How to Waste Taxpayer Money to Instill Fear & Intimidation "Trump Style"

How to Waste Taxpayer Money to Instill Fear & Intimidation “Trump Style”

Let’s face it, Trump cannot govern unless his efforts at fear and intimidation are widespread, resonating with pain for the victims. The reality is that Donald Trump, and his governmental personal lawyers, are costs for taxpayers. As any good lawyer representing massive, monoliths well knows, absent a contract or a statute to the contrary, under US law (state and federal), the loser of a lawsuit does not pay the winner’s legal fees. So, the mere act of filing a federal lawsuit, particularly in an inconvenient and forum-shopped federal venue, can tie up the defendant (criminal or civil) in so many ways. From incarceration (with or without affordable bond) to massive distraction required to defend the litigation. The mere act of filing federal litigation may be enough to stop others from dealing with the defendant in the interim. Big bad mega-corporations, to a lesser extent, rely on banks of lawyers to intimidate consumers seeking redress.

Trump is notorious for filing lawsuits, and now he has a massive “free to him” legal machine to do his bidding. The DOJ and the relevant enforcement and agencies are NOT neutral or independent representatives of US taxpayers. Without this intimidation factory, Trump’s autocratic hold on this nation begins to crumble. But his most nefarious co-conspirator in this wasteful effort is an unapologetic US Supreme Court, continuing to issue a series of controversial rulings either not anchored in the Constitution or opinionless “shadow docket” rulings that puzzle legal scholars no end. To make matters worse, this litany of horribly decided Supreme Court cases has emboldened Trump to ignore or twist and squirm to avoid lower court decisions, making the Trump administration the greatest and most significant scofflaw in American history. All the while, US taxpayers are picking up the tab.

“A new analysis has found that President Donald Trump and his appointees have flouted a third of the court rulings against them… The Washington Post determined that Trump and his appointees have not complied with about one in three of the 160 legal challenges against the administration in which a judge has issued a substantive ruling, and plaintiffs have complained that Department of Justice lawyers have provided false information, failed to turn over evidence, worked around court orders and cooked up excuses to carry out actions that have been blocked.

“‘The pattern of stuff we have … I haven’t seen before,’ said Andrew McCarthy, a columnist for the conservative National Review and a former federal prosecutor. ‘The rules of the road are supposed to be you can tell a judge, ‘I can’t answer that for constitutional reasons,’ or you can tell the judge the truth.’… Courts are hesitant to begin contempt proceedings, especially when their rulings are under appeal, and analysts say judges might be reluctant to call on the U.S. Marshals, whose director is appointed by the president, to enforce their orders and risk a standoff that could ultimately undermine their own authority.” Travis Gettys writing for the July 21st Raw Story. And the DOJ, Trump’s personal law firm, is vast and pervasive.

There are several buildings in the DC area, even excluding the FBI and other investigatory federal agencies within the Department of Justice, and 44 prosecutorial offices scattered across the country. One of the great areas of growth in Trump’s federal bureaucracy is in the horde of lawyers on the federal payroll: 35,940 attorneys working in America’s 203 federal agencies, costing almost $6 billion a year. The Department of Justice makes up a large chunk of that with almost one-third of all federal attorneys employed in the prosecutorial agency. That is the power that Trump can bring to bear in an agency that is nominally supposed to be a neutral protector of American rights but is today, openly, according to Attorney General Pamela Bondi, predicated entirely to loyal servants of Donald Trump and his agenda. That is an amazing negation of the DOJ’s historical role.

Trump has amassed the largest personal intimidation force in American history. White Christian nationalists rejoiced at this turn of events. Now they had this massive machine dedicated to their cause as well as a quasi-military force – ICE – with a budget bigger than the military budget of most countries on Earth… combined with the ability to disguise their identity and act without warrants to weed out anti-Trump protestors and Latino “invaders.” Accountability and constitutional protections have left the building. But do federal prosecutors knowingly file actions that they know they cannot win just to harass Trump opponents? Hell yes! As reported by James Queally and Brittny Mejia in the July 24th Los Angeles Times, looking at Trump’s selection for US Attorney in the Central District of California as he attempted to do his boss’ bidding:

“To bystanders at the federal courthouse in downtown Los Angeles, it sounded as though U.S. Atty. Bill Essayli would not take no for an answer… A prosecutor had the irate Trump administration appointee on speaker phone outside the grand jury room, and his screaming was audible, according to three law enforcement officials aware of the encounter who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.

“The grand jury had just refused to indict someone accused of attacking federal law enforcement officers during protests against the recent immigration raids throughout Southern California, two of the federal officials said… It was an exceedingly rare outcome after a type of hearing that routinely leads to federal charges being filed.

“On the overheard call, according to the three officials, Essayli, 39, told a subordinate to disregard the federal government’s ‘Justice Manual,’ which directs prosecutors to bring only cases they can win at trial. Essayli barked that prosecutors should press on and secure indictments as directed by U.S. Atty. Gen. Pam Bondi, according to the three officials… Court records show the reason for Essayli’s frustration… Although his office filed felony cases against at least 38 people for alleged misconduct that took place either during last month’s protests or near the sites of immigration raids, many have been dismissed or reduced to misdemeanor charges.

“In total, he has secured only seven indictments, which usually need to be obtained no later than 21 days after the filing of a criminal complaint. Three other cases have been resolved via plea deal, records show… The three officials who spoke to The Times on condition of anonymity said prosecutors have struggled to get several protest-related cases past grand juries, which need only to find probable cause that a crime has been committed in order to move forward. That is a much lower bar than the ‘beyond a reasonable doubt’ standard required for a criminal conviction.” Trump seems to have dedicated himself to destroy California, but he should be wary of the power of that state to destroy his ambitions.

I’m Peter Dekom, and wonder if Trump can distract and neutralize his Jeffrey Epstein problem in time to stop a massive rebellion against his wasteful egotistical spending, while failing to take care of the very voters who put him in office.