Below is a slightly expanded version of my column in the New York Post on the verdict in the Trump trial. The Manhattan case, in my view, was a raw political use of the criminal justice system. It is only the latest example of the use of the justice system for political purposes and harkens back to the Adams Administration at the start of our Republic. I discuss that period in my book, The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage (which is available this month).
Here is the column:
After years of trying — in the words of the judge — “to get the damned rascal in this court,” it was a conviction that many welcomed.
But those words were not from Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan, and the conviction was not that of former President Donald Trump.
Rather they were from US Supreme Court Justice Samuel Chase, at the end of the 18th century, when America embraced political prosecutions to target critics and opponents.
The man on trial then was James T. Callender, a muckraking writer critical of President John Adams.
For accusing politicians of corruption, Callender was charged with sedition, fined $200 and put in prison.
It was one of the many political prosecutions carried out by the Adams administration.
Undeniable reality
Political prosecutions are something most citizens associate with dictatorships.
But the Trump prosecution has forced many to confront the undeniable reality of the politicization of our legal system.
In many respects, President Biden and Democrats have re-created the Adams era.
Biden has led calls for censorship of political critics and his administration has coordinated the silencing and the blacklisting of those with opposing views.
Democratic politicians have pressured social-media companies to serve as surrogates for the government in banning, throttling and defunding individuals and groups.
Indeed, I have previously written that Biden is now the most anti-free-speech president since Adams.
The Adams era also reflected the same blind loyalty of many media outlets.
Federalist publications supported the crackdowns while echoing charges against political opponents as seditionists and insurrectionists.
Jeffersonian publications, like Callender’s, attacked Adams for his “unbounded thirst for ridiculous pomp, foolish adulation, and selfish avarice.”
The nation was divided down the middle as both sides accused each other of being traitors and insurrectionists. Sound familiar?
A chilling return
Yet, it is the politicization of the legal system that is the most chilling return to the Adams era.
Even liberal legal analysts and figures have admitted that the case against Trump was unprecedented and would not have been brought against anyone other than Trump.
CNN legal analyst Elie Honig recently wrote that there should be concern over a judge being appointed (not randomly selected) who is not just a Biden donor but someone who “has earmarked donations for ‘resisting the Republican Party and Donald Trump’s radical right-wing legacy.’”
Adding to these concerns is the movement of the third-highest official in the Biden Justice Department to the staff of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg to build the case against Trump.
Before joining the case, Matthew Colangelo was also paid by the Democratic National Committee for “political consulting.”
So Trump was convicted in a trial with a Biden donor judge, who has a daughter who is a major Democratic operative, a lead prosecutor previously paid as a DNC political consultant and a jury selected in a district that voted roughly 90% against Trump.
The trial itself was a travesty.
Even after sitting in the courtroom watching the trial and the verdict, I still have no idea what Trump was convicted of in the case.
The charges were built on a dead misdemeanor barred with the passage of the statute of limitations.
It was zapped back into life by alleging that the falsification of business records occurred to unlawfully influence the 2016 presidential election.
Merchan told the jury members that they did not have to agree on what those unlawful means may have been.
Specifically, he allowed them to base their verdict on any one of three vaguely defined crimes of a federal election violation, falsification of business records or taxation violations.
Thus, the jury could have divided 4-4-4 on what actually occurred but the verdict was still treated as unanimous by Merchan to convict Trump.
Like much else in the case, that didn’t matter in deep-blue Manhattan.
Legal analysts and commentators openly celebrated on MSNBC and CNN — joining many in the streets.
This was a thrill-kill conviction, and the response of many in the media bordered on the indecent.
For many outside of Manhattan, the scene was repulsive and chilling.
You can hate Donald Trump but still be repelled by the use of the criminal justice system for political purposes.
There is, however, one silver lining. We went through political prosecutions under Adams and, to a lesser extent, Thomas Jefferson.
Yet, we survived. Our system corrected such abuses over time.
The Alien and Sedition Acts used to prosecute Callender expired.
Justice Samuel Chase was impeached for his partisanship (though not convicted).
With this case, you feel the weight of history in the conviction of a former president, but also a historical awakening.
Sometimes it takes a great abuse to shock the public into recognizing the need to act.
