Government

Donald Trump Is Witness Tampering Again

I mean, why do we even have witness tampering laws if this is going to be okay.

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(Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

If you’re about to testify about the Mafia, and goodfella shows up outside your house and says “nice family there, it’d be a shame if anything happened to them,” that’d be witness tampering.

If you were about to testify about you boss, and your boss took you to the racquetball club and gave you a big speech about loyalty before dangling a promotion in front of you, that’d be witness tampering.

The reason why both of those conversations would happen in private is because the mafioso and the shady boss know that there are laws against witness tampering and they’re not trying to catch an obstruction of justice charge while intimidating you.

We live in a world where the President of the United States violates these laws against witness tampering, and he violates them in public from the Oval Office (or wherever Trump accesses Twitter). NOBODY has sufficiently explained to me why he faces no consequences for activity that would get any thug on the street thrown in jail.

Donald Trump is witness tampering again, today, IN FRONT OF OUR VERY EYES.

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That’s the President of the United States making a sentencing recommendation about an ongoing investigation where he is one of the individuals being investigated, while praising the “guts” of a witness who refuses to cooperate with authorities. The clear INTENT is to intimidate Stone and any other person considering of testifying against Trump. He’s telling them that “guts” will be rewarded, while he will use the full powers of his bully pulpit to get the harshest possible penalties for those who testify against him.

THAT’S ILLEGAL. Here’s from George Conway:

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Here’s from Lawfare, which wrote about Trump’s witness tampering over the summer… because Trump has publicly engaged in witness tampering before:

First, encouraging witness misbehavior, unlike firing officials or directing the conduct of federal law enforcement, is not plausibly within the president’s Article II functions. In urging a potential witness not to cooperate with a federal investigation that touches on his own conduct, the president is much more like a normal citizen before the justice system and much less distinctive, as even those most skeptical of the application of obstruction laws to the president concede. “The president can obstruct justice,” Josh Blackman makes clear, even in arguing that he “cannot obstruct justice when he exercises his lawful authority that is vested by Article II of the Constitution.” Tampering with a witness is not a lawful authority vested in Trump by Article II.

Second, to the extent that Mueller appears to be considering a pattern of obstructive behavior that includes internal executive-branch management abuses and public communications about law enforcement officials, the additional element of public communications directed at a particular potential witness to encourage that person’s non-cooperation seems significant. Not only does it show that the aggregate pattern does not consist wholly of Article II-authorized behavior, it also widens the scope and breadth of the corrupt behavior at issue.

If Trump isn’t guilty of witness tampering then “witness tampering” laws are inoperative against the rest of us. That is the result that my liberal tautology ultimately leads me to: Trump is not above the law so laws that are not applied to Trump do not exist. The “but he’s the president” exception doesn’t apply to actions that he takes beyond the scope of Article II’s contemplation of powers. Threatening people who cooperate with federal investigations is CLEARLY beyond the scope of his Article II powers. So if Trump can get away with threatening federal witnesses then… SO CAN EVERYBODY ELSE.

F**k it. Honestly. If there are no rules for Trump then it’s hypocritical to apply rules to anybody else. If there’s going to be freaking ANARCHY then everybody gets to play. I’m not about to be the post-apocalyptic character who is still playing by the rules of a society long since annihilated.

Next time I’m under investigation for my role in a massive criminal conspiracy, I’m going to make it very clear what happens to snitches.

Elie Mystal is the Executive 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.

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