change. I am grateful to the brave secret service agents and law enforcement officials who risked their own lives to protect my husband.

To the families of the innocent victims who are now suffering from this heinous act, I humbly offer my sincerest sympathy. Your need to summon your strength for such a terrible reason saddens me.
...
We are all humans, and fundamentally, instinctively, we want to help one another. American politics are only one vehicle that can uplift our communities. Love, compassion, kindness and empathy are necessities.

And let us remember that when the time comes to look beyond the left and the right, beyond the red and the blue, we all come from families with the passion to fight for a better life together, while we are here, in this earthly realm.

Dawn is here again. Let us reunite. Now.

This morning, ascend above the hate, the vitriol, and the simple-minded ideas that ignite violence. We all want to world where respect is paramount, family is first, and love transcends. We can realize this world again. Each of us must demand to get it back. We must insist that respect fills the cornerstone of our relationships, again.

I am thinking of you, my fellow Americans.

The winds of change have arrived. For those of you who cry in support, I thank you. I commend those of you who have reached out beyond the political divide – thank you for remembering that every single politician is a man or woman with a loving family.

jester6
a few seconds ago
To me, the most disguising feature of people on the left is that they do not understand human nature, especially when it comes to violence and reciprocity.

They think violence is just an antiseptic theoretical concept. They treat it like an idea or theory you would toss around in a classroom or dope-infused bull session in a dorm room. They seem to believe violence is something you can experiment with and then turn off with just a few words.

They also never consider the fact that humans are hardwired to be reciprocal. If someone gives us a gift, we are more likely to give a gift in return. If someone wrongs us, we are more likely to wrong them back.

If you read the history of any major conflict, you will find that almost everyone starts with one or both sides, making fundamental mistakes when assessing their opponents.

I am certain if we ever stumble into a civil war, the left's poor understanding of human nature will be a major cause.

Sean Davis @seanmdav
·
BREAKING: A source familiar with Trump’s security detail tells @FDRLST that the former and future president’s detail has been asking for beefed up protection and resources for weeks, but has been rebuffed time and again by Biden’s DHS.

DHS, which oversees Secret Service… Show more
8:10 PM · Jul 13, 2024

But don’t listen to the naysayers, Trump advised in a tongue-in-cheek Truth Social post on Saturday—just keep doing what you’re doing. “MAKE CHINA GREAT AGAIN!”

Monday, the Supreme Court handed down a mixed bag of a ruling on presidential immunity. In my view, they took what could've been a straightforward and elegant decision — the president is immune from prosecution for acts committed in office unless he has been impeached for those acts — and turned it into a dog's breakfast of angels-on-the-head-of-a-pin litigation about what constitutes official and unofficial acts. //

What has passed with remarkably little notice is Justice Clarence Thomas's concurrence. Justice Thomas says the Court is putting the cart before the horse. The first question that needs to be answered is not whether acts were official or unofficial. The critical first question is whether this prosecution is legal at all. Thomas's comments begin on the 44th page of the linked document.

I write separately to highlight another way in which this prosecution may violate our constitutional structure. In this case, the Attorney General purported to appoint a private citizen as Special Counsel to prosecute a former President on behalf of the United States. But, I am not sure that any office for the Special Counsel has been “established by Law,” as the Constitution requires. Art. II, §2, cl. 2. By requiring that Congress create federal offices “by Law,” the Constitution imposes an important check against the President—he cannot create offices at his pleasure. If there is no law establishing the office that the Special Counsel occupies, then he cannot proceed with this prosecution. A private citizen cannot criminally prosecute anyone, let alone a former President.

No former President has faced criminal prosecution for his acts while in office in the more than 200 years since the founding of our country. And, that is so despite numerous past Presidents taking actions that many would argue constitute crimes. If this unprecedented prosecution is to proceed, it must be conducted by someone duly authorized to do so by the American people. The lower courts should thus answer these essential questions concerning the Special Counsel’s appointment before proceeding.

...

Even if the Special Counsel has a valid office, questions remain as to whether the Attorney General filled that office in compliance with the Appointments Clause. For example, it must be determined whether the Special Counsel is a principal or inferior officer. If the former, his appointment is invalid because the Special Counsel was not nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate, as principal officers must be. Art. II, §2, cl. 2. Even if he is an inferior officer, the Attorney General could appoint him without Presidential nomination and senatorial confirmation only if “Congress . . . by law vest[ed] the Appointment” in the Attorney General as a “Hea[d] of Department.” Ibid. So, the Special Counsel’s appointment is invalid unless a statute created the Special Counsel’s office and gave the Attorney General the power to fill it “by Law.”

