As long as I'm getting things on the record (while I still can without too much fear of reprisal) I want to endorse a video by Legal Eagle that lays out the case against voting for Donald Trump in 18 minutes of some of the best video commentary I've ever seen. It's well worth watching, and encouraging others to watch, but just in case you don't want to invest the time and would rather read, I'm posting a (very lightly edited) transcript here. Yes, this is blatant copyright infringement. I apologize. But the stakes are high and this seemed like a risk worth taking. The Legal Eagle team has laid out this case better than I could ever hope to do.
[Transcript of "The Most Important Election of Our Lifetimes" by Legal Eagle]
This is likely to be the most important election of our lifetime. This is not hyperbole. Never have the stakes been higher, but neither has the choice been so easy to make. This is a video that I dreaded I would have to make. I was really looking forward to the possibility that the Republican nominee would be anyone other than Donald Trump. If it had been Mitt Romney, Nikki Haley, or even Ron DeSantis, this video endorsement would've simply explained that you should vote for whoever you wanted based on your policy preferences, because from a legal perspective, it would've been safe to vote for either candidate and it was going to be gloriously click baity with probably the same title and thumbnail that I used here. But unfortunately, this isn't that video because the Republicans nominated Donald Trump. Again.
Others will explain the policy differences between Vice President Kamala Harris and foreign President Trump, but that's not the point of this video. I have very strong policy preferences, and while they do come out from time to time because law is the result of politics, this video's endorsement is not based on those policy preferences. And when I talk about a policy matter, I'm talking about the laws that a president might sign or the actions they might take, things that they can legitimately do under our system of governance. And those preferences are partisan, and that's fine. Reasonable minds can differ about those policies, but this is not about policy. This is about the law itself. This is an endorsement based on the law from a group of lawyers based on their experience and knowledge of the law, and it's about the preservation of our democracy.
So not to bury the lead, LegalEagle cannot endorse Donald Trump for president. For the good of our country, the right vote is for vice President Kamala Harris. Donald Trump represents an affront to the law. Kamala Harris will uphold the law. This election is a choice between a criminal or a prosecutor, and I'd like to explain why this distinction is the only one that matters in this election. Because Donald Trump represents a credible threat to the rule of law, free speech and free elections, and without the rule of law, free speech and free elections, the rest simply doesn't matter.
At that point, your policy preferences are irrelevant. We believe that if you care about the rule of law, the even handedness of our governmental and judicial systems, and want to make sure that your vote counts in the future, you cannot vote for Donald Trump in this election. And I'd like to make the case that if you do care about the rule of law, Kamala Harris is the only choice.
First, not to state the obvious but Trump is a criminal who has no respect for the law and seeks to flaunt the law for his personal gain. Trump is a convicted felon many times over. Trump paid off an adult film actress to stop her from going public with their relationship and then falsified business records to hide a violation of election law. A jury convicted him of all 34 charges related to the incident, which was meant to influence the outcome of the 2016 election. Sentencing has been delayed because of the election. Additionally, Trump sexually assaulted E. Jean Carroll, then repeatedly defamed her. After Carroll won two lawsuits against Trump, the judge ruled that the jury had found that Trump's actions were considered rape according to the common definition of the word. Trump's apparent success as a businessman was built on fraud and a total disregard for the law. Earlier this year a New York court ruled that Trump fraudulently misrepresented his financial figures to get loans and other benefits. This went on for decades. Trump is now banned from serving as an officer and director of any New York corporation. He was barred from taking out loans from a New York bank and now must pay hundreds of millions of dollars in fines.
And there are a myriad of other cases. Trump was forced to pay $25 million to students who attended Trump University because the real estate seminars were a scam. Trump is banned from running a charity in New York because he misused charity funds for his political campaign. And that list of verdicts, settlements and convictions is likely to grow substantially. Trump was indicted for legally retaining highly classified defense documents, an obstruction of justice. The most serious charge against Trump is that he retained national defense information, which is a violation of the Espionage Act. Trump kept these secret documents at his private club, a place that has been described as a haven for spies. Trump was indicted in Washington DC for conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, obstruction and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding and conspiracy against rights, all in an effort to overturn the 2020 election results. In Georgia, Trump was charged with committing a range of crimes related to the 2020 election in that state, including racketeering solicitation of violation of oath by a public officer and false statements.
[T]rump has been impeached twice. First related to Ukraine. Trump's first impeachment occurred following a house inquiry that determined that he solicited foreign interference in his reelection bid. And Trump obstructed the investigation by instructing his administration officials to disregard subpoenas for documents and testimony. Trump tried to force Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy to investigate Joe Biden by withholding military aid. And Trump also tried to promote a conspiracy theory that Ukraine, not Russia, was responsible for interfering in the 2016 presidential election.