That was the case when the public finally saw Sen. Joe McCarthy in the first televised hearing of an Un-American Activities hearing. It was enough to stop the Red Scare and the abuses of political dissidents. Back then, the left was the target of such weaponization of the legal process. Today, it is the left pushing such abuses.
In the faces of ecstasy of demonstrators and commentators alike this week, we see the same joyful release from the bounds of legal process. The addictive quality of rage.
For them, it was a cathartic moment that was described by one commentator as a reason to celebrate and a “majestic” moment.
For the rest of us, it was more menacing than majestic.
It could prove to be the moment that galvanized many outside of Manhattan; the moment when citizens saw where our rage has taken us.
Sometimes we have to be forced to see what we have become to better understand who we are.
We are better than this.
Jonathan Turley is an attorney and professor at George Washington University Law School.
All I can say is the wimp azz republicans haven’t looted any stores or even burned down one lousy building. Seriously, who can take you seriously without burning something?
Did you know that Alvin Bragg has tried to sue Trump in court over 100 times in the past? That was tax payer money well spent! I guess he just kept trying to “Get Him,” until finally something stuck! It is really hard for me to say that this was a fair trial considering everyone involved in this political prosecution was a Democrat. From the AG to the DA, to the entire Prosecution team, to the Judge, to pretty much every single Juror, they were all Democrats. Since you can smell BS so well, you want to tell me how you can’t smell the BS that steams up from this Trump Trial?
It does not matter that they were democrats. What matters is that this entire thing was garbage from the start.
What matters is that they painted Democrats as willing to go completely lawless to “get Trump”
Never knew my ancestor was a Fascist!
Can you name 1 person who Senator McCarthy named as a Communist who wasn’t.
As someone who is neither conservative or liberal and who is not only not a fan of Trump but quite the opposite, I can easily see this trial was a complete sham, nothing more than pure political retribution and the current political party misusing the legal system to attack and arrest their political opponent.
I don’t see how this kangaroo court decision will ever be allowed to stand. This has nothing to do with Donald Trump and everything to do with what Prof Turley said, about us “being better than this”.
This is about who we are as a nation, not about Donald Trump.
Are we a corrupt banana republic now? Because that’s the only type of place this sort of corruption would be allowed to stand.
As someone who can sniff out BS, I can see that you are partisan and are lying. This case had to pass through multiple gates in our legal system which make sure prosecutors (or any litigant) can’t merely put someone in legal jeopardy because they want to. In a criminal case there has to be evidence of a crime (and save me your BS about “what was the crime?” Trump illegally cooked the books in order to use campaign funds to keep information from voters), there has to be a grand jury review, all the evidence has to be submitted to the defense before the trial begins, the defense gets to reject jurors it does not like (there were Trump voters on the jury), a jury weighs the evidence to make a decision. Either you’re willfully ignoring this or you’re not very bright. Your comments like “complete sham,” “political retribution,” misusing the legal system,” “kangaroo court,” banana republic,” are simply that of a facile intellect. If what you say is true, you should easily be able to show how the evidence is bad or wrong. You fail.
He didn’t use campaign funds
You are a joke if you think this wasn’t a sham and abuse of the legal system. Dems hid Hunters laptop to avoid fallout leading up to an election and nothing happened. Biden had classified documents everywhere that he did not have authority to possess and nothing happens. This country is in trouble and Trump may be the only person who can get America back on track.
“Indeed men too often take upon themselves in the prosecution of their revenge to set the example of doing away with those general laws to which all alike can look for salvation in adversity, instead of allowing them to subsist against the day of danger when their aid may be required.” – Thucydides 3.84.3
“Indeed men too often take upon themselves in the prosecution of their revenge to set the example of doing away with those general laws to which all alike can look for salvation in adversity, instead of allowing them to subsist against the day of danger when their aid may be required.” – Thucydides 3.84.3
Did you know that Alvin Bragg has tried to sue Trump in court over 100 times in the past? That was tax payer money well spent! I guess he just kept trying to “Get Him,” until finally something stuck! It is really hard for me to say that this was a fair trial considering everyone involved in this political prosecution was a Democrat. From the AG to the DA, to the entire Prosecution team, to the Judge, to pretty much every single Juror, they were all Democrats. Since you can smell BS so well, you want to tell me how you can’t smell the BS that steams up from this Trump Trial? You must live on a Democrat Farm or something…
“This case had to pass through multiple gates in our legal system which make sure prosecutors (or any litigant) can’t merely put someone in legal jeopardy because they want to.”
