{"id":8192,"date":"2022-06-24T18:36:38","date_gmt":"2022-06-24T18:36:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=8192"},"modified":"2022-06-24T18:36:38","modified_gmt":"2022-06-24T18:36:38","slug":"detached-from-reality-is-trumps-best-defense-at-this-point","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=8192","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Detached From Reality\u2019 Is Trump\u2019s Best Defense at This Point"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\n\n“Attorney General Bill Barr..said former President Donald Trump\u2019s insistence that the 2020 election had been stolen from him indicated he was \u201cdetached from reality.\u201d Ironically, that seemingly damning assessment of Trump\u2019s state of mind might be his best defense against a possible criminal prosecution.
The Jan. 6 Committee has spent a great deal of time during its first two hearings trying to prove that Trump knew he lost the 2020 election fair and square. On Monday, they effectively used the testimony of Trump\u2019s former staff and lawyers to hammer home that Trump was repeatedly told the vote totals went against him, that allegations of election fraud were bogus and that he continued to spread them to his followers anyway.”  
…
“as several former Trump insiders testified, the former president clung to implausible conspiracy theories advanced by a handful of legal advisers such as Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman and Sidney Powell.”
…
“prosecutors would have to overcome the likely defense that Trump sincerely believed the election had been stolen because he had been told so by people he believed were knowledgeable. Defendants usually don\u2019t go to prison for following legal advice. While Eastman, Giuliani and Powell were conspiracy theorists whose claims were thrown out of multiple courts, they also were lawyers with, at one time, good credentials. Trump\u2019s defense team would argue that he trusted them and relied on their advice. Poor judgment might disqualify someone for public office, but it is not, in and of itself, a crime.”
…
” That would also be a defense to another potential charge \u2014 that Trump obstructed an official proceeding, which requires proof that Trump had corrupt intent. A federal judge recently found that it was \u201cmore likely than not\u201d that Trump had corrupt intent, relying on the fact that Pence and others told Trump that Eastman\u2019s plan to set aside valid slates of electors and send the process back to the states was illegal. But in the context of a federal jury trial, Trump would only need to convince one juror that there was reasonable doubt<\/em> that he believed a plan proposed to him by a prominent lawyer (who had once been a former Supreme Court clerk) was lawful.”  
…
“Garland has been dealt a difficult hand. Many who view the committee hearings will assume that the mountain of evidence amassed by the committee would be more than sufficient to convict Trump. But Garland and his team must know that such a case would be a coin flip at best, and federal prosecutors don\u2019t win over 95 percent of their cases by rolling the dice. They charge defendants when they know they have the goods, and based on what we\u2019ve seen so far<\/em>, they don\u2019t have an airtight case against Trump.”  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/magazine\/2022\/06\/15\/detached-from-reality-trump-jan-6-00039641<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Attorney General Bill Barr..said former President Donald Trump\u2019s insistence that the 2020 election had been stolen from him indicated he was \u201cdetached from reality.\u201d Ironically, that seemingly damning assessment of Trump\u2019s state of mind might be his best defense against a possible criminal prosecution.<\/p>\n

The Jan. 6 Committee has spent a great deal of time during its first two hearings trying to prove that Trump knew he lost the 2020 election fair and square. On Monday, they effectively used the testimony of Trump\u2019s former staff and lawyers to hammer home that Trump was repeatedly told the vote totals went against him, that allegations of election fraud were bogus and that he continued to spread them to his followers anyway.” <\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“as several former Trump insiders testified, the former president clung to implausible conspiracy theories advanced by a handful of legal advisers such as Rudy Giuliani, John Eastman and Sidney Powell.”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“prosecutors would have to overcome the likely defense that Trump sincerely believed the election had been stolen because he had been told so by people he believed were knowledgeable. Defendants usually don\u2019t go to prison for following legal advice. While Eastman, Giuliani and Powell were conspiracy theorists whose claims were thrown out of multiple courts, they also were lawyers with, at one time, good credentials. Trump\u2019s defense team would argue that he trusted them and relied on their advice. Poor judgment might disqualify someone for public office, but it is not, in and of itself, a crime.”<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

” That would also be a defense to another potential charge \u2014 that Trump obstructed an official proceeding, which requires proof that Trump had corrupt intent. A federal judge recently found that it was \u201cmore likely than not\u201d that Trump had corrupt intent, relying on the fact that Pence and others told Trump that Eastman\u2019s plan to set aside valid slates of electors and send the process back to the states was illegal. But in the context of a federal jury trial, Trump would only need to convince one juror that there was reasonable doubt that he believed a plan proposed to him by a prominent lawyer (who had once been a former Supreme Court clerk) was lawful.” <\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

“Garland has been dealt a difficult hand. Many who view the committee hearings will assume that the mountain of evidence amassed by the committee would be more than sufficient to convict Trump. But Garland and his team must know that such a case would be a coin flip at best, and federal prosecutors don\u2019t win over 95 percent of their cases by rolling the dice. They charge defendants when they know they have the goods, and based on what we\u2019ve seen so far, they don\u2019t have an airtight case against Trump.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[336,1143,1138,542,221,347,1135,119,1134,170],"class_list":["post-8192","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article-share","tag-attack","tag-capitol","tag-capitol-building","tag-congress","tag-donald-trump","tag-hearings","tag-insurrection","tag-investigations","tag-riot","tag-trump"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8192","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8192"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8192\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8193,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8192\/revisions\/8193"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8192"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8192"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8192"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}