[H]is second impeachment was incitement to insurrection, The House of Representatives impeached Trump for encouraging his supporters to storm the Capitol in an attempt to disregard the certification of the 2020 presidential election. Now, obviously both times he escaped conviction in the Senate. But remember, impeachment is a political remedy, not illegal one, but the Trump bipartisan impeachments were unprecedented. And even Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell suggested that Trump should be convicted in court regardless of the impeachment in Congress.
There's a disturbing pattern of Trump's crimes. They are explicitly intended to subvert the democratic process. Trump has run for president three times in the last decade, and each time he's tried to illegally and improperly influence the outcome of the election. In 2016, Trump engaged in the hush money scheme to prevent news of his affair with Stormy Daniels from going public. And the Mueller report documents the many contacts between the Trump campaign and Russian operatives, concluding that Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election by waging social media disinformation campaigns and by hacking the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign. The report also details 10 instances where Trump attempted to interfere with the investigation and obstruct justice. 34 individuals and three companies were indicted because of the Mueller report, including Trump allies, Roger Stone, Mike Flynn, and Paul Manafort, who you will recall was Trump's campaign chairman.
If a man is judged by the company that he keeps, Trump has surrounded himself with corruption. His 2016 campaign chairman, Paul Manafort and Vice-chairman Rick Gates were convicted of conspiracy against the United States. His advisors, Roger Stone, Peter Navarro, and George Papadopoulos committed obstruction of justice, contempt of Congress, and making false statements. Trump organization CFO, Alan Weisselberg was convicted of tax fraud. Trump's national security advisor, Mike Flynn lied under oath. Chief strategist Steve Bannon was convicted of contempt of Congress and that's only the beginning of his troubles. His former personal attorney and fixer, Michael Cohen, was convicted of campaign finance violations. His fundraiser, Elliott Broidy went down for corruption and bribery. Even his lawyers, Ken Chesebro, Jenna Ellis and Sydney Powell pleaded guilty to crimes related to the 2020 election. And unbelievably, on his way out the door, Trump granted clemency to his corrupt political advisors, Paul Manafort, Roger Stone, Michael Flynn, Steve Bannon, and George Papadopoulos.
In 2020, Trump did everything he could to overturn the results of that election, even if that meant disenfranchising millions of voters. He pressured the governor and Secretary of State of Georgia to find him votes just enough to win and not for nothing. He encouraged the riot outside and the siege inside of the US capitol to stop the 2020 election. For the first time since 1820, the Capitol was laid siege. He encouraged the rioters to kill Mike Pence. He sought to delay the results of the election by any means necessary. And as detailed in the DC prosecution, this was only the most visible part of a larger conspiracy to make sure that the election certification never happened.
As you can see, many of Trump's crimes and conduct strike at the heart of our democracy. They are both self-serving and anti-democratic. The hush money payments were meant to keep the information from hurting him in the election. The Ukrainian blackmail scheme was for the purpose of soliciting a bribe in the form of fabricating dirt on his presumptive political rival, Joe Biden. And he conspired to bring down Congress. And here we are in 2024 and Trump is once again waging war on the democratic process. He's already declaring the election rigged against him. His running mate denies that Joe Biden won the 2020 election. His handpicked leader in the House of Representatives won't commit to certifying the results. And he pressured Republicans in swing states to pass legislation and rules preventing the states from counting votes until election night. He subverted democracy before and is trying to do it again right in front of our faces, which takes me to the next point:
Donald Trump will destroy our core freedoms for his own personal gain. Trump frequently undermines free speech by attacking the media, individual journalists, social media platforms and critics. He retaliated against John Bolton for writing a book, which is the ongoing subject of my lawsuit against the government. A never sent draft resignation letter by General Mark Milley said Trump was "doing great and irreparable harm to the US" in 2020 after police used tear gas and batons to clear protesters and journalists out of the then President's way for a photo op in Lafayette Square. Law enforcement used tear gas because Trump was told he couldn't just shoot the protestors.
He has repeatedly called the press the enemy of the people and weaponized the DOJ against certain reporters. Trump said he would revoke the broadcast license of CBS, which isn't a thing you can do, because they interviewed his opponent, Kamala Harris. And Trump has a game plan if he's elected again, it's called Project 2025. Project 2025 is a bespoke manual for fascism. It lays out exactly what Trump can do, how can do it and who he can staff the government with. And the worst part is that it includes a whole bunch of things that are arguably legal but are just old timey fascism.
