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Home Front: Politix

Checkmating DoJ and Jack Smith

2024-03-03

[Clarice @ AT] This week, all eyes were on the Willis-Wade fiasco in Fulton County, Georgia, but three less smuttily scintillating cases seem at last to be limiting the overreach of the Department of Justice respecting the J6 defendants and Jack Smith’s persecution of President Donald Trump. In interpreting criminal statutes, it seems to me that Courts should not be creative and expansively read into them things that the legislature (that writes the laws) did not clearly proscribe as illegal, and it appears that finally, courts higher than the highly partisan D.C. Circuit judges understand that.

The J6 Defendants
If you have been paying attention at all, you are aware that hundreds of peaceful January 6 demonstrators at the Capitol have received draconian punishments and, as Julie Kelly so assiduously reports, are being very badly treated in confinement. A few have even committed suicide because of their treatment at the hands of the D.C. Courts and the prosecution.

Two cases signal that as many as 100 or more of them will have a pathway to obtain reduction of their sentences. As I will explain, these cases and the Supreme Court’s grant of certiorari in response to a Trump motion for a stay, may well result in a major loss to Special Counsel Jack Smith and those counting on a jail term for Trump being a vehicle to schlep the demented President Biden over the finish line for a second term.

THE FISCHER CASE
Joseph Fischer was one of the J6 defendants who declined to enter into a plea agreement. Like most of the J6 defendants he was at best guilty of a misdemeanor – trespassing -- but the Department of Justice charged him under 18 U.S.C. Sec. 1512 (c)(2) of “corruptly interfering with an official proceeding.” Because the Administration would prefer the narrative that J6 was an ‘insurrection” and not, as counsel for many of the defendants William Shipley believes it was, “a protest over which the police lost control because they were undermanned and unprepared,” this is the tag DoJ has chosen.

Fischer’s case went through the appeal process and when he lost, he applied for certiorari to the Supreme Court, which was granted. The case will be heard in mid-April.

THE BROCK CASE
Further jeopardizing the DoJ’s railroading of the J6 defendants is this week’s decision by the D.C. Court of Appeals. Looking at the same statute as the Supreme Court is considering in Fischer, three judges on the D.C. Court of Appeals, (Millett, Pillard, and Rogers, all of whom were appointed by Democrat presidents) ruled this week that rioters did not merit lengthier sentences for interfering in the “administration of justice” when they paraded through the Capitol.

TRUMP V. U.S.
The Supreme Court granted certiorari upon Trump’s application for a stay on the question “Whether and if so to what extent does a former President enjoy presidential immunity from criminal prosecution for conduct alleged to involve criminal acts during his time in office?” The court in effect is saying that it -- not lower courts -- has the sole authority to decide when a former president has immunity for acts committed while in office. This case completely halts the D.C. proceeding.

Posted by:Frank G

#5 True! What my mother would have called :nasty people".

Posted by: Chesney Sleting4519 2024-03-03 13:11

#4 They have failed already. Any further attempts will increase the magnitude of their failure. If they had accepted the losses in2016 and 2020, the Trump presidency would not have had the impact it will have in the end. I hope they keep trying. They are not smart people.

Posted by: Super Hose 2024-03-03 11:42

#3 ^There is reliable evidence that he was using cheat sheets in high school exams.

Posted by: Grom the Reflective 2024-03-03 10:56

#2 What's that John Durham fellow been up to lately? Just wondering.

Posted by: DooDahMan 2024-03-03 10:55

#1 So if the insurrection cases go away, So does Jack Smiths? Thats OK, I just read there is another fraud case heading Trumps way. I guess they are going to try to get him for every property he bought or sold.

Posted by: 49 Pan 2024-03-03 10:51

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