{"id":23449,"date":"2016-08-10T14:46:45","date_gmt":"2016-08-10T21:46:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=23449"},"modified":"2016-08-10T14:46:45","modified_gmt":"2016-08-10T21:46:45","slug":"how-trump-gets-away-with-treason","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2016\/08\/10\/how-trump-gets-away-with-treason\/","title":{"rendered":"How Trump Gets Away with Treason"},"content":{"rendered":"

Seldom does a day go by that Rump Dump Trump or one of his close Republican Aides does not signal his followers to achieve through violence what he is unable to accomplish through his normal flood of hatred.  But lately, he has been calling for the assassination of the President of the United States, if he is not elected.  I learned how he gets away with treason.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\"0810TrumpKKK\"<\/p>\n

Over half a century ago, Clarence Brandenburg stood before a small gathering of his fellow Ku Klux Klansmen dressed in full Klan regalia. \u201cWe\u2019re not a revengent organization,\u201d Brandenburg told the gathered bigots, \u201cbut if our President, our Congress, our Supreme Court, continues to suppress the white, Caucasian race, it\u2019s possible that there might have to be some revengeance taken<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, the Republican presidential nominee made a statement that was far more similar to Brandenberg\u2019s than one would expect from someone who wants to become the Leader of the Free World. \u201cIf [Hillary Clinton] gets to pick her judges \u2014 there\u2019s nothing you can do, folks,\u201d Donald Trump told a campaign rally. Then he added an allusion to violence: \u201calthough the Second Amendment people, maybe there is, I don\u2019t know<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both statements contained calls to violence against the speakers\u2019 political opponents. And, at least under the letter of the law, there\u2019s a plausible argument that Trump\u2019s statement was illegal. One federal law provides that \u201cwhoever knowingly and willfully threatens to kill, kidnap, or inflict bodily harm upon<\/a> . . . a major candidate for the office of President or Vice President, or a member of the immediate family of such candidate\u201d commits a federal felony. Another provides that someone who intentionally solicits another person<\/a> to \u201cengage in conduct constituting a felony that has as an element the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force against property or against the person of another in violation of the laws of the United States\u201d may also face criminal charges.<\/p>\n

But such a prosecution would be unconstitutional, thanks to a case that Brandenburg brought up to the Supreme Court. Donald Trump, arguably the most important racist leader<\/a> in the United States for a generation, is the direct beneficiary of Brandenburg\u2019s racist speech and the legal rule that emerged from it.<\/p>\n

In the wake of his suggestion that \u201cthere might have to be some revengeance taken<\/a>\u201d against the president and other high officials, Brandenburg was prosecuted under an Ohio law that punishes individuals who \u201c\u2018advocate or teach the duty, necessity, or propriety\u2019 of violence \u2018as a means of accomplishing industrial or political reform.\u2019\u201d But the Supreme Court ruled that, under the First Amendment, mere advocacy of violence cannot be a crime absent much more…<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

From <Think Progress<\/a>><\/font><\/p>\n

In my opinion, Brandenburg v. Ohio<\/a><\/em> was wrongly decided.  The next President will likely choose four Supreme Court Justices.  They will be chosen by Clinton or by Trump.  There are no other possibilities.  On the plus side, if we can break the Republican stranglehold on the Court, maybe we can challenge and overturn such miscarriages of justice.  That is my hope.<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Seldom does a day go by that Rump Dump Trump or one of his close Republican Aides does not signal his followers to achieve through violence what he is unable to accomplish through his normal flood of hatred.  But lately, he has been calling for the assassination of the President of the United States, if […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-5-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23449"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23449\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}