On Thursday, former President Donald Trump was found guilty by a jury of his peers in Manhattan concerning the “hush money” case, which alleges that he paid off former pornstar Stormy Daniels as a means of keeping her quiet about an alleged affair they had prior to the 2016 presidential election. This, of course, was a total scam of a trial and most of us can clearly see that. The odds were stacked against Trump from the very beginning.
Now that the verdict has been rendered, many are wondering whether or not the Supreme Court might have the authority to get involved and review the case. Legal experts have answered in the affirmative.
via The Daily Wire:
Trump was convicted on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in an unprecedented verdict against the presumptive Republican presidential nominee just months before the 2024 election. The verdict is likely to be appealed by Trump’s legal team, however, and experts say the final decision in Trump’s hush-money trial could come down to a ruling from the highest court in the land.
Attorney Roger Severino, who is the vice president of Domestic Policy and the Joseph C. and Elizabeth A. Anderlik fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told “Morning Wire” on Friday that Trump’s legal team could make “constitutional arguments that his right to a fair trial was violated.”
“And the Constitution means something,” Severino went on to add. “It means, if anything, you cannot jail political opponents because you don’t like what the American people are going to vote for.”
Severino then said that he believes that the Supreme Court will indeed intervene in the case should the former president not win his appeal. And well they should. This is a major constitutional issue. First off, Trump was denied a change of venue request, despite the fact New York City is a liberal strong hold and him being a well known conservative figure means trying to find someone to be on the jury who wasn’t biased against him would be rather difficult, if not impossible. That’s a major problem.
“Ultimately, I think the Supreme Court, if he doesn’t win on appeal, will take this up and reverse,” the attorney continued. “This is a political prosecution. We are better than this as a country and this cannot stand.”
The Heritage Foundation fellow added that whether Trump ends up behind bars is still unknown, saying “it would be shameful if this judge were to order this man to go to jail when they weren’t able to point to any victims.”
“This is so shocking and unprecedented that we’re even discussing the possibility of putting political opponents in jail in the middle of an election,” he stated concerning the matter.
The former president is scheduled to receive sentencing on July 11, which is just four days before the Republican National Convention is to be held in Milwaukee where Trump will receive the official nomination for president. He could potential serve four years in prison.
Lawyer and political commentator Mark Levin also wrote about the possibility of the Supreme Court ruling on Trump’s guilty verdict, saying he was surprised that “TV lawyers and others” talking about Trump’s conviction “ignore a federal path to the Supreme Court.”
“The issue is how to get out of the New York system and bring the case to the Supreme Court, which may or may not take it up,” Levin said in a piece he wrote on Thursday night. “That is why I look to Bush v Gore, where the S Ct decided to step in BECAUSE it was a presidential election.”
“There was another court involved, the Florida Supreme Court. And it was that court that the Supreme Court believed was violating the Equal Protection Clause. That was the doctrine it settled on, given the unequal treatment of voters,” Levin’s op-ed continued.
The popular conservative pundit then explained how the case prosecuted by Democratic District Attorney Alvin Bragg, which was decided by 12 Manhattan jurors could end up going before the Supreme Court.
“In New York, you would file the notice of appeal, ask for a stay of the trial court, and seek expedited review,” he stated. “You need to protect your ability to timely appeal and not abandon it. You might then file applications for common law writs with the US Supreme Court, where the S Ct can take action if it chooses, and legitimately claim the harm is immediate and ongoing not just to a presidential candidate, but to the federal electoral system, federal campaign jurisdiction (reverse federalism), and the precedent that might otherwise be set and spread throughout the country. The denial of due process infected every aspect of the case.”
Thinking further out loud
The issue is how to get out of the New York system and bring the case to the Supreme Court, which may or may not take it up. That is why I look to Bush v Gore, where the S Ct decided to step in BECAUSE it was a presidential election. There was another…
— Mark R. Levin (@marklevinshow) May 31, 2024
This whole case was a travesty. It’s the legitimization of lawfare, the use of the criminal justice system to silence political opposition. If it’s allowed to stand, it’s the beginning of the end for the American way of life.
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