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Don would’ve been better off robbing Stormy with a gun – Bragg would have thrown case out

JONATHAN TURLEY Jonathan Turley is an attorney and a professor at George Washington University Law School.

JAMES Comey could not contain himself with the news of an indictment of former President Donald Trump. Comey hopped on Twitter to declare, “It’s been a good day.”

The former FBI director, who has been teaching and speaking on government ethics, joined others in celebrating the upcoming arrest of Trump because nothing says “ethical leadership” like a patently political prosecution.

Comey declined to prosecute Hillary Clinton on her email scandal despite finding that she violated federal rules and handled classified material “carelessly.” He declared, “Ethical leaders lead by seeing above the short term, above the urgent or the partisan, and with a higher loyalty to lasting values, most importantly the truth.”

Yet now Comey is heralding the effort of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who campaigned on a pledge of bagging Trump for some unspecified crime.

While the actual charges will not be disclosed until the release of the indictment, the underlying theory discussed for months is an effort to revive a dead misdemeanor offense of falsifying business records — years after the statute of limitations expired.

Bragg may try to accomplish this Frankensteinian feat by converting this into a felony. The long-debated theory in Bragg’s office was whether they could effectively allege a violation of federal election laws even though the Justice Department and the Federal Election Commission declined such charges.

Notably, Bragg’s predecessor declined to bring these charges. Bragg himself declined to do so, and that led to two of his prosecutors resigning in protest.

Mark F. Pomerantz then proceeded to do what some of us view as breathtakingly unprofessional. He wrote a book on what he learned in the investigation, which was ongoing. He made the case for indicting an individual who had not been charged, let alone convicted. He continued to engage in this public campaign despite requests from his former office that he was undermining its investigation.

The public pressure worked. Bragg caved.

Making it a ‘felony’

Despite the widespread criticism of Bragg for reducing charges in an array of felonies by Manhattan criminals, he spent months working to convert a misdemeanor into a felony.

Trump would have apparently been better off robbing Stormy Daniels at gunpoint rather than paying her off for an NDA.

Bragg is operating directly out of Comey’s handbook on “ethical leadership.” After all, it was Comey who joked about how he violated department rules to nail Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn. He delighted audiences with how he told underlings “let’s just send a couple guys over” to trap Flynn.

It was Comey who was fired after former Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein cited him for “serious mistakes” and violating “his obligation to ‘preserve, protect and defend’ the traditions of the Department and the FBI.”

It was Comey who violated federal laws and removed FBI material (including reported classified material) after being fired and then leaked information to the media. Despite this, Comey was heralded by the media and made wealthy on book and speaking tours.

Bragg knows 62% of people view his case as “mainly motivated by politics,” but (like Comey) he is playing to an eager audience. The buildup to Trump’s booking has the appeal of a thrill kill for Dems.

It will be another “good day” for Comey and others who put politics above principle in the use of the criminal-justice system.

THE GATHERING STORMY

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2023-04-01T07:00:00.0000000Z

2023-04-01T07:00:00.0000000Z

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