PARDON ME!

 In December, 2018, I wrote:

“The latest revelations from Mueller, by means of the Manafort and Cohen sentencing memoranda, strongly suggest that ... i) our president is a criminal, ii) his son is a criminal, iii) his son-in-law may be a criminal, and iv) his former campaign manager, a convicted criminal who has lied about his connections to Russian operatives, is facing a very long prison sentence.”

And,

“This leads ineluctably to the conclusion that members of the TCF will be pardoned before the termination of Trump's presidency in January, 2021.”

And,

“But there is no way, I suggest, that Trump dares to pardon Flynn before November 3, 2020, and Donald is going to have to issue a satchel-full of pardons to his crime family. And who knows, maybe to himself!” (He waited until November 25 to pardon Flynn, not that the timing seems to have made a material difference.)

...........

Two years later, Trump’s chickens have come home to roost. The press reports that he has recently discussed with advisers issuing pardons for his family members, and clown Giuliani.

That’s not all. We learn from an unsealed but severely redacted court order that the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia is pursuing a bribery investigation involving an unknown person presently in the custody of the federal Bureau of prisons in connection with a possible conspiracy to obtain a pardon or commutation in exchange for campaign contributions. The redacted decision authorized the US Attorney to look at and use in its investigation, a trove of documents from some 50 devices. A claim of attorney-client privilege was rejected by the court. The redactions make it impossible to identify the participants, but it looks like somebody in prison was conspiring to acquire presidential clemency via communications, directly or indirectly, with a Trumpian swamp creature. Is this yet another pardonable person or persons? Or a member of the group mentioned above? We’ll see.

One thing the press seems to miss in its current reporting is the possible negative legal consequences to the President and his clan in connection with a pardon.

 A federal “pardonee” no longer has any Fifth Amendment rights in connection with any inquiry into federal criminal conduct. For example, Flynn’s pardon was for “any and all offenses.” That means he cannot be indicted for any pre-pardon federal offenses. It follows, then, that he cannot claim a Fifth Amendment right to refuse to testify on the ground his answer might tend to incriminate him regarding any federal offense.

But because of the so-called "dual sovereignty" doctrine, a federal conviction does not bar a state conviction for the same misconduct, and visa-versa.

But while a federal pardonee can be prosecuted by the state for federally pardoned conduct, if he is called before a NY state grand jury, he gets the equivalent of a state pardon if he answers questions about any subject; under NY state law he is immune from state prosecution on that subject. The witness, now immune from prosecution by either entity, is thereby stripped of any rights to refuse to testify. On he contrary, the more he talks, the more immunity he gets!

Think of federal pardonee Jared Kushner being asked questions about federal pardonee Donald Jr., or federal pardonee Paul Manafort being asked about pardonee Rudy Giuliani.

Oh, how the rats will play!

The scenario brings to mind one of my favorite recent cartoons: Ivanka, accompanied by her husband, asks her father if they are gonna go to jail, and the President responds, “Well you kids may, but I am going to Russia.”

The crowd had it right: “Lock him up!”

A bientot.

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