Trump will pardon Manafort by Monday

[RandySF]

Trump teed it up this afternoon by accusing the judge of unfairly jailing Manafort before trial. Citing fairness has been his MO for every pardon so far.

[struggle4progress]

1. That would be a bigly misstep. Very bigly. Very very bigly.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

6. You are correct and for that reason it won't happen.

[PJMcK]

13. McGahn will not let it happen

Or he'll have to resign.

It would clearly be an act of obstructing justice.

Besides, it wouldn't do the trick because Robert Mueller already built an inoculation into his indictments. The recent Manafort/Kilimnik indictments won't go away if Trump pardons Manafort. The case would continue against Kilimnik unless Trump were to pardon a Russian national as well. That pardon would probably be a step too far even for the spineless GOP.

It must suck to be McGahn. I have no mercy, of course, but he must hate himself for taking that job.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

15. Wray and Rosenstein would likely resign too.

At that point we are on our way to becoming a banana republic.

[malaise]

21. Didn't he recuse

Himself and his folks?

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

26. Why I hope he does it... that is, if it leads to The Dotard's impeachment, well worth doing.

[Sanity Claws]

2. Then he can't use 5th Amendment to not talk

If he fails to talk, he will eventually be held in contempt of court and back in jail. If he does talk and lies, then he will perjure himself and open himself up to more criminal charges.

[Sancho]

24. this.....

[jberryhill]

28. Baloney

If he's pardoned on Monday, and gets on a plane to Russia on Tuesday to move to his new digs on the Black Sea, he doesn't have to show up and testify to jack shit.

You think Edward Snowden has to show up in the US and testify to anything?

Come on.

[Sanity Claws]

36. Can be detained under the Material Witness

Statute.
Right now he doesn’t even have a passport to travel under.
Mueller is no dummy and will be prepared to take quick action if necessary.

[jberryhill]

37. Not having a passport is not a problem

A passport only matters if the country to which you are going cares about you having one.

It's a piece of paper. If Russia wants to let him in, he's coming in.

[Sanity Claws]

40. That might help Manafort

But will be another nail on Trump’s coffin.

[shanny]

39. I don't think a tRump pardon will help him much with the Russian oligarchs

who claim he owes them $17 million. True or not, not a good choice to run off to Russia. Jail would be safer.

[BigmanPigman]

3. He is distancing himself from him today,

just like with Cohen. I don't think he can pardon him yet since he is in jail for for breaking bail and not his original charges.

[dem4decades]

4. That would certainly start a firestorm.

[oberliner]

5. Doesn't he have to be convicted of something first?

[Spider Jerusalem]

7. Nixon wasn't (n/t)

[RandySF]

8. Ford pardoned Nixon

For any crimes he MAY have committed.

[bornfree17]

9. Nixon

Was pardoned by Ford and he was never convicted

[DemocratSinceBirth]

10. Nope

Nixon was granted a prospective pardon by Ford. Jimmy Carter pardoned all Vietnam War era draft dodgers , many of whom weren't convicted, much less charged or tried.

[oberliner]

12. Thanks to you and all the others who responded

[imanamerican63]

11. Then here comes Mueller with state charges?

[pnwmom]

14. He could hand evidence over to AG Barbara Underwood or to other

Democratic AG's in states where Mueller found crimes.

[imanamerican63]

16. Exactly!

You might want to say Manafort commited crimes😜!

[ProudLib72]

17. Mueller committed crimes??!!

The Rump must think so.

[pnwmom]

18. LOL. Fixed. n/t

[ProudLib72]

19. Someone will likely correct me on this, but I envision Underwood

already having the case ready to go at the drop of a hat. Just letting Mueller take the lead until such time as the Rump tries to botch it up.

[jberryhill]

29. Oh yeah? And she's going to have him cuffed and brought back from Russia?

If Manafort is pardoned, he is going to leave the country, and he's not coming back.

Hey, go round up Roman Polanski for the State of California.

I can't believe people think he would stick around to be indicted by a state.

[pnwmom]

32. You don't think she already has the evidence and an indictment ready to go,

if necessary?

[shanny]

41. Mueller doesn't do state charges;

state AGs have to...one thing might have improved in that area recently:

There has been much speculation about how tRump has eluded prosecution for so long: mob ties since the 70s at least, discrimination in housing, illegal loans from Daddy to his casino, etc etc etc. (details here: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/01/donald-trump-scandals/474726/ ).

A lot of this stuff has been more or less in plain view and some have wondered if dRump had acquired dirt on people in power...it is true that Schneidermann did go after him for tRump University, but that case was settled after the election. I wonder about the timing of it. And I wonder if tRump knew about Schneidermann, and kept a lid on things with a little leverage.

I think it is a good thing he is gone, for more reasons than the obvious one.

[LiberalArkie]

20. Trump will wait until after Manafort testifies to decide whether to pardon him or have him

and his family have a tragic airplane accident.

[beachbum bob]

22. I hope he does...gives Gop cover to turn on trump...

[Hekate]

23. Trump and Manafort will both be bigly screwed if he does that

My understanding is that Manafort will no longer be allowed to plead the 5th, that he will still have to testify to anything Mueller wants to investigate, that he can still be charged with other crimes, and that if he prevaricates to the Grand Jury orthe FBI it is still a crime.

[Gothmog]

25. Then Manafort will be called before grand jury to testify on Tuesday

Once pardoned, then Manafort has to tell the truth in grand jury.

On Wednesday, the NY Ag will indict and Manafort will still be headed to prison

[Louis1895]

27. Double jeopardy question

I understand that there is a question of double jeopardy laws in NY. Basically, my understanding is that NY cannot charge Manafort with the same crime in state court that he is charged in federal court. How does that work if he is charged but pardoned before trial? It seems to me that the state court could still charge since he never got to the point of being convicted in federal court.

I hope my question makes sense. All of these guys (and a few gals, too) need to be in prison for a long time.

[Gothmog]

31. The NY statute only applies if the case goes to jury

Jeopardy does not attach until plea or jury picked https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/04/schneiderman-double-jeopardy/558389/

At issue is the question of when jeopardy “attaches,” or takes effect. That can happen when a defendant pleads to a crime, or when a jury is sworn in. A president could wait until a jury was sworn in or a plea entered, and then pardon them, and the former defendant could then cite the New York statute to prevent being tried in state court.

A pardon at this stage does nothing under the NY statute

[grantcart]

33. All of the questions you raise have never been litigated on point in court.

More questions than answers.

I think that there are crimes that he hasn't been indicted for that could be prosecuted for.

[jberryhill]

30. On Tuesday, he'll be out of the US entirely on a one-way ticket

[grantcart]

34. Wouldn't Manafort have material witness warrant on him before he exits jail?

[jberryhill]

35. They can't hold him on that forever

They have to have a solid reason to believe that his testimony could not be secured. If they say he "might" leave, and he says he's not leaving, they can't just hold him indefinitely.

[grantcart]

38. The US currently is holding people indefinitely under MW, but all they need is to

hold him for a grand jury appearance and then tie further holding to a criminal prosecution

Since September 11, 2001, the U.S. has used the material witness statute to detain suspects without charge for indefinite periods of time, often under the rubric of securing grand-jury testimony

In any case I believe that his release would still have to be ordered by a judge giving Mueller time for a Material Warrant. A material warrant would give time for state charges to be filed as well as holding him for appearance in any relative pending grand jury or criminal proceedings, right?