Why should Donald Trump go to prison? Well, I could quote Elizabeth Barrett Browning and say, "Let me count the ways." But, really, there's only one answer.
As we well know while munching our popcorn, Trump is facing a myriad of charges all over the country in both civil and criminal courts. He's already been found responsible for sexually assaulting then defaming E. Jean Carroll in Manhattan. Elsewhere in Manhattan, the Trump Organization had been found guilty in Letitia James' lawsuit alleging tax fraud. Jack Smith, the special prosecutor, has already hit Trump with another 37 counts, 31 of them pertaining to violating the Espionage Act in hoarding thousands of classified documents. Then there's the insurrection part of Smith's investigation that could hit Trump with
45 more charges. And, in Fulton County, Georgia, DA Fani Willis seems ready to
issue her own indictments by the end of the summer.
That doesn't include the other collection of civil suits that Trump is facing or has recently faced, including Michael Cohen's recent suit against Trump over unpaid legal fees that was
settled for $1.3 million. That's a lot of legal action for a guy who claims to be more innocent than a newborn baby.
So which of these should carry a prison term?
Well, violating the Presidential Records Act of 1978
isn't a criminal statute. Granted, it's an Act of Congress but it's still little more than a guideline. It's not even among the list of 38 counts in the
49 page list. So, Trump isn't going to prison for that. The
31 counts under the Espionage Act? Well, many of those counts carry a mandatory 20 year sentence. However, successfully prosecuting Trump on any one of those charges necessarily involves the always slippery slope of proving intent.
New York AG Letitia James'
$250,000,000 civil suit against the Trump Organization is, once again, civil, as is almost every case an Attorney General's office charges so he's obviously not going to prison for that, although it could finish him financially, especially as Wall Street banks over three decades ago had decided not to do business with him.
Fulton County DA Fani Willis has been working for two years on, presumably, an airtight racketeering case against Trump for trying to overturn the results of the 2020 election in Georgia. That exposes him to the risk of jail time and, in the unlikely event he wins the presidency next year and is convicted, the state conviction is one from which he wouldn't be able to pardon himself.
And then there's the second and quite possibly larger half of Jack Smith's investigation: The insurrection.
If Jack Smith can prove intent, intent to defraud the US by trying to overturn the results of the 2020 election, and Trump is never subtle about his intentions, then those are the charges that should land him in prison. Why?
Because, out of all the other charges, the January 6th insurrection is the only one that resulted in the loss of human life. That's, at the very least, negligent homicide or even manslaughter.
As we now know through the impeccable lens of history,
nine people lost their lives either as a direct or indirect result of the riot. Four rioters died as had five police officers who were all at the Capitol that day. Obviously,. they weren't all angels or martyrs. Ashli Babbitt was shot and killed by a Capitol officer as she tried to climb through a door window that offered access to a hallway, the other end of which cowered lawmakers fearing for their lives. If Babbitt had been allowed through, that would've been the camel's nose under the tent and countless legislators could've been murdered.
Rioters broke into the Senate chamber and
came within 40 feet of getting their hands on Mike Pence. His Secret Service detail,armed and dangerous federal agents, were in such fear for their lives,
they called home and said goodbye to their loved ones. I think Smith could make a pretty good case that by essentially ordering Mike Pence's assassination, Trump was playing his final hand. No VP, no certification of the Electoral College vote count. Sensing the riot would fail, Trump played his final card and tried to make it, dare I say it? his final solution.
Four of the officers who died did so by suicide because they were so traumatized by the events of that day. They were essentially
marched into a meat grinder and failed by their leadership, the DOJ, FBI and, lastly, the White House. They were outnumbered and handcuffed by rules of engagement that were so
laissez faire as to render them completely incapable of fulfilling their sacred duties to the Capitol and the lawmakers within it.
All because Trump whined for an hour and a half about how an election he decisively lost was stolen from him, meaning it was stolen from them, the 74,000,000 of those who'd voted for him. If Trump never had that rally at the Ellipse, nine people who are now dead would still be alive and walking among us. Trump made that. Him, his cronies, both his eldest sons, two lawyers now facing disbarment proceedings... they all made that. Nine corpses, 140 or more police officers sent to the hospital because they were told not to raise their hands against their fellow white people.
Remember, all it took was a conspiracy theory that, of course, turned out to be false, that BLM was going to the Capitol the year before. Before anyone knew it, National Guard troops in riot gear
surrounded the Lincoln Memorial and other places three deep in case Black people got all uppity. That would be the same DC National Guard that was nowhere in evidence on January 6th because Trump refused to call them out until long after the damage, including deaths, was done. And even then, Pence had to seize that power and
call them out himself.
That was just the day after
Trump's pathetic Bible stunt at St. John's that was the end result of DC police violently displacing peaceful demonstrators protesting, ironically, police violence after George Floyd's murder in Minneapolis the previous month.
But, not to put too fine a point on it, that law enforcement's attitude toward its job from the boots on the ground to leadership being completely predicated on skin color and social motive, what Trump did that day resulted in the loss of nine human lives.
Maybe Jack Smith can use another example not related to January 6 that proves Trump's words often have fatal actions. I'm speaking, of course, of
Cincinnati.
Right after the execution of the search warrant at Mar a Lago last August 8th, Trump screamed about it on Truth Social. Immediately, a crowd had surrounded the resort, all protesting the "violation" of Trump's Fourth Amendment rights. Most notably, a day or two later, a lunatic who'd been listening entered the FBI field office in Cincinnati and fired a nail gun at a plexiglass window. By the end of the day, he was shot dead by that same FBI in an empty field like a scene out of a Depression-era gangster movie.
And it's these people who are listening to Trump with the most rapt attention. Luckily, like the idiot in Cincinnati, they tend to be stupid people who announce their intentions on social media like toddlers having tantrums and announcing they're going to pull down their pants and piss on the carpet.
But stupid people, as we've often seen time and again, tend to be the ones who have the most guns and ammo as well as white grievance. By falsely making his grievances theirs, by burdening his supporters with legal travails that aren't theirs, Trump is weaponizing his base and dragging them into his personal hell. And they gladly follow him as if they're going to a day at the beach, complete with 7-11 snacks.
And we unmistakably saw this at the Ellipse on January 6, 2021. It was the first time the Capitol had been sacked since the British did it 207 years before during the War of 1812. Again, nine people lost their lives.
Trump's words do have consequences. Idiots who listen to him and take what he says at face value lose their lives. Trump and his actions on January 6th resulted in the loss of nine human lives and he's still allowed to play golf at Bedminster and Mar a Lago. We know the DOJ and
FBI had the dry heaves at the thought of even investigating Trump much less charging him for his obvious role in the riot.
It took Merrick Garland a year and a half to even appoint a special counsel. Justice delayed, Justice denied, as Dr. King said. But, delayed justice is still better than no justice at all. And it's only fitting that, if Trump goes to prison for any of his countless crimes, it ought to be the one that resulted in the deaths of nine human beings who still ought to be among us right now.