Whether the Special Counsel’s office was “established by Law” is not a trifling technicality. If Congress has not reached a consensus that a particular office should exist, the Executive lacks the power to unilaterally create and then fill that office. Given that the Special Counsel purports to wield the Executive Branch’s power to prosecute, the consequences are weighty. Our Constitution’s separation of powers, including its separation of the powers to create and filled offices, is “the absolutely central guarantee of a just Government” and the liberty that it secures for us all. Morrison, 487 U. S., at 697 (Scalia, J., dissenting). There is no prosecution that can justify imperiling it.

Minister of War
2 hours ago
"the president is immune from prosecution for acts committed in office unless he has been impeached for those acts"

Bingo!

Period.

End of story.

Close the book.

John Roberts is an idiot once again & the conservative justices are required to roll their eyes & go along with his stupidity just because that was the only way to get even a partial victory.

Montana radio host Aaron Flint pointed out that replacing Biden with another Democrat will still leave in power the people currently using him like a presidential skin suit. That’s also true, to a large extent, of replacing Biden with Trump. //

However, because we’ve already had the benefit of a Trump presidency, we can see that even a president as vigorous and defiant as he struggled to truly exercise authority over the people and institutions that, constitutionally speaking, the president commands.

Some of the most egregious examples of this occurred among cabinet-level national security types. Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman under Trump Gen. Mark Milley was one of the worst offenders. Washington Post and New York Times reporters say, according to excerpts from Haley McLean, that Milley deliberately stayed in his position to sabotage voters’ elected commander-in-chief, saying to staffers of Trump, “I’ll just fight him” and “I will fight from the inside. //

Milley also disobeyed Trump’s order to pull U.S. troops from Afghanistan, setting the stage for the disastrous Afghanistan pullout Milley oversaw under Biden that seriously damaged U.S. foreign policy goals, killed 13 U.S. soldiers, and left stranded thousands of American citizens. //

In my new book, I point out that scholars such as Christopher Caldwell have shown that for more than a century the United States has been living under “two Constitutions.” One is the original Constitution that secures consent of the governed, rule of law, and government of the people, by the people, and for the people. The second Constitution, or regime, is that of the “living Constitution,” which I explain is essentially totalitarian because it recognizes no limits on its powers.

That second regime now has the upper hand, and it is run by this cabal of unelected bureaucrats who believe they have the right to saddle, ride, and spur Americans and bend us to their will. They don’t care what we vote for. We’re getting what they want regardless of how we vote. That goes for Congress, too, whom the deep state also treats like window dressing and who usually lives up to that cynical expectation.

So yes, the deep state is shamefully using Biden as their puppet president. But they believe they have the right to ignore the Constitution and voters even when the president isn’t a walking cadaver. For people who know that when the Democrat press starts shouting something it’s proof the opposite is true, this puts a pretty dark cast on all the Democrat shrieks about “democracy.”

This is not a shocking discovery, but the report contains the receipts of the manipulation and shows specifics of how things transpired. Even while there was conflict and opposition within the agency, the ability to still move quickly to advance the plan to aid Biden and/or impact Donald Trump is revealing. In addition, the most disqualifying aspect of the whole laptop fable is how the CIA was working in concert with the FBI on behalf of the Biden campaign. We have learned that the intelligence community went to social media companies and instructed the executives on how they should treat any mention of the laptop as a Russian misinformation campaign. //

The way this collusion played out — between the CIA, FBI, Biden Campaign, and the press — is essentially the Deep State laid bare. The sad truth and depth of this is seen in the massive difficulty in bringing anything approaching accountability to bear for any of this for anyone involved. This is a massive example of manipulating an election result, but all of those shown as guilty are the same players today, bleating about the threats to our democracy. //

123FJB
3 hours ago
Just keep in mind that at least half of your fellow Americans have no problem with what was done and in fact are hoping for it to happen again and again.

Let THAT sink in.

Not only are the enemy inside the gates, they are having a party in the town square in broad daylight.

etba_ss 123FJB
2 hours ago
And the heads of all these agencies were appointed by the guy they were screwing over.

