In the first hours of his second term, President Donald Trump pardoned nearly everyone
convicted of crimes associated with the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol – including former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio – and commuted the sentences of 14 more, including Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes.
CNN reported that nearly 1,600 people have been charged and about 1,300 have been convicted of crimes committed on that day. There are about 300 cases “still active and unresolved
,” CNN reported.
According to a Washington Post analysis, 14 leaders of far-right militant groups Oath Keepers and Proud Boys have been convicted of seditious conspiracy
. And 379 people have been charged with felony assault; most of them have been convicted already. though some are still awaiting trial. Trump also ordered the Justice Department to dismiss all pending indictments against Jan. 6 defendants.
To understand the situation, Jeff Inglis, a politics editor at The Conversation U.S., spoke with John E. Jones III
, a retired federal judge who was appointed to the bench by President George W. Bush and confirmed unanimously by the Senate in 2002. Jones is now president of Dickinson College.
What’s the difference between a pardon and a commutation?
A pardon essentially wipes away the offense and restores the constitutional rights that a person convicted of a federal felony crime would be deprived of, such as the right to vote and to travel unimpeded. Technically, it does not mean they’re not guilty of the offense, but it washes away all the consequences of the offense.
A pardon can be anticipatory, but in most cases historically it’s given after a person has been convicted of a crime, or at least charged.
A commutation means that, essentially, the president believes the sentence is too harsh or too long. The commutation could either let somebody out of jail immediately and terminate their sentence or could shorten the amount of time remaining for them to serve.
The key difference is that a commutation doesn’t change the fact of a conviction and doesn’t wash away the consequences.
What do judges think about a president exercising the power to pardon and commute?
There have been instances historically where judges probably have agreed with commutations and pardons. It’s typically not ever top of mind when you sentence people that someone is going to commute that sentence or pardon. It’s a pretty rare occurrence.
I will say that in my experience, if someone was angling for a commutation or pardon without any sense of gratitude or remorse, that would be more difficult to swallow for the judge who passed the sentence.
The Washington Post’s forensic assembly of video and photos from Jan. 6, 2021.
What do judges think about Trump’s actions in these Jan. 6 cases?
In many cases, these judges sentenced the offenders to less than what the government was asking for. They gave them a break and went below the advisory sentencing guidelines
that judges have to consult when they pass sentence. They’re not mandatory, but judges have to explain why they’ve sentenced outside the guidelines when they pass sentences. The Department of Justice wanted sentences at the upper end of the guidelines because of the conduct of the individuals.
When it comes to Jan. 6 offenders, not only do I think they received appropriate due process, but in some cases, I believe they received excessive due process.
For example, look at the case of a person from Pennsylvania named Joseph W. Fischer
. Fischer is a former police officer
, and he was charged, among other things, with obstructing the business of Congress
by damaging or destroying items. He argued that his actions did not meet the criteria of obstructing Congress
and took his case all the way to the Supreme Court, which sided with Fischer. He had access to the courts. He had good lawyers. He took the case all the way up and was able to rid himself of that particular charge.
I think the judges were fully capable and did, in fact, sentence according to the degree of conduct of the offenders.
You’re a retired federal judge. How does this action of pardoning and commutation of this group of people make you think about the justice system?
Two of the purposes of sentencing are deterrence and respect for the law.
Taking deterrence first, imagine you are an individual who believes that taking the law into your own hands and attempting to interfere with the business of government is the right way to proceed when you disagree with the result. The message that blanket pardons or commutations sends is essentially: You can get away with those actions without penalty, because your benefactor is going to save you in the end.
Respect for the law is another aspect. What I’m hearing from a number of incarcerated folks who say they expect to be pardoned or have their sentences commuted is that they don’t believe they’ve done anything wrong. Might those same individuals engage in similar behavior at another time, thinking that they can do that with impunity?
I think Trump is going to make these people into martyrs and heroes, and to my mind, that flies in the face of the facts of these cases.
Video footage shows several scenes from the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection.
How do you think about Trump’s Jan. 6 pardons and commutations alongside the pardons and commutations that former President Joe Biden issued on the way out the door?
It’s really troublesome. Setting aside my judicial career and history and career in the law, the fact of the matter is, the general public just sees dozens and dozens, if not hundreds, of pardons.
