Trump Labels Indictment ‘Election Interference,’ Predicts It Will ‘Backfire Massively’

He’s probably mostly right. The whole thing is likely to reinforce his “mighty victim” brand and help him win the nomination.

I find it interesting how many "Never Trumpers" seem to be rooting for him to win the nomination. I think that a lot of "Never Trumpers" are actually "Never GOPers" and they figure that having Trump as the GOP nominee will ensure a GOP loss. I guess I agree with that conclusion, but not that goal. I have been a "Not Trump- IF I have a better choicer" not a "Never Trumper", but for the sake of our country I wish Trump would just retire. I do however hope that this finally opens the eyes to some who have been unwilling to admit that we have an unequal justice system in this country and that a person's political views will have an effect on how they are treated when it comes to the application of the law.

....about what the actual end game is with this accusation. The best estimates I see here are that Bragg is using a legally novel theory (convolution of federal and state law), and is doing so after promising in his campaign to "get Trump". Really, even the most progressive voters should have said "no" to him for that last bit--it's shades of Stalin's secret police chief Lavrentiy Berea and the notion of "show me the man, I'll show you the crime."

The indictment might prove this to be incorrect when unsealed, but the sequence of events here is, yes, reminiscent of the bad old days in the USSR.

And in that light, unless Bragg's got something nobody's anticipated, the question is (as in Stalin's USSR) what the goal is with the prosecution. Is it to take Trump out, or is it to put Trump in because DeSantis is getting traction with the electorate?

I don't know which it is, but again, unless Bragg's got something nobody knows about and nobody's leaked, it reeks to high Heaven. I make no defense of Trump's apparent dalliances, but we don't want to subvert the law as usually applied to "get" one person. This is especially the case when I consider that "novel" legal theories tend to undermine a key principle of American law, which is that the law should be understandable by a person of average intelligence--yes, similar to the Christian doctrine of perspecuity of the Scriptures, just applied to the law. If you cannot understand the law, neither can you follow it, and the law becomes a bludgeon instead of a guide.

JD Miller wrote: I find it interesting how many "Never Trumpers" seem to be rooting for him to win the nomination. I think that a lot of "Never Trumpers" are actually "Never GOPers" and they figure that having Trump as the GOP nominee will ensure a GOP loss. I guess I agree with that conclusion, but not that goal. I have been a "Not Trump- IF I have a better choicer" not a "Never Trumper", but for the sake of our

I am a registered Republican and have always voted straight Republican until the last election. Right now I guess you could call me a "Never GOPer". I won't be voting Republican until they rid themselves of the crazy elements and people within the party. That being said, I'm not in favor of Trump being indicted unless it's legitimate. It will be interesting to see what actual evidence the prosecution is using to support the indictment.

Bert Perry wrote: it’s shades of Stalin’s secret police chief Lavrentiy Berea and the notion of “show me the man, I’ll show you the crime.”

Not really. People on the right use “I’m going to get so and so” language in political rhetoric all time. I’m pretty sure Trump has done a lot more of this than Bragg has. If this is a reason to not vote for someone did it make you not vote for Trump last time around?

In any case, this will be a jury trial which is as far from Stalinesque as you can get.

JD Miller wrote: I find it interesting how many “Never Trumpers” seem to be rooting for him to win the nomination.

I have not seen this. For my part, I hope and pray that he is not nominated… that he’s not even close to nominated.

No, Aaron. Mr. Bragg campaigned on the promise to prosecute, concocted what most legal observers believe to be an untenable and novel means of prosecution that confuses jurisdiction and mixes federal and state law, and to enable these prosecutions is actually refusing to prosecute serious violent felonies like armed robbery.

In one way, this is worse than Beria (and Himmler and Mielke), because at least Beria/Himmler/Mielke didn't admit to refusing to prosecute armed robbery in order to go after political targets. To be fair, they went after millions of political targets, but still, unless Bragg's found something in the law that everybody else overlooked, this is a very, very dangerous thing he's doing.

.....and the nature of the charges is pretty much exactly as predicted, using federal election law (this is key) to overcome the statute of limitations for state laws to "prosecute" crimes which occurred after the 2016 election. OK, help me out here; the funds were not from Trump's campaign, were not portrayed as so, and were spent after the campaign ended, but somehow Alvin Bragg gets to play make believe and pretend that this was an unauthorized and fraudulent business record that runs afoul of campaign finance and New York business records laws.

If there is justice in this world, Alvin Bragg will be disbarred and prosecuted for this, especially since the bum isn't even bothering to prosecute violent crimes like armed robbery. "Oh, yeah, and your relative can't sleep at night and needs constant mental health care after she had a pistol shoved in her face, but we're going to let the <redacted> who did this to her go back out on the streets."