Trump simply cannot allow this to stand. I have zero confidence he will make any better choices in Round 2 or clean anything out or drain any swamp. His attention span is too short and he's too focused on the nightly news clip, verses the long, hard, behind the scenes slog of cleaning out the swamp.

 DC_Draino
@DC_Draino
·
One of Trump’s White House lawyers now openly confirms he was secretly working against him to stop the DOJ from investigating 2020 election fraud

This is the Deep State in action to remove Trump

They wanted zero federal investigations of 2020 election fraud & got their wish

Tom Fitton @TomFitton
Former WH lawyer confirms he, behind Trump's back, organized threats of mass resignations to successfully thwart Trump from appointing an acting attorney general (@JeffClarkUS) who would seriously investigate 2020 election. https://politi.co/3Txnk93. //

Plans are no doubt underway for the second Trump administration. Those plans rightly include cleaning house of anyone who might be tempted to undermine that administration in any way. Democrats will call it "revenge." But Donald Trump will be able to quote one of his predecessors and say, "I won." //

American Accountability Foundation
@ExposingBiden
·
🚨WE ARE DECLARING WAR ON THE DEEP STATE

The Left is having a category 5 meltdown over this.

Here's what we're doing, and why we're doing it:

Our investigators at the American Accountability Foundation (AAF) are currently working on building a list of rotten bureaucrats at the… Show more
10:11 AM · Jun 24, 2024 //

Democracy is where the people rule, via their elected leaders, not where the bureaucrats rule. //

Ribs_of_Rock
5 hours ago
So the head of a federal government employees union (the most unconstitutional thing I’ve ever heard of) is saying that firing unelected bureaucrats is seeking to undermine democracy. Democracy being a system of government based on people voting on leaders and political issues. Once again I think that we overestimate the factual knowledge of the opponent. While they may be possessed of great base cunning and shrewdly manipulative with the aid of their vile media accomplices, they somehow seem to think that democracy is a system of government controlled by democrats. This is a remarkably idiotic thing to say and I can’t believe that the evil union head doesn’t know better. We are tasked with persuading or counteracting a vastly ignorant group of “voters” who vote due to government pressure and government largesse.

 To get specific, the Bureau of Land Management shows that 3,377 permits were issued in 2023, supposedly outpacing the 2,507 that Trump's admin approved in its third year in office. This would bring the total number of permits approved to 9,522, leaps and bounds over the 6,541 permits approved by the Trump admin. This was heralded as a victory by press outlets like Politico, despite them all being eco-warriors in every other situation.

But the real numbers were revealed later when technical errors they blamed on the Trump administration were fixed according to the Beacon:

The spokesman added that the agency couldn't vouch for the data from the Politico report in January. And he noted the "online reporting tool can be interpreted in various ways."

BLM's online system was undergoing a system outage at the time of this report.

In February 2023, meanwhile, BLM quietly revised separate figures, lowering the number of unused fossil fuel drilling permits it had approved. The agency changed that number from 9,000 unused permits to less than 6,700, blaming the error on a Trump-era technical change.

The actual number from the Trump administration was 10,795. I'm not a mathematician, but that seems a far larger number to "less than 6,700."

 Since the beginning of the Rise of Trump, I've maintained that Trump is not a cause, but a symptom. His initial seeking of political office was a reaction to what many Americans see as the rise of a political elite in the United States; politicians serve as though they were the Roman Senate, appointed for life, and many of them grow monstrously rich while in office. There are those on the left now who are comparing Trump to Caesar, but that's a canard; Trump has no military background, and he has not sought to make himself a dictator no matter what pearl-clutching claims are made by his opponents. In his first term, Trump worked within the Constitution. There is no reason to think that he would not do the same in a second term.

Trump may well be our Gracchi. The Gracchi were among the first voices calling out the corruption of the wealthy and powerful in the late Roman Republic. They called for populist reforms, and they worked to put themselves in a position to implement those reforms and, if you will allow the term, Make Rome Great Again - and the establishment of the time, those same wealthy and powerful men, destroyed them for it. (Sound familiar?) But it was that reaction to the Gracchi that led to the Sulla/Marius conflict and then to the rise of Caesar.

