Former President Donald Trump prepares to address reporters following the day's proceedings in his trial in Manhattan Criminal Court, Tuesday, May 21, 2024, in New York.
We’re at a perilous stage with denunciations of the courts and law enforcement coming from Trump’s Republican followers. For his opponents, cheering his prosecutors as if this is a football game also adopts Trump’s worldview and degrades our democratic system. Compare this to Sen. Ted Stevens’ attitude. In my last column, I presented evidence that he was falsely accused and prosecutors cheated to get a guilty verdict. Stevens was shunned by his colleagues and rejected by voters after an extraordinary 40-year career in the Senate. Yet he never turned against the courts or called his trial a sham. Even as he gave his final speech in the Senate, he insisted the system would eventually exonerate him. And it did.
Some liberals, moderates and traditional conservatives want Trump gone by any means necessary. But the means are the point. If journalists and prosecutors give up their integrity in the name of getting rid of Trump, he succeeds in debasing both sides, and we come closer to losing our democratic institutions.In the Stormy Daniels hush money case, the facts are solid, but what they mean legally is not. The prosecutor is bringing a unique case based on a complicated and untried legal theory.
Federal Special Counsel Jack Smith has behaved properly and brought two cases that show no evident political bias. But Smith’s efforts won’t matter if Trump is elected, because he can pardon himself for federal crimes. He surely would do so, and would pardon anyone else who broke the law to help him hold onto power. He sent that message when he pardoned Roger Stone, who had been convicted of committing perjury to protect Trump.
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