Pierce: The President* Is in Violation of His Oath of Office

[babylonsister]

The President* Is in Violation of His Oath of Office
It appears Donald Trump is assisting a foreign government in a conspiracy to obstruct justice in the political murder of a resident of the United States.
By Charles P. Pierce
Oct 17, 2018

snip//

There is absolutely no question that the president* is acting against the Constitution and in violation of his oath of office in continuing to conduct private business the way he and his family are conducting it, and there is also absolutely no question that this hedging about the murderous Saudi royalty—for reasons that very likely have as much or more to do with his business interests as they do with oil or some vague threat from Iran—is precisely what the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution was designed to prevent.

The Founders in convention in Philadelphia were very clear on precisely what the threat to republican government a grifting chief executive would be, at least according to Mr. Madison's notes. (One study found that the members of the convention discussed corruption in office on 25 percent of the days the convention was in session. They recognized that rampant corruption was a form of tyranny all its own, and that it likely always would lead to more conventional forms.)

During the ratification debate in South Carolina, C.C. Pinckney, who was the primary author of the Emoluments Clause as it was written into the Constitution, argued that the clause was necessary precisely because the presidency was a democratically elected office, and not an inherited royal title.

Kings are less liable to foreign bribery and corruption... because no bribe that could be given them could compensate the loss they must necessarily sustain for injuring their dominions... the situation of a President would be very different.

They were so concerned about it that the prohibition against emoluments was one of the few things that they transferred to the Constitution from the failed Articles of Confederation, amending the original only to the extent that Congress was empowered to determine the propriety of a proposed emolument from a foreign power, and this was a prerogative that the early Congresses guarded quite jealousy.


more...

https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a23872355/president-trump-saudi-arabia-jamal-khashoggi-emoluments-clause/

[spanone]

1. K&R...

[liberal N proud]

2. Of course he is and has been on numerous counts, but...

No one with the authority to hold him accountable is willing to do so.

[Funtatlaguy]

4. Wait now...Paul Ryan and McConnell will surely....hahaha...I'm so stupid.

[Blue_Tires]

3. And that's the ultimate problem with Trump... He's bulletproof because

When literally EVERYBODY expects Trump to be lecherous brutish dishonest corrupt racist thieving incompetent childish petty egotistical, etc. etc, there's no scandal that can possibly shock any of us... Outrage and moral indignation don't have any bite anymore. There's nothing he can do that some part of our collective minds doesn't instantly respond with "Well, he's Trump, what the hell did you expect?"

And it's shit like this that keeps me awake most nights, because I don't think we've even seen the half of it yet.

[mnhtnbb]

5. Any candidate for POTUS should be required to make tax returns public.

Period.

I don't know how we get around that. Maybe enough states have to pass a requirement that tax returns are made public in order for a candidate to appear on the ballot?

Tax returns aren't going to inform us of racism, misogyny, bigotry, incompetence, or any other character issues. But at least people could get a picture of the financial dealings of the candidate.

[Cha]

6. Of course he is.. just like he's Obstructing Justice

in the USA for his own skin. So that's two countries so far.. Oh wait.. there's Russia, too.

[yuiyoshida]

7. Ya think?

[JayhawkSD]

8. Well, that's certainly definitive proof.

"There is absolutely no question that the president* is acting against the Constitution," then going on to say, "and there is also absolutely no question that this hedging about the murderous Saudi royalty," are, "for reasons that very likely have as much or more to do with his business interests..."

Not a Trump fan at all, voting Democrat down the line, so hold your flamethrowers. But we do have some small thing called a "burden of proof," and it doesn't allow for use of the word "likely."

Can we send a man to prison for robbing a bank because a prosecutor said that is "likely that he did it" to the judge?

[kentuck]

9. I think Mueller may be looking at this very closely?

Looks like something that might interest him, maybe?

[Kablooie]

10. The Republican Congress is more responsible for this than Trump.

They are all in violation of their oath of office by supporting and enabling the president's violations.
If they had done their job by forcing Trump to either drop his unconstitutional activities or be thrown from office, none of this would have happened.

The whole bunch of them really should be impeached.

God I hope the midterms give Dems enough power to start doing something about this dangerous travesty.

[Vinca]

11. It appears the whole incident is yet more grounds for impeachment . . . at the very least.

[Hekate]

12. Kick

[malaise]

13. From Day 1

Hes a treasonous scumbag