Abuse of power: another article of impeachment?

A version of this was published in the Sky Hi News, June 13-14, 2018
https://www.skyhinews.com/news/muftic-abuse-of-power-another-article-of-impeachment/

A new term is creeping into the impeachment vocabulary thanks to recent media focus.  It is abuse of power , the  second article of impeachment against Nixon in the Watergate scandal. Reminders of this are  good reasons to  take a  deeper dive into where we stand today on impeachment and what articles of impeachment could be brought  if Donald Trump were to be the subject.

 First, impeachment of Trump is unlikely but possible. What is different from Watergate  is that Democrats held the majority In both House and Senate and  controlled the House impeachment process when GOP Nixon was president.  Today, President Trump’s party is the majority in both House and Senate. Even then, it would take a vote of 2/3 of the Senate to convict even if  the  House of Representatives  turns blue in 2018 and begins the impeachment process.  Chances are slim  that Donald Trump would be impeached while the Senate is likely to be still  too closely divided to convict. The House or Senate  could gain a Democratic majority in 2018, and do damage to the GOP/Trump in 2020 by holding hearings, though.   A  damning report by Special Counsel Robert Mueller or Trump’s firing of the investigators investigating him  might even  give a GOP Congress  enough of  a backbone to proceed. So far Trump has been told by Mueller  he is a subject, but not the target of his criminal  investigations, yet. Impeachment articles are as the House defines them.  Much could  fall under the Constitution’s   high crimes and misdemeanors clause.

 Nixon resigned  before impeachment.  We still have the articles of impeachment to compare and contrast.  The  first article of impeachment against Nixon was obstruction of justice. White House tapes showed he lied about his part in the coverup.  In Trump’s case , Mueller must show  Donald Trump’s criminal intent was to obstruct the Russian investigation when he fired  FBI Director James Comey. Impeachment articles do not need  a prosecution’s criminal findings, though.  In December Trump wanted to fire Special Counsel Robert Mueller, the chief investigator investigating him, and Mueller’s boss, Rod Rosenstein, before they have made their final report. He claims often they are on a witch hunt. He has  backed off when GOP senators said that would be obvious evidence of  intent to obstruct  justice. Some witches have been found already in Trumps immediate circle and some are  Russians. Many  are under Mueller’s gun, some  already charged, indicted,  pleaded, out on bond,  or in jail

 Other possible impeachment articles authorized  in the Constitution are bribery and   treason, neither in Nixon’s articles. Treason could  be  more politely defined  as (collusion)  conspiring with a foreign government (Russia)  to help his  election and their national interests, a major focus of the Mueller investigation.  Connections between the Trump business organization and Trump himself benefiting from recent real estate loan deals with China coinciding with lifting sanctions on a Chinese telecom are raising eyebrows, not to mention violation of Constitutional emoluments clauses.

  In the Nixon case the abuse of power charge was based on his ordering  the IRS  to go after those on his enemies list, including the LA Times and their owners.  Trump’s repeated  demands  of  the semi autonomous  postmaster  to increase postal rates on Amazon, is suspected abuse  because its owner, Jeff Bezos, also owns the Washington Post, Trump’ chief media critic. Trump  has tried to argue Amazon pays   too low  postal rates which causes USPS deficits, but obvious evidence is  that deficit is caused by pension funding. Trump’s role in the denial of the Time Warner ATT merger that would have helped CNN is once again under scrutiny.  To be subject to impeachment and  prosecution,  the threat does not need to be carried out. Update June 12, 2018  Courts OK Time Warner ATT merger:https://www.politico.com/story/2018/06/12/att-time-warner-merger-approved-642333

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 To write this blog, I drew on so many source and documents, and my own research for prior posts on the impeachment procedure,  there are too many to list. However, I am particularly indebted for MSNBC’s  Rachel Maddow’s calling thoroughly documented  attention to the history of the Nixon impeachment’s article 2 in a recent broadcast and the implication of Trump’s demand on the US Postal Service