Nope
” In a criminal case there has to be evidence of a crime”
Correct – there is not.
” (and save me your BS about “what was the crime?” Trump illegally cooked the books in order to use campaign funds to keep information from voters),”
Anbd guess what – that is NOT A CRIME – it is also a false claim.
There is no right of voters to know whatever they want about the private lives of candidates or others.
In fact it is ACTUALLY a crime to provide private information that you do not have a legitimate right to share.
Daniels did have the right to her story – and she sold it to Micheal Cohen for a platry 130K.
She could have sold it to Clinton. Clinton paid 1.6M for the collusion delusion – do you think she would not have given Daniels a fortune for a True story ? One of the reasons it is unlikely that the Daniels story is true is that selling a false story to 3rd parties is fraud and can get you in deep trouble. But selling a false story to the person is is about is not fraud – because they already know it is false.
” there has to be a grand jury review,”
Have you never heard the one about ham sandwiches ?
” all the evidence has to be submitted to the defense before the trial begins, ”
You have clearly not been paying attention – Trumps team was not given witness lists until the day before each witness appeared.
They were not told what the predicate crime was until the prosecution was in the midst of closing arguments.
You talk about the procedural protections for criminal defendants – yet these were all steam rolled.
In the middle of this case the NY court of appeals (the NY equivalent of the Supreme court) reverse the Harvey Weinstein conviction.
Why ?
Because the judge allowed testimoney of uncharged crimes, and because the judge failed to give a jury instruction requiring jurors to draw a predjudicial conclusion from witnesses to facts that the prosecution did not call.
Here we have that from end to end – whe have allegations – no actual evidence of crimes that have never been indicted, never prosecuted, and in fact were rejected even as violations of federal regulations. The Clinton campaign was fined for illegal campaign finance expenditures – the Trump campaign was not.
Regardless, NYS has no jurisdiction over FECA – the law is actually explicit about that – specifically to prevent exactly this kind of nonsense.
And finally the judge unsurprisingly botched the jury instructions on a law that is a federal not state law.
While there were massive errors throughout the prosecution – there will be significant focus on the jury instructions. Because improper jury instructions generate rapid reversals.
“the defense gets to reject jurors it does not like (there were Trump voters on the jury)”
False.
“a jury weighs the evidence to make a decision.”
You really have never been in court.
While this was a partisan jury lead to water by an illegal prosecution.
Our jury system is the best system we have – but it is quite poor overall.
“Either you’re willfully ignoring this or you’re not very bright.”
Yup, insulting people that is sure to be persuasive.
I can tell you that I personally know two people with IQ’s north of 145 that think this was a sham.
Neither of whom voted for Trump.
” Your comments like “complete sham,” “political retribution,” misusing the legal system,” “kangaroo court,” banana republic,” are simply that of a facile intellect. If what you say is true, you should easily be able to show how the evidence is bad or wrong. You fail.”
I would suggest that you contemplate your own insults and how they would apply to you.
But lets address this “complete Sham”.
Do you think there is a chance in h311 you would have gotten a conviction anywhere else in NYS that voted anywhere near 50:50 for Trump ?
Do you think there is a chance in h311 that you could get a conviction in 95% of the united states ?
There is a reason the DC case is in DC, the GA case is in Atlanta, and the Bragg/James cases are in Manhattan.
There is a reason that in the unlikely even the FL case goes to trial that Trump will be acquitted there.
The reason is that these are among the few places int he country that you can actually rig these trials.
Just to be clear – this is not about Democrats. There are democrats in this country who are honest judge, honest prosecutors, and would be honest jurors.
But the odds of getting democratic prosecutors who are lawless and corrupt, judges that are lawless and corrupt, and juries that either hate Trump so much they would convict no matter what or who are terrified of being cancelled should they be exposed as holding out for acquittal.
If you honestly beleive the garbage you are spewing about this being a fair trial – then Merchan should have recused, Bragg should have turned the case over to a prosecutor from a different country – one that did not run on Get Trump and that had not sued him 100 times – and lost.
and the venue should have been changed to Staten Island or long island or upstate NY.
