It's Legal For Trump To Pay His Lawyers With Money Donated From Suckers
The law cannot help those who don't help themselves.
So here we are again: once again, Donald Trump has done something shady, once again, there are no laws preventing his behavior, and once again, decent people are left with impotent rage, while MAGAers are somehow proud that they’ve been cucked by Donald Trump.
Donald Trump is not normal, but our reactions to his behavior are becoming all too familiar.
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In today’s lesson of “laws versus norms,” Reuters reported that Trump has been using campaign donations, many of which are made through the purchase of a red trucker hat, to pay his legal bills resulting from the Russia probe. These are Trump’s personal bills, and he’s using his campaign cash to pay them.
And that’s all perfectly legal. From Reuters:
The U.S. Federal Election Commission allows the use of private campaign funds to pay legal bills arising from being a candidate or elected official.
While previous presidential campaigns have used these funds to pay for routine legal matters such as ballot access disputes and compliance requirements, Trump would be the first U.S. president in the modern campaign finance era to use such funds to cover the costs of responding to a criminal probe, said election law experts.
It’s not like Trump is the first president under criminal investigation. If it’s legal to use campaign donations in this way, why hasn’t anybody else done it?
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Well, because for any other president, their own supporters would likely revolt if they found out campaign funds were used in this way. I don’t like to play this game… but her emails. Can you imagine her emails? Can you imagine the UPROAR if Hillary Clinton was president and under investigation from the F.B.I. and used her campaign funds to pay for her legal fees?
Tucker Carlson would transubstantiate into a smug grin, wreathed in flame. Bernie Sanders people would MARCH all the way from Williamsburg to East New York, where they could safely smash windows in areas they haven’t yet gentrified. Clinton’s own campaign contributors would file lawsuits against her to get their money back. The storm would be so bad that the National Weather Service would give it a name, and “Hurricane Hillary” would ravage the media for weeks.
Laws exist because courts and police enforce them. Norms can exist only if the people enforce them. But Trump’s own people — the ones harmed most by this breach of protocol — are like “meh.” There are not calls for him to reimburse his campaign contributors. There aren’t even calls for him to stop doing it. When asked about how Trump’s legal bills are being paid, Trump attorney John Dowd said, “That’s none of your business.”
Trump’s supporters seem satisfied with that answer.
And so we are back where we always are. Trump has done something that is “not illegal,” and the only people who can punish him are thrilled or indifferent.
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After Trump leaves office, if our society survives that long, we should really think about codifying some of our norms into actual laws.
Trump using campaign, RNC funds to pay legal bills from Russia probe: sources [Reuters]
Elie Mystal is an editor of Above the Law and the Legal Editor for More Perfect. He can be reached @ElieNYC on Twitter, or at elie@abovethelaw.com. He will resist.