An update: Trump refuses to provide information about how he has  persoally profited during his tenure...another example of both abuse of power and thumbing his nose at the emoluments clause:
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/05/trumps-company-isnt-tracking-all-the-money-it-gets-from-foreign-governments

http://money.cnn.com/2017/10/15/media/trump-jessica-rosenworcel-nbc-license/index.html

http://fortune.com/2018/05/12/rudy-giuliani-trump-att-time-warner-merger/

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-11/trump-threatens-nbc-tv-licenses-after-story-on-nuclear-buildup

BBC reports Cohen took Ukraine bribe money to arrange meeting with Trump http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44215656

https://www.yahoo.com/news/anything-stop-foreign-government-favors-trump-043850542.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/10/us/politics/trump-sought-to-fire-mueller-in-december.html

https://criminal-law.freeadvice.com/criminal-law/violent_crimes/criminal-threats.htm

Articles of impeachment against Nixon regarding abuse of power: . ”repeatedly engaged in conduct violating the constitutional rights of citizens, impairing the due and proper administration of justice in the conduct of lawful inquiries, of contravening the law of governing agencies of the executive branch and the purposes of these agencies. ...”   

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/02/trump-amazon-jeff-bezos-stock-value-495803

As I noted in a prior Facebook posting that this threat against Amazon shipping rates  is really  stupid  on Trump’s part. Amazon can switch to Fed Ex and UPS with which they already have contracts avoiding the Post Office and this will spur Amazon’s stated plans to short cut all of these services by moving up the time line in establishing their own delivery service, already in the works. The only people punished by this will be us consumers and million customers of Amazon who will pay higher shipping rates or they will be absorbed by Amazon until their own service is on line or they use UPS and Fed Ex instead.  The financial loss will be USPS’.

  Full disclosure: I am the owner of a small cosmetic company which is an Amazon seller and I am a customer, too.  I live  an hour and a half way from major retailers so I depend on ecommerce.  Even when my own web ecommerce site sells the same items at a lower price also  including shipping, customers prefer to order the same ones offered  on Amazon because they trust their guarantees and policies made to Prime customers and prefer  the user friendliness  of their technology.  I imagine  Donald Trump is neither an Amazon  seller nor a customer so he has no clue other than  thinking this is a way to punish a media outlet owner by trying to damage his  other business’ investors’ stock prices. This action if implemented  is likely to end up in civil court anyway over  contract matters.

Why firing Rod Rosenstein would be like firing Robert Mueller

Now the House Freedom Caucus is trying to "fire"Rosenstein: Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein Tuesday compared articles of impeachment drafted against him by members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus to an extortion attempt.

“There have been people who have been making threats privately and publicly against me for quite sometime and I think they should understand the Department of Justice is not going to be extorted,” he said speaking at The Newseum’s Law Day event. “We are going to do what is required by the rule of law and any kind of threats anybody makes are not going to affect the way we do our job.”

The House Freedom Caucus, which is chaired by Rep. Mark Meadows, North Carolina Republican, have drafted eight articles of impeachment against Mr. Rosenstein, multiple media outlets reported late Monday. Those drafts reportedly accuse Mr. Rosenstein of abusing his authority when he renewed a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant on Trump campaign aide Carter Page ahead of the 2016 presidential campaign.

From the Washington Times, May 1, 2018

https://www.c-span.org/video/?444870-1/justice-department-extorted-articles-impeachment-rosenstein

https://www.factcheck.org/2017/07/trumps-power-pardon/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Nixon

http://www.newsweek.com/trump-leak-mueller-questions-experts-906857

This post was written the last time rumors were Donald Trump was threatening to fire those investigating him, but it is a relevant now as rumors are rampant now, 4 11 18
Revised February 8, 2018

Update: April 20, 2018: AG Sessions threatens to quite if Rosenstein is fired:
http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/384221-sessions-warned-white-house-he-could-quit-if-trump-fired-rosenstein

Why do some in Congress equate firing Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein with the same importance as  firing  Special Counsel Robert Mueller? We know the Deputy Attorney General has the power to fire Mueller and the President must go through him to do it, but whoever sits in the Deputy Attorney General's chair also  has the ability  to influence the outcome of the Mueller investigation even if Mueller is not fired. The Deputy AG has the power to limit the  scope of the investigation and to make  the  decision whether  to release the Mueller report in some form to the US public.  