Trump wants to do one of those one weird tricks but for ending civil liberties, for example, the Comstock Act of 1873 is a federal law that regulated the distribution of materials considered to be obscene lewd, or immoral. The law primarily targeted materials related to birth control, abortion, pornography, and contraceptives. The law is still on the books and Trump and his allies want to enforce it once again to ban medical abortions and contraceptive and criminally convict doctors.
And then there's the Alien Enemies Act of 1798. One of the four laws known collectively as the Alien in Sedition Acts passed by Congress during the presidency of John Adams. The Alien Enemies Act gave the president the authority to detain, arrest, imprison, or deport non-citizens from nations that were considered to be hostile to the United States. And Trump has said he wants to use this law to use the military on American soil to inter and deport tens of millions of immigrants.
And he doesn't just want to stop there. He wants to use the Alien Enemies Act to use the military to deport <i>legal</i> immigrants, including Dreamers and Haitian immigrants who are legally residing in the United States. And who, I will remind you, despite the blood libel levied by Trump, did not eat any cats or dogs -- that was a complete fabrication.
And under the same auspices, Trump has also found to use the military against Democrats who, he claims, are the "enemies from within."
You don't have to take our word for it. Many of Trump's key appointees and advisors will absolutely not vote for him in 2024. The list is vast and growing. It includes former Vice President Mike Pence, former Chair of the Joint Chiefs Mark Milley, former National Security Advisor, John Bolton, former White House chief of Staff, John Kelly, former Secretary of Defense, James Mattis, former Attorney General Bill Barr, former Secretary of Defense, Mark Esper, and former Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson. And this is merely the tip of the iceberg. There are hundreds, if not thousands more. There has never been an administration in history where so many of the people that the president himself appointed have changed their mind and stated that the President is unfit for office. In part, they recognize that Trump with full faculties was a threat to democracy. General Mark Milley called Trump, "A fascist to the core."
[I]t's [also] clear that Trump is ... in mental and physical decline. His speeches are word salads. He doesn't live in the same reality that we do and he just simply makes up facts all day long. And while losing a step when you're almost 80 is not necessarily incompatible with a successful presidency, here the lack of mental faculty means he's more likely to be taken advantage of by his advisors and more quickly to jump to authoritarian tactics.
History has shown that Donald Trump will always take the easy road. And in a second term, there won't be anyone to curb those tendencies.
Which brings us to the economy. Economic policies are usually based in policy preferences. There are some who welcome Trump's plan to place tariffs on all foreign goods. In other words, sales tax of up to 200% on anything made outside of the United States, a tax that you, the consumer would pay, which would cause all Americans to pay thousands more per year. In one instance, an iPhone might cost as much as $4,000. And then of course, other countries would retaliate by levying the same tariffs on US goods, which would kill US exports. ...
[T]hose who think that Trump would be better for the economy fail to take into consideration the effect of Trump's lawlessness on this country and the economy. The only other economic plan that he talks about would be to deport tens of millions of immigrants, many of whom came to this country as children and lived as Americans for decades. This policy, while likely completely infeasible, would also be a disaster for the economy and do next to nothing for high prices.
But more importantly, Trump's destruction of the rule of law, free speech and free elections would itself be terrible for the economy. Individuals and businesses rely on the notion that government will apply the law even-handedly. And they even require the freedom to be critical of the government without fear of government reprisal. And they need to know that when a politician is voted out of office, they will leave peacefully. And they need to know that a politician will not use the office for personal gain at the expense of their country. Unlike Trump, who steered government and foreign contracts to his own businesses like the Trump Hotel, and then promptly sold that when he left office. When you take away free speech rights, property rights and fair elections, and then add in graft and crony capitalism for the President and their friends, you have a recipe for economic disaster, apart from the legal disaster in and of itself. Imagine Germany in 1932, Venezuela in 2005 or Hungary in 2010. Let's not add the United States in 2024 to that list.
Countries with strong legal systems attract more foreign investment. Businesses need to trust that contracts will be upheld and they need to know that their success doesn't depend on whether they personally like the president or not. Trump has threatened CEOs who don't support him. He gave contracts to his friends. He filled his White House with nepotistic advisors, and specifically his son-in-law exploited his position to personally enrich himself.
