Merrick Garland, the U.S. Attorney General, must address the ongoing legal battles against former President Trump as the nation grows weary of repeated revelations regarding interference by the DOJ and FBI in the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections to favor Trump's opponents. When the FBI failed to achieve its desired outcome in 2016, it sought to undermine the presidency of the 45th president.
Special Counsel John Durham, in his recent report about the FBI's investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election, found that the Justice Department and FBI "failed to uphold their important mission of strict fidelity to the law" regarding the events during the election campaign. Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) accused senior FBI and DOJ officials of actively assisting the DNC and Hillary Clinton in promoting the "Russia collusion lie."
Furthermore, in 2020, the FBI played a role in suppressing the dissemination of the Hunter Biden laptop story by Big Tech, presumably to favor Biden's election. Journalist Matt Taibbi astutely observed that Twitter appeared to function as an extension of the FBI.
Every day, Trump becomes a martyr at the hands of the Democrats and the administrative state, who utilize legal means to pursue him.
Special Counsel Jack Smith, appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland, is investigating Trump for potential violations of the Presidential Records Act, the Espionage Act, and obstruction of justice related to documents recovered from Mar-a-Lago.
Smith is nearing the conclusion of the document investigation, and news reports suggest that he may criminally indict Trump in the days or weeks following Memorial Day. Additionally, Smith is investigating Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
Garland Must Apply Justice Evenly To Biden And Trump
On August 8, the FBI raided Mar-a-Lago and recovered classified documents.
In a September 60 Minutes interview, President Biden criticized Trump, calling him "totally irresponsible" for storing top-secret documents at Mar-a-Lago.
Ironically, Biden also ran into a similar problem! On January 9, 2023, the DOJ informed the public that Biden had also mishandled classified documents first discovered in early November. This triggered a flurry of news stories, making it challenging to keep up. Documents were found in various locations, including Biden's Delaware home, garage, the Penn Biden Center, and a Boston lawyer's office.
Despite awareness of Biden’s mishandling of documents before the midterm elections, the DOJ waited for the midterms to be over before making it public. Public knowledge of the Biden documents could have negatively impacted the midterms.
The FBI’s double standard in both cases is clear. While Trump received rough treatment, the FBI and DOJ treated Biden with kid gloves.
The media attempts to explain that Biden committed a lesser offense than Trump, although both likely committed similar violations. The threshold for Trump regarding document violations is higher due to his declassification powers as president. Additionally, Trump took the documents after his presidency, whereas Biden took them after his vice presidency.
While Jack Smith is investigating Trump, Merrick Garland appointed Robert Hur to investigate Biden's mishandling of documents.
Moving forward, Garland must ensure that both Special Counsels apply the same standards to both parties.
Constitutionally, as the sitting president, Biden cannot be indicted and can only be impeached, preventing Garland from pressing charges against him.
At the same time, it is improper for him to indict Trump, the likely Republican nominee and a former president who, by having held the office of President, commands a high bar for similar violations.
The critical question is whether Biden can be shielded from indictment for the violation, while Trump could potentially face charges for the same offense.
Precedents Matter
Established precedents tell us that indicting Trump would be an overreach of the law. To understand the context, let's examine similar past violations.
In 2003, Sandy Berger, the former National Security Adviser in the Clinton Administration, took classified documents from the National Archives on multiple occasions. Berger concealed the documents in his clothes and walked out. He was fined $50,000 and sentenced to 100 hours of community service.
Hillary Clinton housed an email server, purportedly for “convenience,” at her home in Chappaqua, New York, while she was Secretary of State. She did not use or activate her state.gov email account, which would have been hosted on servers owned and managed by the US government. Her home server housed a few classified documents accessed by foreign governments. Despite this, FBI Director James Comey chose not to bring a criminal case against Clinton, stating that no "reasonable prosecutor" would do so. However, he acknowledged that she and her aides were "extremely careless" in handling classified information.
The violations committed by Sandy Berger and Hillary Clinton were far more severe than what Trump allegedly did. Therefore, Garland must carefully consider these past precedents and avoid overreaching in the case of Trump.
Questioning An Election Is Not A Crime
Jack Smith is investigating efforts by Trump and others to overturn Biden’s 2020 wins in battleground states.
Many Republicans believe that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump. We concede that no one knows the truth. Trump lost by just 50,000 votes. There were numerous irregularities related to mail-in ballots, absentee voting, and ballot harvesting. Further, Zuckerburg’s $400 million funding for election operations benefited Democrats.
According to Hans von Spakovsky, a former Federal Election Commission member, Zuckerberg’s donations to a pair of nonprofits that doled out the cash to nearly 2,500 counties in 49 states “violated fundamental principles of equal treatment of voters since it may have led to unequal opportunities to vote in different areas of a state.”
Merely because individuals like Jake Tapper at CNN and Joe Scarborough at MSNBC repeatedly castigate any questioning of the election in derision as a 'big lie,' it does not make their thinking an irrefutable truth.
Trump's statements indicate his genuine belief that the election was stolen from him. This differs from knowingly claiming victory despite losing.
After being impeached by the House on January 6 and subsequently acquitted by the Senate, the Democrats pursued a one-sided January 6 committee, which many consider a staged spectacle. The Special Counsel's investigation marks the third attempt at the same matter.
Trump is not the first candidate to question an election. Stacy Abrams, a hero for Democrats, has yet to acknowledge her 2018 loss for governor of Georgia. Even Jamie Raskin, a Democratic member of the Jan. 6 committee, had protested against the 2016 election on the House floor.
The Special Counsel must not creatively extrapolate the matter and pin charges on Trump.
Jan 6
All Americans regret that things got out of hand on January 6.
Democrats and the media characterize them as insurrection. They have yet to show remorse for losing Ashli Babbitt, an innocent bystander.
According to the Associated Press, three days before supporters of President Donald Trump rioted at the Capitol, the Pentagon asked the U.S. Capitol Police if it needed National Guard assistance. Additionally, as the mob approached the Capitol building, the Justice Department offered FBI agents, but the police declined their help on both occasions.
It is impossible to show that Trump was the direct cause of the January 6 riots.
Public Perception
The reputations of both the FBI and DOJ are in the basement. Americans know the two-tier justice system, where Democrats are let go while Republicans are prosecuted. TIPP Polls have shown that Americans lack trust in both organizations.
Public perception matters. The FBI and DOJ are important agencies that Americans want to hold in high esteem. But if they can’t resist political persecutions and prosecutions, America is no longer the shining city on the hill but a failed state like Pakistan, where each political party in power regularly prosecutes the other.
Public perception and rebuilding confidence in the judicial system must be the main criteria for Garland. The Left’s hatred for Trump in certain quarters is not reason enough to indict Trump.
Inquisitive minds around the country are wondering why it took only five months to charge Congressman George Santos with fraud, money laundering, theft of public funds, and false statements. However, nearly five years have passed, and the DOJ has yet to clarify the Hunter Biden situation, leading many to wonder if it is protecting the Biden family.
In our opinion, Garland went too far when the FBI raided Mar-a-Lago in a Rambo-like fashion and ordered an investigation of a former president under the Espionage Act. He has a golden opportunity to put an end to the legal battles against Trump and restore the credibility of the nation's leading law enforcement agencies.
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