Do you think you could have gotten an indictment anywhere outside of NYC ?
Do you think you could have gotten a prosecutor to take the case ?
Do you think you could have gotten a judge that would not have dismissed this for failure to state a crime ?
“use campaign funds to keep information from voters”
A ” facile intellect.” would be one that gets basic facts of the case wrong.
Cohen Paid Daniels from his own money. He later was paid by Trump for a number of things including securing the Daniels NDA – from Trump’s personal finances.
No Campaign funds were involved. Separately MERchan misstated law that he does not have any jurisdiction over and failed to inform the jury that even if you decide that Trump making this payment was an unreported campaign contribution – which requires time travel as the payments were not made until 2017 AFTER the election, you would STILL have the problem that legally candidates can contribute unlimited amounts to their own campaigns.
Misstating the law is a fatal error in all criminal cases.
It would be a” facile intellect.” that would not know that.
It would be an especially “facile intellect.” that ranted and raved idiotic nonense about a case getting all kinds of facts and law wrong in a comment on an article by one of the most pre-eminent constitutional law professors in the United states who identified many of these errors.
Or the 3rd grad version “Can you read” ?
No I’m not even close to a partisan or any sort of Trump supporter and anyone who knows me or bothers to read my comments would know that in fact just the opposite and I can see this trial is clearly nothing more than a insanely brazen political prosecution and retribution as well as trying to control the outcome of the election.
I mean the very irony of the literally trumped up charges claiming he paid her to influence the election while they’re literally arresting the opposition candidate in the current election is stunning, and if you can’t see that then you won’t see that and are just lying to yourself and everyone else.
“We are better than this.”
*********************
Nope, only some of us. The others are what optimists like to call “misguided.” I refer to them as ‘enemies of the Republic.”
“The Hillary campaign operative who cooked the books to hide payments for the Steele Dossier became SEC Chair.
The Biden campaign operative who orchestrated the 51 spies-who-lied about Hunter’s crimes became Secretary of State.
Dems know how to reward election interference.” @DavidSacks
saw that earlier on Twitter. He is not wrong
Professor Turley, your lack of practical legal experience is showing. Your assumption about the jurors being unduly biased by their democratic political leanings is simply wrong. I’m a lawyer with 15 years of experience trying cases in New York City (in addition to litigating issues of constitutional magnitude), representing the most despised people in society—convicted sex offenders and seriously mentally ill criminals. Manhattan jurors reliably are the most capable of setting aside bias and thinking critically about a prosecution, especially one so inherently consequential. Perhaps you are correct about the jury instructions leading to an incorrect verdict. But faulting the jury pool undermines your persuasiveness. I also question some of your comments about the judge (who presided over my first jury trial, which I lost). Although I agree with criticism of his closing the courtroom when he dressed down the Trump witness. Argument that a Manhattan jury was unable to look past party affiliation to judge the case is, at most, projection. It says more about the maker of that accusation than anything else.
That you would comment here in defense of this judge, and this jury verdict, and this obvious corruption of “justice” says far more about your judgment than Professor Turley’s.
And you know it is corrupt because…trump said so? Give me a break. Those close to trump say this guilty verdict was 50 years in the making. He has flouted the law so long and gotten away with it, his time just ran out. trump has been involved in over 4000 law suites. Who is in court that much? Clearly he is not the saint he is pretending to be.
That you use fake names to post, bait others, and respond therein…… priceless.
When Trump becomes President you be found hiding under your mommy’s basement bed wetting your diapers.
“And you know it is corrupt because…”
I’m not brainwashed, like you.
Trump has never “pretended to be a saint.” Unlike Joe Biden who “pretends” to be the poorest politician in Congress, and a compassionate, kindly old grandpa Lunch Box Joey from Scranton. What a load of crap.
Do you know where you will find about 535 individuals who have “flouted the law and gotten away with it” forever? There’s a big white building….
Biden, Inc. has been flouting the law and getting away with it for as long as he has been in politics.
No one is above the law? When this country sees several members of Biden’s racketeering crime syndicate, including Big Guy, shackled and frog marched into prison, then maybe people will believe we still have a functioning justice system in this country. Today? No one should believe it for a second.
You need to stop getting your news from (un)truth Social. trump is not the god you pretend him to be.