At base, Trump's advantage on the economy is an illusion, which takes me to my final point: this time, it's different. Obviously, we saw what a Trump presidency can look like. He was president for four years, so why is this the most important election of our lifetime? Well, this time there are no guardrails. There is no deep state, but there are long held institutions, the career bureaucrats and political appointees with half a conscience who pushed back against Trump's worst impulses. And sometimes it worked. His own advisors would slow walk his craziest ideas. But Trump learned his lesson, which is why Project 2025 is so frightening. Project 2025 vows to remove over one million federal employees and would replace expert and non-partisan civil servants with a raft of political loyalists.
We've all taken it as given at this point that if Trump is elected, he would end the many active DOJ investigations and prosecutions into himself on day one. And frankly, it's frightening that we all just assume that he's going to do that at this point. But if he does, that would likely result in mass resignations at the Department of Justice. And Trump would relish that and simply install political loyalists instead. Heck, he might do it even without the resignations.
Yes, he was impeached twice, but he was also acquitted twice. Congress will not stop the next President Trump. And in the interim, the Supreme Court not only granted sweeping immunity, but it basically laid out an instruction manual on how to do all of the above. Wanna use your Department of Justice to prosecute your enemies for no reason, fine, you're totally immune. What's that, you wanna shoot your political rival, don't be silly, just bomb them with an F35. Now it's totally legal and totally cool. The current Supreme Court says, have at it the guardrails that once existed to keep Trump's worst impulses in check are simply gone.
A second term, President Trump would gut the administrative state and fill it with political cronies. Congress will rubber stamp everything that he does. The Supreme Court will continue to say that almost everything he does is immune. And Trump will claim that any election that he loses is illegitimate. There's only one guardrail left: a vote so overwhelming he can't dispute it.
So that brings me to my closing argument. Vice President Harris is the only sane choice in this election. She's a former state prosecutor and state attorney general. She believes in free and fair elections and in free speech. This election is a choice between law and criminality. As Senator, Harris grilled Trump Attorney General Bill Barr about whether he ever opened an investigation because Trump asked him to attack his enemies. And this is a key point because as Attorney General, Barr eroded the rule of law himself, though he has now changed tunes, he misrepresented the Mueller reports findings and shut down an investigation to whether Trump took a $10 million bribe from Egypt to fund his 2016 campaign.
And I do not believe Harris will appoint an Attorney General who weaponizes Department of Justice the way that Trump has. I believe that Harris will support Supreme Court justices who preserve the rule of law and not grant sweeping immunity to the single most criminal president. I believe she will only nominate judges who the American Bar Association says are qualified. And while this is a low bar, Trump can't clear that bar as he nominated 10 judges who the ABA rated as completely unqualified. And I believe it is highly likely that she will not destroy the rule of law. It is highly likely that she will actually uphold the rule of law and saying that out loud, I can't believe how low the bar is, but that's where it's been set.
There it is, you have the choice between someone who will promote free and fair elections, promote core freedoms and uphold the rule of law versus a wannabe dictator. Now, I'm sure many of you already agree with Harris's policy positions. And for those people, you're already convinced of her bonafides. And to those people, all I will say is go out and vote. Elections are won by turnout. Please do whatever you can to vote this year and convince your friends to do the same and not sit on the sideline.
[F]or those of you that disagree with some or all of Harris's policy choices, I hear you. I also don't agree with everything that she espouses. But Kamala Harris appears to be running as a fairly standard Democratic President, both small D and Big D Democratic. Even if you hate democratic policies, a normal Democratic president is better than a fascist Republican. A president who agrees with every single one of your policy positions, but has this one thing where he destroys the government isn't really worth it. And even if you didn't get everything you wanted outta the last four years, or even if you hate Joe Biden, wasn't it nice having a normal person in the White House instead of a crazy weirdo? Wasn't it nice not waking up to deranged tweets and chaos?
It's not a given, but it is frighteningly possible that if Trump is elected again, there is no coming back from this. Many of our institutions held back Trump's worst instincts, and it's possible that they might again, but he and more importantly, his radical advisors learn their lessons and won't make the same mistakes twice. 2020 was a trial run, this time the restraints are gone. This really is an election between a felon and a prosecutor. Donald Trump is a clown, but he's a clown with a gun. And even a clown can be dangerous, sometimes especially so.
And this clown would have the nuclear codes and the DOJ. I think that there is a non-zero chance that he would use the Department of Justice and the US military against Americans who criticize him, against ordinary Americans who he calls the enemies from within. I think that because he keeps saying explicitly that. So whatever your policy preference on the left or the right, I promise you it is more important to preserve the rule of law. So hopefully for the last time, LegalEagle makes a presidential endorsement for this year's election. LegalEagle wholeheartedly endorses Kamala Harris for President of the United States. Now go out and vote because it could be your last [chance].
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