It is probably true that we’re seeing an overuse of the pardon power at this point, maybe more than we’ve ever seen in history.
I see the point: He’s taking Trump’s threats of retribution
seriously. The Justice Department could convene grand juries and investigate folks, and whether they were bona fide charges or not, it would cost them millions of dollars in legal fees. In the case of Hunter Biden, I guess any parent has empathy. It’s his son, and he had the power to do it. It’s sort of a tortured situation.
But then I think about all of us on Jan. 6, 2021, turning on the TV and seeing something that we’ve never seen before in history. It is rare that something happens for the first time in history, and that searing image is stuck in a lot of folks’ brains.
I think you absolutely can logically and factually differentiate them. But I don’t know if that’s what’s going to happen in the court of public opinion.
The argument from Trump world was that it was Trump’s vow to go after Hamas full-force that provided the impetus for the cease fire. Biden later was asked about whether history would say he got credit for the deal His reaction?
President Biden brushed off a question about who would get the credit for the Israel-Hamas ceasefire deal struck Wednesday.
“Is that a joke?” Biden responded when asked by a reporter whether he or President-elect Trump would get credit for the deal, which could bring an end to the 15-month conflict in Gaza.
Trump publicly celebrated the news of the deal before an official statement from the White House was released hours later. The president-elect also claimed the credit for himself, saying a deal would not have happened without his victory in November over Vice President Harris.
While announcing the deal with Harris by his side, Biden acknowledged it will be implemented after he leaves office and said his team has been working with Trump’s incoming team. Trump is set to be sworn in Monday.
“I’d also note, this deal was developed and negotiated under my administration, but its terms will be implemented, for the most part, by the next administration. For these past few days, we’ve been speaking as one team,” the president said in remarks from the White House.
He also highlighted that the deal is the same framework of a deal his administration helped negotiate in May, and that Israel was able to weaken Hamas with the help of aid from the U.S.
Rupert Murdoch’s New York Post reported
Biden’s comments in an article titled “Biden says Americans will be among Gaza hostages released, snarkily refuses to credit Trump in sealing deal: ‘Is that a joke?’
Retiring President Biden said Wednesday that US citizens will be among those released by Hamas as part of a Gaza Strip cease-fire deal with Israel — while refusing to give any credit to President-elect Donald Trump for escalating pressure on the terrorist group.
“I’m proud to say Americans will be part of that hostage release in phase one,” Biden, 82, said at the White House after Qatar’s government announced the agreement, in which hostages are expected to be released as early as Sunday.
[…]Biden credited his own administration and repeatedly refused to give any credit to Trump, 78, who had threatened “hell” for Hamas if it did not release the hostages by the time he took office on Monday.
Asked about the contribution of Trump’s envoys to sealing the agreement, Biden replied, “Well, you know, this is the exact framework of the deal I proposed back in May, the exact.”
When a reporter pressed whether Biden or Trump deserved credit, the president said, “Is that a joke? Oh —” before walking away.
Trump, whose Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff was heavily involved in the endgame of negotiations, claimed credit earlier Wednesday, saying it “could have only happened as a result of our Historic Victory in November.”
As for who takes credit for this agreement—you’ll hear a lot of crowing from the right that this was somehow Trump who negotiated the deal. He does deserve some credit for applying public pressure and signaling his desire to end the war. The fact that both Trump’s representative and Biden’s were in Doha together was an exceptionally rare example of bipartisan cooperation on a seemingly impossible issue. But the Biden administration has worked tirelessly for the past fifteen months to bring about this deal.
BREAKING NEWS: Donald Trump Is Not President Yet and Had Nothing to Do with the Ceasefire Deal Beyond Tweeting About It Like a Six Year-Old Girl on a Sugar High; The Deal Was Negotiated By President Biden and Other Serious People Who Are Actual Adults and Have Human-Colored Skin https://t.co/UHsT2Bqqwd
Hell no Trump shouldn’t take credit for the ceasefire in Gaza. To all of you #MAGAMorons
posting ” thank you President Trump “, let me dumb it down so you can understand: pic.twitter.com/EImrks8OeK
Pathetic little man Donald Trump continues to try to take credit for the ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas that he didn’t negotiate and MAGA is clapping like seals.