Rosenstein's tenure is in jeopardy. CNN quotes  President Trump as having said of Rosenstein, “Let's fire him, let's get rid of him,” but was talked out of it.  Soon after the Nunes memo came to the public's attention, it was seen by critics as an attempt to create a pretext for the President to fire him. Mr. Trump revived the possibility. When asked if he would fire Rosenstein,  Trump  answered "you figure it out".  In a letter to President Trump, Democratic Congressional leaders wrote "Firing Rod Rosenstein, DOJ Leadership, or Bob Mueller could result in a constitutional crisis of the kind not seen since the Saturday Night Massacre." They were referring to  similar actions Richard Nixon took in Watergate. Even Paul Ryan, House Majority  Leader, said : "Rod Rosenstein is doing a fine job."  

Donald Trump has his own self-interested reasons to want to fire Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. Assuming President Trump believes firing Special Counsel Robert Mueller would certainly trigger serious impeachment attempts, firing Rosenstein would be a tempting alternative. Rosenstein has already indicated he was not a Trump team player when his Department of Justice  objected to the release of the Nunes memo.The Nunes memo was also  viewed by many as an attempt to provide  Donald Trump with a public rationale  to fire Rosenstein  for alleged “deep state bias” and  for  FBI alleged  incompetence in a single  court filing to renew a FISA warrant for surveillance of Carter Page. The Nunes memo was also seen as an attempt to damage the credibility of the FBI so that their findings would be viewed as biased. Polls show that strategy is working with the GOP rank and file

Some senators have warned him firing Rosenstein also could backfire on him just as did the the firing of FBI Director James Comey. Comey was investigating President Trump's associates' with contacts with Russians. That firing resulted in the appointment of Mueller to investigate if the President or his associates were obstructing justice or they conspired with Russians to interfere in the 2016 elections, or even if financial crimes were committed, all possible impeachable offenses.

Another possible temptation for Donald Trump to fire Rod Rosenstein would be to limit the scope of Mueller’s report. The Deputy AG has the power to put the report in a desk drawer if he does not see release of it would be in the public's interest, whatever that means. A new deputy AG could take money laundering off the table or out of the report, for example. Mr. Trump has made it clear that subject was a red line he thought Mueller should not cross.

The game could then become delay, delay, delay until after the November Congressional elections. Firing Rosenstein and replacing him with a Trump loyalist could a result in drawn out court challenges, congressional hearings, and a confirmation vote of the Senate, though it would not halt the investigation since it could continue under Rosenstein's deputy. Donald Trump could also contend his reason try to avoid testifying to the Mueller team or taking the 5th was that the FBI was too politically biased against him. That issue could also be tied up in the Courts past the November 2018 election.

Win or lose the court challenges, resulting delays could benefit the GOP and President Trump. The GOP fear is the 2018 midterms could flip control of the  House that  has impeachment powers to Democrats. The GOP now has the majority in the House and while they have control, it is realistic to believe they would not impeach their President. Delays would give Donald Trump an opportunity to keep up the morale of his base through November and keep Congress in GOP hands. It might work. In the midst of Watergate, Nixon was re-elected to a second term by a large majority. It was not until after that  election he was forced by the courts to release the tapes that his role in the Watergate cover up was revealed to the public and impeachment was begun.

There are two unforeseen circumstances that could change this scenario: the Mueller findings could be
so explosive even House Republicans could not ignore them and would proceed with impeachment or
that Mueller would indict the president and shortcut impeachment proceedings. Whether he has the power to do the latter is an unsettled legal matter and would depend upon a Supreme Court ruling..