Whether Trump wins a second term or not, the die has been cast. The wealthy and powerful have been called out. Trump may be leading the populist movement, but he is not the populist movement, and that movement is not going away. Trump himself has proven to be notoriously resistant to any attempts to brush him aside. Will history continue to rhyme? Will there, in another generation or two, be another American civil war? An American Caesar? There may well be - but that's a story for another column. //

RSB
10 hours ago
This is where you have to be a bit more nuanced. Yes Rome lost its Republic and a LOT of that went back to corruption and a degradation of society to where the first loyalty of the troops was to their generals not the state. And yes the moral rot of Rome itself was a causal factor in this because people turned to the strong generals to give them some actual peace and security.

In one respect Rome got lucky. Caesar was not some tyrannical monster and Octavian (in one of the big surprises of history) was possibly the greatest statesman in history. He built the Empire on the notion of lowered taxes, respect for individual rights and security for trade, commerce and everyday life within that framework. And the result was the Pax Romana. True the moral issues remained (albeit lessened due the laws against theft, murder et al being enforced), it fell to later rulers such as Vespasian who threw a lot of the decadent people out of the Senate and government and promoted Italians who were more closely tied to the common folk and had more rural morals - then Roman morals improved.

So. Is America on the road to having its "Caesar"? Probably. Will we get lucky like Rome did? No way to know.

The faux dramatic ad, which highlights Trump’s legal challenges and says Biden has been focusing on "lowering health care costs and making big corporations pay their fair share," says, in part:

This election is between a convicted criminal who is only out for himself, and a president who is fighting for your family. //

Le Fromage Grande
6 hours ago edited
The only reason that there aren't two convicted felons running for president is because one of them was declared to be mentally unfit to stand trial.

Let that sink in. //

Quizzical
7 hours ago
"This election is between an unconvicted criminal who is only out for himself, and a former president who is fighting for your family."

Fixed that for the Biden campaign. //

houdini1984
8 hours ago
We rightly mock this lawfare communication strategy, but we shouldn't assume that everyone sees it the same way. Yes, we know that the convictions are bogus and the sexual abuse trial was a sham, but it's important to remember that tens of millions of Americans exist in a different type of bubble. Theirs is a fact-free, government propaganda bubble that feeds them a steady diet of Orange Man Bad lies. How many Americans will hear those lies - and ads like this - and believe them?

The far left exists in an echo chamber. To a large extent, we do too - that is, if we fail to recognize that too many in middle America only hear what the left wants them to hear. Our side better be aggressive about getting the truth out there if we want it to override the left's lies. Don't just assume that Americans are smart enough to discover the truth for themselves. If they were, the Democrat party would have ended long ago.

To put it plainly, the left hates President Trump more than they love this country. Government officials at the federal and state levels have censored President Trump, filed civil suits in order to sanction him, illegally removed him from the ballot, and perverted the law in order to prosecute him. This is a strategic attack against a former President of the United States, against a current candidate for President, and against the value we as a Nation place on our system of government, our legal system, and our very identity. The term lawfare, while apt, fails to adequately convey the moral depravity underpinning this strategic attack. I encourage this body to address each tactical front in the broader conflict provoked by lawfare. //

Bailey outlines numerous flaws inherent in the prosecution:

1. Failing to uphold the rules of professional conduct by which prosecutors are bound
2. Failing to specify the other crime Trump was alleged to have committed/intended to commit in falsifying the business records, such that his Sixth Amendment rights were violated
3. Seeking a gag order in violation of Trump's First Amendment rights
4. Perverting the law to meet the facts rather than objectively applying the law
5. Failing to require unanimity from the jury on the predicate offense(s) //

Ready2Squeeze
18 minutes ago

To put it plainly, the left hates President Trump more than they love this country.

This should read:

To put it plainly, the left hates President Trump more than they love hate this country.

Ben Shapiro @benshapiro
·
What an enormously stupid and vile comment. Trump is not Hitler. And voting is not storming a beach under a hail of machine-gun fire to free millions from the tyranny of the Nazis.

Hillary Clinton @HillaryClinton
Eighty years ago today, thousands of brave Americans fought to protect democracy on the shores of Normandy.

This November, all we have to do is vote.
2:16 PM · Jun 6, 2024 //

These delusions of grandeur are astonishing and pathetic. This is what happens when people, devoid of religion and purpose in life, try to project their emptiness onto politics. No, you aren't like D-Day veterans because you showed up to vote against the bad orange man. To even suggest that is insane. That I even have to say that is a sad testament to just how far the Democratic Party has fallen. //

WestTexasBirdDog
16 hours ago
Actually Hillary is totally correct. We do need to vote this November, but not with the result she wants.

