Citizen Trump could face prosecution after he leaves office
By Zakaria Virk, Editor
It’s been more than three weeks since Mr. Trump lost the election to Mr. Biden whom he had called ‘the worst candidate’. Question is being asked when he will concede. And when he does concede what damage would he have caused to USA by then.
There are five stages of grief. (1). Denial and isolation; (2). Anger (3). Bargaining (4). Depression (5). Acceptance. Mr. Trump is at stage 1 of the grief.
It is said that Trump’s legal woes are likely to deepen because in January he will lose the protections the U.S. legal system afforded to a sitting president. Since taking office in January 2017, President Donald Trump has been besieged by civil lawsuits and criminal investigations of his inner circle.
There is grand jury pending investigation by the Manhattan district attorney into the president’s family business and its practices, as well as his taxes. The two-year inquiry has been stalled since last fall, when the president sued to block a subpoena for his tax returns and other records, a bitter dispute that for the second time is before the U.S. Supreme Court. A ruling is expected soon. But if the Supreme Court rules that district attorney Cyrus Vance is entitled to the records, and he uncovers possible crimes, Mr. Trump could face a reckoning with law enforcement — raising the startling specter of a criminal conviction, or even prison, for a former president.
This investigation of a sitting president has taken on even greater significance because Mr. Trump’s past use of his presidential power — pardoning those close to him charged with federal crimes. It is likely that he will pardon himself, his family before leaving the office.
District Attorney originally probe focused on hush money payments that Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen made before the 2016 election to two women who said they had sexual encounters with Trump, which the president has denied.
Some legal experts state that Mr. Trump could face federal income tax evasion charges, pointing to NY Times report that he paid $750 in federal tax in 2016 and 2017. New York’s Attorney General, Letitia James, has an active tax fraud investigation into Trump and his family company, the Trump Organization.
- Jean Carroll sued Trump for defamation in 2019 after the president denied Carroll’s allegation that he raped her in the 1990s in a New York department store and accused her of lying to drum up sales for a book. Trump also faces a lawsuit by Summer Zervos, a 2005 contestant on Trump’s reality television show “The Apprentice”. Come what may Biden will be sworn in on January 20, 2021 as 46th President of the United States.