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https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/12/republicans-quietly-warn-trump-dont-fire-mueller/

https://poll.qu.edu/national/release-detail?ReleaseID=2517

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2017/12/mueller-trump-deutsche-bank

https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/26/politics/donald-trump-rod-rosenstein-frustration/index.html

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/02/02/democrats-trump-obstruction-386078

http://thehill.com/homenews/sunday-talk-shows/372215-house-intel-gop-rep-memo-doesnt-give-trump-reason-to-fire

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/house-gop-leaders-hold-weekly-press-conference-ahead-of-sotu-live-stream/

https://www.factcheck.org/2018/02/qa-nunes-memo/

http://www.businessinsider.com/mueller-threatened-to-subpoena-trump-over-negotiations-for-interview-2018-5

 From factcheck.org    https://www.factcheck.org/2017/05/special-counsel-qa/

“What happens when the special counsel’s investigation is complete?

Rosenstein’s order notes that if Mueller deems it “necessary and appropriate,” he is “authorized to prosecute federal crimes arising from the investigation of these matters.” The federal code states that at the conclusion of a special counsel’s investigation, he must provide the acting attorney general with a confidential report explaining decisions about whether or not prosecutions are warranted. The acting attorney general could decide to make that report public. According to the code, the “Attorney General may determine that public release of these reports would be in the public interest, to the extent that release would comply with applicable legal restrictions.”

Hypocrisy is not new in politics; , it has just gotten worse

Rep. Devin Nunes, Donald Trump's GOP House member errand boy, was at it again. After having to recuse himself from the Russian investigation because of flagrant partisanship,  in a prior stunt. Devin Nunes, chair of the House Intelligence Committee,  wants to release his "memo" on alleged misdeeds by the FBI.  The Trump administration's own Justice Department says it contains classified information and  release would be "extraordinarily  reckless ", harmful to US security.  Nunes is on a thinly disguised  campaign to try to obstruct the Mueller investigation by damaging the FBI's reputation and to give a reason to fire Deputy  AG Rod Rosenstein who is  supervising the Mueller probe. The reason the Justice Department gave : the Nunes memo includes  information into FBI secret methods to gather information. No wonder Russian bots are cheerleading for the release of this memo. Russia could  learn much helpful to their own attempts to subvert US democracy and learning more about sources and methods used by US security services.  The FBI believes also it is misleading. and inaccurate.  https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2018/01/31/fbi-grave-concerns-expected-release-nunes-memo/1083218001/

Of course, after exhaustive investigations led by a GOP Congress into Hillary Clinton's e mails that allegedly contained classified information, those investigations  went nowhere because her intent to include them was not proven. Now  Nunes intentionally wants to release classified information harmful to the US.     Is it  OK if the GOP intentionally does release information that hurts US security  but it is  not OK if Clinton unintentionally did it  and with no damage to US security?

It is just boys being boys and locker room talk if the GOP 's flag bearer, the President of the US.  admits to sexual assault on starlets and pays off porn stars for his encounters, but it is impeachment worthy when Bill Clinton "did not have sex with that women".  Give Trump a "mulligan", White  Evangelical religious leader  's exhort while some of  their believers believe Trump   "was sent by God".  Give me a break.  How many of the GOP would like their kids to grow up and be like Donald Trump?

I yearn for those simpler  days when President Jimmy Carter admitted he had "lust in in heart".  But of course, he, a devout Christian,  came in for ridicule by his political critics  as a hypocrite.   How far  down  the toilet has the country gone?

https://www.vox.com/identities/2018/1/23/16924546/evangelical-tony-perkins-trump-stormy-daniels-affair-mulligan

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/01/27/millions-of-americans-believe-god-made-trump-president-216537

http://www.businessinsider.com/release-the-memo-campaign-russia-linked-twitter-accounts-2018-1

https://www.usnews.com/news/national-news/articles/2017-04-06/house-intel-chairman-devin-nunes-recuses-self-from-russia-investigation

https://www.thedailybeast.com/doj-warns-that-releasethememo-would-be-extraordinarily-reckless