Causing a false entry to be made in a company’s records is a misdemeanor offense in New York, subject to a two-year statute of limitations. The statute says, however, that if the false business entry was made for the purpose of concealing the commission of, or intent to commit, “another crime,” then it is a felony offense, which has a longer statute of limitations. //

Although this was a state prosecution, Bragg brought in Matthew Colangelo, a high-ranking official from the Justice Department, to serve as lead prosecutor in the case. Colangelo previously had served as acting associate attorney general, the third-highest position within DOJ. //

Third, although the indictment alleged that Trump caused a false business record to be entered on the company’s books for the purpose of concealing the commission of, or intent to commit, “another crime,” the indictment didn’t say what that other crime was. And Bragg refused to say what it was when asked about it during a press conference.

Trump’s legal team filed a motion for a bill of particulars, asking Merchan to compel the state to disclose what the other crime was so that Trump’s lawyers could prepare his defense adequately. Merchan refused.

Indeed, it was not until the charge conference shortly before closing arguments that the prosecution team disclosed its speculations about what that other crime might be. And it was not until the prosecutor gave his closing argument—after Trump’s lawyer already had made his and sat down—that he finally said anything to the jury about what the other crime was. //

Fifth, Merchan’s pretrial ruling severely limited what Brad Smith—a former member of the Federal Election Commission and one of the nation’s leading authorities on federal campaign finance laws—could say from the witness stand. Smith was prepared to testify that Trump’s $130,000 payment to Cohen to reimburse the lawyer for the payment to Daniels was a personal expense, not a campaign expense, which didn’t violate campaign finance laws.

Indeed, Smith would have testified that if Trump had paid this money out of his campaign coffers rather than out of his own pocket, that would have been a federal campaign finance violation. Merchan wouldn’t allow Smith to say any of this from the witness stand. His testimony was going to be so limited that the Trump legal team decided it was worthless to call him as a witness, and so they didn’t. //

Eighth, there is a strong argument that neither Bragg as the DA nor Merchan as the judge had jurisdiction to put anyone on trial—much less a former president—for alleged violations of federal campaign finance laws. Nothing in the Federal Election Campaign Act gives state court prosecutors and judges jurisdiction over such matters.

And, according to a 2023 memorandum of understanding between the Federal Election Commission and the Justice Department, the FEC “has exclusive jurisdiction over civil enforcement of the federal campaign finance laws” and the Justice Department “has exclusive jurisdiction of criminal enforcement of the federal campaign finance laws, including related criminal offenses.”

Here, both the FEC and DOJ investigated the matter and declined to pursue it.

Constitutional law expert Hans von Spakovsky says the conviction isn’t likely to stick, for an array of reasons. Chief among them: Merchan’s convoluted jury instructions, in which the Biden campaign-donor judge framed the jury’s deliberations in a way that, according to legal expert Jonathan Turley, “seemed less like a jury deliberation than a canned hunt.” Merchan told the jurors they didn’t have to agree on the three possible “unlawful means” prosecutors vaguely alleged Trump had employed to “influence” the 2016 election.

“The jurors were told that they could split on what occurred, with four jurors accepting each of the three possible crimes in a 4-4-4 split. The court would still consider that a unanimous verdict so long as they agree that it was in furtherance of some crime,” Turley wrote in the Hill before the verdict was handed down. //

Von Spakovsky said Merchan’s instructions point to reversible error — “an error in trial proceedings that affects a party’s rights so significantly that it is grounds for reversal if the affected party properly objected at trial,” according to the Legal Information Institute. //

“That is one of the craziest things I have ever heard and it is a complete violation of President Trump’s substantive due process rights.”

Von Spakovsky said the standard in like cases is that jurors come to a unanimous agreement on each of the charges they are deliberating. He said Merchan added an absurd twist to the proceedings after handicapping Trump’s defense throughout the trial. //

As for Merchan, von Spakovsky said the judge is either one of the most incompetent judges he has ever seen or his curious instructions to the jury was “a sign of intentional misfeasance.”

“In fact, I think it’s the latter because throughout this entire case he has acted as if he is an alternate member of the prosecution team,” the legal expert said.