“He [Trump] has flouted the law so long and gotten away with it, his time just ran out.”
Please tell me you are not the anonymous I am presently arguing with because if so, I have been arguing with an idiot. The other anonymous blamed Trump without understanding the Trump U incident. Having failed there, he started to talk about Weisselberg because he is so shallow that he could not stay on topic.
Now I hear this garbage. Please, please tell me you are another anonymous person, so I don’t have to ask for a list of those things where Trump flouted the law.
*****Keep hiding under anonymous so your mistakes can diffuse through all the anonymous posters. That is what you want from the government, as it’s part of your personality not to take responsibility for what you do or say.
Stop analyzing this lawfare against Trump as exactly how “anyone” would be treated by the “justice system.”
Trump is not any defendant – he is the political opponent of the current president in the current presidential election cycle.
Should the woke Left now refer to President Trump as a “justice impacted” individual?
For all we know you’re a fry specialist at McDonalds who’s watched too many Matlock reruns, since you use a troll handle instead of your name. If you’re truly a lawyer then you shouldn’t be afraid of putting your name behind your words. But you don’t, so your claims don’t carry any weight.
And if you are an attorney and can’t see the obvious political bias throughout this entire sham of a case then you’re obviously as corrupt as they are.
This entire case is a sham. I’m not a Trump supporter in fact I’m just the opposite. I think he’s a joke of a candidate for the highest office in the land. Always have thought that and likely always will. He treats it like he’s a contestant on a game show. And his incessant nocturnal “tweeting” , it was ridiculous for a global leader the way he’s literally insult and attack private citizens on social media. I thought people were crazy for nominating him.
But compared to Biden and more importantly the forces behind Biden he was a statesman of the highest order. That’s compared to Biden. Not in real life. But compared to Biden anything would be good.
And now we have Biden’s cabinet prosecuting Biden’s political opponent in the upcoming election, and a former US President. There’s nothing about this prosecution that spells legit. Not a damn thing, and if even I who think Trump is a poor candidate for President and was a poor President when he held the office, … can see through this sham of a prosecution then anyone can and you have no excuse.
If what you say about yourself is true that is which of course who the heck knows. You could be anything. You could be a troll in Russia or a salseclerk in South Dakota. But whatever or whoever you are, you sure can’t see reality when its staring you in the face.
Can’t or won’t.
More Yada Yada Yada from another leftist NY attorney. What a shocker?
The jury in the Merchan show trial should not be above criticism. They had a duty and they failed spectacularly by convicting an innocent man. Their verdict does not deserve automatic, unquestioned “respect”…. not in the least.
Did you pay any attention to the trial? He paid the money, it was not accounted for correctly. Hope Hicks said on the stand that trump did it for the election.
What is so hard about that to understand?
It doesnt matter if he did it for the election. That is not illegal.
The premise is that he conspired before the election to affect the election by taking certain actions AFTER the election.
The only action that occurred before the election is that Cohen entered into an NDA with stormy Daniels, and paid her 130k. EVERYTHING ELSE occurred after the election. Therefore nothing else that happened could have affected the election and therefore there could be no conspiracy to do so.
That is not possible, plain and simple.
You are too simple minded to understand what was wrong about that jury. Imagine if there were 2 holdouts, who refused to let the judge essentially order them to find Trump guilty. What would have happened to them in the event of a hung jury? Do you have any idea? They would have been outed by their fellow jurors and immediately doxxed by AOC and the media. They and their families lives would have been ruined at best, and very possibly in jeopardy from left wing nut jobs. Would you put your 12 year old daughter thru that?
So gfy, whoever you are pretending to be “autumn”, but really just another booger eating lefty like all the rest. My guess is you are as likely to be an attorney as Gigi.
Turley and very few prominent Democrats have said this is wrong what Democrats did with their sham show trial. The Democrats always get in line, marching lockstep with Dear Leader, just like the Marxists they are. Notice to Democrats – and especially those of you in the legal profession – if you do not speak up publicly declaring that what your party’s political thugs are doing is wrong, then you too are a Communist Marxist thug complicit in this criminal conspiracy, coming straight out of Biden’s White House, hellbent on the destruction of not just Trump, but our Republic.
To ask these radical Democrats to speak these words would be akin to splashing Holy Water on a demon: “I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all,”