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Now that the third indictment against former president Donald Trump — this one related to his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election — has dropped, Republicans are scrambling. I mean, it can’t feel great that your party’s presumptive nominee for president is facing so very many felony charges.
One tactic that Senator Lindsey Graham has decided to employ is going after the judge assigned in the January 6th case, Tanya Chutkan. He’s on the cable news circuit peddling the theory that Chutkan — a former defense attorney who was a supervisor at the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia in between stints in Biglaw — is biased against the defendant, Donald Trump.
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He said, “The judge in this case hates Trump,” and, “You can convict Trump of kidnapping Lindbergh’s baby in D.C.” And then comes the real point — a push for a venue change, “You need to have a change of venue. We need a new judge. And we need to win in 2024 to stop this crazy crap.”
Graham: The judge in this case hates trump. You can convict trump of kidnapping Lindbergh’s baby in DC. You need to have a change of venue. We need a new judge. And we need to win in 2024 to stop this crazy crap. pic.twitter.com/QBwggvxM4n
— Acyn (@Acyn) August 3, 2023
Of course, this is a new take for Graham. In 2014, he voted to confirm Chutkan to the D.C. court. And don’t worry — there’s no evidence of bias Graham can point to, just a judge well respected for doing her job.
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But Graham isn’t the only senator to have a change of heart regarding Chutkan now that she’s presiding over the Trump case. As reported by Huffington Post:
He was joined in the confirmation vote by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who also has criticized her in Trump’s case. He said on his podcast that the judge has a “reputation for being far left” and is likely to be “relentlessly hostile” to the former president.
Cruz sarcastically sniped on social media that Chutkan’s reported donations to former President Barack Obama’s campaign and victory fund were “comforting.”
Those donations date back at least two years before Cruz’s vote to confirm the judge, according to Federal Election Commission data.
Funny they don’t see any problem with Aileen Cannon being assigned to the Trump documents case. Yes, the same judge who was ripped to shreds by the Eleventh Circuit for her lopsided and pro-Trump rulings in the Trump warrant case. I suppose they only care about bias when it doesn’t help them.
Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter @Kathryn1 or Mastodon @[email protected].