When is Enough Enough?
With newly revealed doubts over whether the FBI retrieved all the stolen documents at Mar-a-Lago, it's past time to ask how much longer AG Merrick Garland is going to wait to indict Donald J. Trump
On Thursday, The New York Times reported that the Department of Justice informed Donald Trump’s lawyers that they believe he failed to return all the documents he took from the White House, that the dozens of empty folders labeled as containing classified materials “raised further questions about whether the Justice Department had indeed recovered all the classified materials that may have been taken out of the White House.” This prompted my frustrated response:
Why has the DOJ failed to act by now? As long-time DOJ prosecutor and MSNBC analyst Andrew Weissmann asserted:
Meanwhile, as the Times reported, the courteous DOJ outreach enabled the Trump lawyers to debate whether to respond cooperatively and agree to an outside firm conducting a further search or “maintain a more combative posture.” I’m sure you can guess which approach won out.
It’s been two months since the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago. We have yet to hear one word from Trump about why he took the many thousands of government documents or what he intended to do with them. And, as Weissmann noted, “his legal team has not raised one factual or legal defense.”
We are 29 days out from the November 8 midterms. Maybe Attorney General Merrick Garland has decided to wait until after this political event. But we have every reason to doubt Trump has returned all the materials and every reason to wonder if he has sold or otherwise handed them over to foreign adversaries or others. And we have yet to learn if the DOJ plans to conduct a search at his Trump Tower office in Manhattan or any of his other golf clubs where he spends time and may have stored government documents.
The DOJ has made clear that the flagrant mishandling of many of these classified documents puts national security at risk. Anyone else in the world would already have been charged and taken into custody to stop the criminal behavior. The continued failure to do so makes a mockery of the rule of law and demoralizes those among us who expect Justice to act “without fear or favor.” Honestly, when is enough enough?
One other note about the daily bombardment by MAGA Republicans who pretend that, whatever Hunter Biden’s violations are, they represent equivalence to the actions of the former occupant of our White House—including (but not limited to) his taking of classified documents, his role in inciting seditious conspiracy on Jan. 6 or the variety of acts involving election fraud.
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Although he was FBI, not DOJ, James Comey did not hesitate to inform doubt about Hillary Clinton and her emails. It probably cost her the election, other than the US seems unready to elect a woman president. But he thought it was the right thing to do. For this, he was denounced.
We know the DOJ is at work gathering evidence against trump, and I believe Garland is tenacious enough to see it through, but,now, he is being denounced for the opposite. But boy ! Do I wish he would hurry up. That election is coming up fast. I , for one , wouldn't care if it affected the outcome. trump is just as guilty now as he will be later, and we stand to see McCarthy and McConnell take over the reigns of government and push for a trump or DeSantis win in 2024 I do wish, also, that Democrat leaders would be more aggressive in their condemnation of Republican perfidy There are times when one must fight fire with fire.
The legal case has to be beyond reproach and even more beyond a reasonable doubt than usual, given the political - and likely violent - implications. As maddening as it is, this HAS to stick and sink this damnable sociopath.