After Trump’s Conviction, GOP advocates argue that the justice system is being used against them. This is nonsense.
Ever since Trump was convicted on all 34 counts of falsifying business records earlier this last month, there has been a deluge of right-wing activity against the conviction. Figures all over the conservative media sphere have denounced the conviction as a partisan ploy by President Joe Biden, never providing solid evidence as they do. However, what is more troubling is the insistence by Trump and his GOP enablers that the Justice Department is targeting conservatives, in this case, Trump supporters, while ignoring the evidence to the contrary. This fantastical set of alternative facts serves only to maintain the martyrdom complex of the GOP and its march to undermine trust in public institutions for partisan gain.
Trumpist Wonderland
When evaluating how Republicans create their myths of martyrdom, it is important to remember the power of partisanship. While partisanship has always been a component of American politics, the level of dedication to Trump has gone even further than the so-called conservative principles that used to theoretically guide the party. But what is now guiding the party is a perpetual defense of Trump.
After Trump was convicted, Representative Jim Jordan (R-OH) demanded that prosecutors Alvin Bragg and Matthew Colangelo testify before Congress about what he called the “weaponization of the federal government” and “the unprecedented political prosecution…” of former President Trump. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) also lambasted the decision, saying she would vote for Trump “…whether he is a free man or a prisoner of the Biden regime.” The assumption underlying both actions is that Trump’s current legal woes are the product of the Biden administration’s orders and influence and that no Democrat would face consequences from the Justice Department as Trump will. Additionally, neither Jordan nor Greene provided any exculpatory evidence in Trump’s defense. Nor did they explain why Trump failed to testify in his own defense when he previously said he would. If anything, much of their position is tied to accusations of partisan grievances with little to no emphasis on the actual case itself, but more than merely failing to deal with the nature of the case, GOP operatives like Greene and Jordan also ignore direct evidence that shows that the DOJ isn’t targeting Republicans.
The Rule of Law
If the argument that the DOJ under Biden is attacking conservatives is to hold up under scrutiny, there would have to be evidence that the DOJ is ignoring cases against prominent Democrats while pursuing cases against Republicans. However, when one looks for examples of such a bias in recent decisions, the evidence shown is very scant. The evidence to the contrary is quite strong. The Justice Department under Biden has been more than willing to go after powerful Democrats regardless of the political implications to Biden.
While much of the GOP has presupposed so-called lawfare against conservatives, several prominent Democrats have been charged by the DOJ under Biden. In 2022, the Department of Justice’s North District Office of Illinois announced that it was charging then-Illinois Speaker of the House Mike Madigan for “corruptly arranging for payments” to allies of his as part of what the DOJ calls “an alleged conspiracy involving Illinois Bell Telephone Company, which does business as AT&T Illinois.” Madigan was previously charged with racketeering and bribery by that same district office that year.
Madigan was not the only one who was charged. Senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey, a long-standing Democratic senator, was charged with receiving illegal gifts from Qatar in a “bribery and extortion scheme…” Menendez, who denies all the charges, is also accused of being a foreign agent. While it will be difficult to ascertain whether or not Menendez will be convicted thanks to a Supreme Court ruling in 2016, the fact of the matter remains that the Justice Department has pursued Menendez, irrespective of his politics.
But it isn’t simply political figures within Democratic politics that the DOJ has indicted over the last four years. President Biden’s own son, Hunter Biden, was charged in September of last year with gun charges for allegedly lying about his drug use on a form when he purchased a .38-caliber Colt revolver. The President’s son faces up to 25 years in prison if convicted. Nor was that the only case brought against Hunter. In December of that same year, he was charged with tax evasion, which, if convicted, could land the younger Biden with up to 17 years in prison. The younger Biden had attempted to set up a plea deal, but it seems that it fell through, and now he is facing the full might of the law. Far from the preferential treatment that Republicans have argued is present in the Biden DOJ.
Conclusion
If Republicans expect the American people to take their accusations of bias or misconduct by Biden’s DOJ, they are going to have to do better than what they are holding onto right now. If Biden were trying to use the DOJ for his political ends, it would logically follow that he would try to defend his political allies in Illinois and New Jersey. Not to mention his own son, but that hasn’t happened. Instead, he has remained outside the bounds of the DOJ’s efforts, leaving the law in the hands of enforcement instead of his own personal and political desires.
Suppose the Republicans want to deal with the conviction of Trump. In that case, they might want to start by addressing the case at hand or, more importantly, asking themselves why they are about to nominate a presidential candidate who thinks paying off a porn star is an acceptable course of action for a presidential candidate.
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References
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