Weekly Recap: April 20th - 26th
A recap of the big political stories affecting the United States this past week.
With the jury seated, Trump’s first criminal trial got fully underway this week.
The case, headed up by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, involves the alleged crime of committing business fraud to conceal hush money payments made to Stormy Daniels in order to cover up Trump’s affair. Trump admits to the hush money payment.
The timing of the payment was made to keep the affair from going public before the 2016 Presidential race so as not to hurt Trump’s chances of winning the election. That is why this case is being tried as a felony. Business fraud is only a felony in the state of New York when it is used to cover up another crime.
The first witness brought by the prosecution was David Pecker, the CEO of the company that publishes the National Enquirer. Pecker testified on how he had been approached by Trump’s fixer, Michael Cohen, and they had reached an agreement that Pecker would prevent any damning stories of Trump from going to print. Pecker also confirmed that he had spent $150,000 to keep a story on Trump’s affair with Karen McDougal out of the papers. Pecker admitted that the reason to kill the story was that it would have helped Hillary Clinton, and he wanted to help Trump win.
The defense used their cross-examination to paint the narrative as the story had been killed to prevent embarrassment for Trump’s family and showed that Pecker and Trump had connections long before the election. They would share information during Trump’s Apprentice reality TV show days. The goal of this was to suggest that killing the stories and making the payments wasn’t about the election and, therefore, wouldn’t be election interference.
In more Trump trial news, the Supreme Court is currently hearing the case made by Trump’s legal team for Presidential immunity. While it is expected that the Justices will rule against this claim, or at least partially rule against it while allowing more room for delays, the conservative Justices have made some unsettling claims and questions while hearing arguments. Justice Alito claims that allowing a President to be tried for crimes after leaving office may make a President more likely to commit crimes while in office to try to stay in power illegally to avoid prosecution.
Not only is that not a reason to give a President immunity, but that is exactly what Trump attempted to do when he attempted to get the 2020 election vote count changed, then tried a fake elector scheme, and finally told an insurrectionist mob to go to the Capitol and fight like hell. Trump has pending trials for those crimes.
The lawyer representing Trump has the following position: Everything a President does while in office is an official act, and by his interpretation of the law, that means the only way a President can be tried is if they are first impeached by Congress.
The issues with that position are that the Constitution does not provide immunity for Presidents, a corrupt party majority could ensure a President is never impeached, and, as Justice Amy Coney Barrett asked, “What if the criminal conduct isn't discovered until after the president is out of office, so there was no opportunity for impeachment?”
More legal troubles have come for those who helped Trump with his fake elector scheme. This time in the state of Arizona. A grand jury indicted 18 people, including those who posed as fake electors and those who helped organize the group. Specific people indicted with this group are:
Mark Meadows - former Chief of Staff for Trump
Rudy Giuliani - former Trump lawyer who has been found guilty of defamation and is facing charges in other states
Christina Bobb - a lawyer who was ironically recently appointed as the RNC head of Election Integrity
Jenna Ellis - another Trump lawyer who already pleaded guilty in Georgia in October for aiding and abetting false statements and writings
Boris Epshteyn - a Trump campaign adviser who worked hard to overturn Trump’s 2020 election loss
Mike Roman - Trump’s 2020 campaign director who is also facing charges in Georgia
John Eastman - a Trump lawyer, also facing criminal charges in Georgia
Kelli Ward - former chair of the Arizona Republican Party that attempted to get vote counting halted in Maricopa County during the 2020 election
Jake Hoffman - Republican state senator
Anthony Kern - Republican state senator
Greg Safsten - previous Executive Director of the Arizona GOP
South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem is facing backlash from all sides after excerpts from her new book were released. In it, Noem wrote about having a 14-month-old dog that she failed to properly train, so she put it down by shooting it and dumping it in a gravel pit on her property. She made a point of writing that she hated the dog and felt it was less than worthless.
Noem continued on to write that doing so made her realize she needed to put down a goat she owned as well and killed that next, but her first shot missed the mark, wounding the animal, so she had to go and get another shell to shoot it again to kill it.
Rightfully so, the internet has been ablaze in outrage at how someone could kill such a young dog instead of getting help training it or giving it to a rescue organization.
Questions arose about her other animals, including the fact that she tried to defend herself from the outrage by saying she “loves animals. but tough decisions like this happen all of the time on a farm. Sadly, we just had to put down three horses a few weeks ago.” People wondered what would cause three horses to all need to be put down at the same time.
College campus protests turned chaotic in several states this week. These protests began in opposition to the high death toll of Palestinian women and children as Israel continues its campaign against Hamas. Some bad actors used these protests to inflame the situation, including a few people who were using slogans that sought the eradication of Israel and others who were misrepresenting the protests as a whole.
Tensions boiled on both sides as misinformation and a few bad apples were amplified on social media and in the news. At many of the campuses, police were sent in to break up the protests, and arrests were made. The force used has so far worsened the situation, as several instances appeared to be excessive.
The college protests are an example of the growing divide in America over the Israel-Hamas war. Many have chosen a side and fully defended all actions taken by their side while condemning all actions of the other side. A situation that is likely to only worsen until the bloodshed in Palestine begins to subside and a ceasefire or peace agreement is reached.