What do orange juice from Florida; bourbon from Kentucky; potatoes from Idaho; Coca-Cola from Georgia; and automobiles from Alabama and South Carolina have in common? These red state goods may be on a potential list of imports slated for tariffs in Canada.
Approximately 3-in-4 Canadian exports land in the United States. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Canadian officials have developed a three-phase response to the threat.
First, Canadian leaders will continue to work with U.S. officials to attempt to prevent tariffs. Canada has already pledged a “$1.3-billion border security plan
,” for example.
Second, Canadian leaders are preparing a tariff response should Trump go through with his threat. For example, Canada might establish tariffs on consumer goods
“made in Republican or swing states, where the pain of tariffs, like pressure on jobs and the bottom lines of local businesses, would affect Trump allies.”
Canada imports U.S. goods valued at $150,000,000,000 Canadian.
The detailed list of goods is closely held, but it includes dozens of consumer goods from various categories, such as food and beverages, as well as other types of daily products, including dishwashers and porcelain goods like bathtubs and toilets.
Other nations threatened with U.S. tariffs should take the same targeted approach in response. You cannot expect those countries to sit quietly while the U.S. imposes tariffs. That’s not how trade agreements work.
The third is a long-term effort: “diversify Canada’s export market
and [ensure] there are no trade barriers across the country.”
Should Trump proceed, the results will be disastrous.
According to Sunday’s WSJ
, for at least the next two years both inflation and interest rates are likely to be worse than forecasters anticipated before the election. Does that mean forecasters didn’t take Trump’s rhetoric seriously? Because he’s been planning this for months.
So we have a felon as president. In addition to the New York charges, part of the special counsel Jack Smith’s report was just released, showing that Trump was definitely responsible for the riots and attacks on the capitol on January 6. Trump did everything he could to overturn the valid results of the 2020 election and remain in the White House. He did not want to be labeled as a loser even if it required criminal actions. Now, because he was re-elected president by an uninformed electorate, he will not be punished for his crime of insurrection in 2020. A sitting president can escape prosecution for virtually anything he does.
One cannot really blame Trump for his actions. He is driven by his emotions and his gut, instead of his brain. He does not carefully think things out before making statements and announcing policy. Though Biden’s age and mental capacity have been questioned, Trump has also shown signs of cognitive impairment, mixing up names of people and nations. He was not terribly smart to begin with, and the ravages of time, his diet and lack of exercise have probably caught up to him.
Trump’s immediate goal is to enact revenge on those people who opposed him in the past and currently, in and outside of government. That will happen after he is inaugurated. These so-called adversaries acted in good faith to do what they considered as benefiting the nation. But Trump doesn’t see it that way. He believes that loyalty to him is more important than allegiance to the Constitution. And who knows now what crazy schemes he will pursue once he’s in office. Will the military be used to occupy Greenland and invade Panama? Perhaps also Canada. Will Bitcoin replace the dollar to increase Trump’s wealth? Will vaccines be prohibited?
The travesty of Trump’s election does not rest on Trump’s shoulders but on those of the American people. Instead of investigating all of Trump’s purported crimes and odd behavior, they took Trump’s words as gospel and believed what he said while campaigning, as well as before and afterward. Billionaires will certainly benefit from Trump’s tax cuts as will corporate entities. The middle class not so much. And the poor will suffer even more. Trump has no feelings of compassion and may cut programs that helped the poor and middle classes, like Medicaid, Obamacare, SNAP and so forth. Our national debt will also balloon because of the tax cuts. Trump talks about tariffs replacing taxes, but really has no idea how effective they will be and how much suffering they will cause the American people.
America’s standing in the world will plummet with Trump as president as people globally will wonder how Americans could have elected Trump as president. Our alliances will be destroyed with NATO probably the first to be dissolved. Uninformed about the repercussions of another Trump presidency, the people have spoken. Now we will have to await the consequences.
www.robertlevinebooks.com
Buy The Uninformed Voter on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and at your local bookstore
Posted at 10:05 AM in 2024 presidential election, Authoritarianism, billionaires, Constitution, Donald Trump, election denial, imperialist, Insurrection, NATO, political lies, Republican Party, Vaccines | Permalink | Comments (0)
