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Opinion: I am not naive enough to believe that a pardon would in any way begin the process of healing or mend our broken fences. But it's still the right thing to do.

AP Explains: Trump pleads not guilty to 34 charges

A stone-faced Donald Trump made a momentous court appearance Tuesday as the only ex-president to be charged with a crime as he was confronted with a 34-count felony indictment. (April 4)

AP

Back in the day, our nations founders had this crazy idea to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility .

I say crazy because nearly 2 centuries later the union is nowhere near perfect, justice for all has yet to be established and virtually no aspect of our domestic situation is tranquil.

These days, one of the major reasons for this turmoil is former President Donald Trump, a man who has never been particularly keen on tranquility.

Just the opposite.

Chaos is his game.

That may be one of the reasons hes in trouble, most recently having been indicted by the Manhattan district attorneys office with 34 counts of falsifying business records.

He also faces possible indictment out of Atlanta for allegedly attempting to subvert the 2020 election results in Georgia.

As well as more potential indictments stemming from a Department of Justice investigation into the classified documents Trump took to Mar-a-Lago, as well as any connection he may have had to the Jan. 6., 2021, insurrection.

The general publics reaction to Trumps indictment falls into two categories. People either believe it is proof that no one is above the law, or proof of a politically motivated witch hunt.

Should any of the cases against Trump proceed to trial, where a verdict is reached, not a single persons opinion about this will change.

Not one.

Should Trump be found guilty, there would be an appeal, or perhaps many appeals.

And no matter how those cases are resolved, Id guess he will never spend any time in jail because, basically, we have yet to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility .

Given all that, President Joe Biden should pull a Gerald Ford and pardon Donald Trump. And, yes, I know, a president can't pardon someone for a state crime, only for federal offenses. But Biden can eliminate federal complaints. He can set a tone. He can be, in a way Trump never was, presidential.

In 1974, after former President Richard Nixon resigned over his involvement in the Watergate scandal, for which he would have faced criminal prosecution, Ford announced that he had decided to grant a full, free and absolute pardon to Nixon.

The pardon was not well received. A majority of Americans wanted Nixon prosecuted, and Fords decision may have cost him the subsequent presidential election.

Ford never wavered, however.

He appeared before a congressional committee and told them, I was absolutely convinced then as I am now that if we had had anindictment, a trial, a conviction, and anything else that transpired after this that the attention of the President, the Congress and the American people would have been diverted from the problems that we have to solve.

A playmate and indictment: Arizona's connection to Trump's woes

One of those who disagreed with Ford at the time was Democratic Sen. Ted Kennedy.

In 2001, however, while presenting Ford with a Profile in Courage award, Kennedy said, Unlike many of us at the time, President Ford recognized that the nation had to move forward, and could not do so if there was a continuing effort to prosecute former President Nixon.His courage and dedication to our country made it possible for us to begin the process of healing and put the tragedy of Watergate behind us.

Every president grants pardons.

Barack Obama issued 212. George W. Bush did 189. Trump, during his time, granted 143.

They are often controversial. More proof of our messy system of justice.

I am not nave enough to believe that granting a pardon to Trump would in any way begin the process of healing or put the tragedy behind us.

But its still the right thing to do.

Ford told the House committee, Our nation is under the severest of challenges now to employ its full energies and efforts in the pursuit of a sound and growing economy at home and a stable and peaceful world around us. We would needlessly be diverted from meeting those challenges if we as a people were to remain sharply divided over whether to indict, bring to trial, and punish a former President .

Yeah, what he said.

Reach Montini ated.montini@arizonarepublic.com.

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Joe Biden should pardon Donald Trump, spare us from indictment ... - The Arizona Republic

April 4 (Reuters) - When Donald Trump walks into Justice Juan Merchan's courtroom on Tuesday to face criminal charges, it will be a first for a former U.S. president but familiar territory for the veteran judge who serves on Manhattan's criminal court.

Merchan last year oversaw a criminal trial of the Trump Organization that ended with the real estate company convicted by a jury of tax fraud and hit with fines, while one of its longtime executives, Allen Weisselberg, pleaded guilty and was sent to jail.

Trump is expected to be arraigned before Merchan on Tuesday following a grand jury investigation into hush money paid to porn star Stormy Daniels in the run-up to the 2016 U.S. presidential election. The grand jury has indicted Trump, though the specific charges have not been publicly disclosed.

Susan Necheles, a Trump attorney, told Reuters the former president will plead not guilty.

Merchan sentenced the Trump Organization to pay $1.6 million after jurors convicted the company in December. The judge also sentenced Weisselberg, who long served as an executive under Trump but was the prosecution's star witness in the trial, to five months of incarceration.

On Friday, Trump, who was not charged in his company's case, lashed out at Merchan on his Truth Social platform.

"The Judge 'assigned' to my Witch Hunt Case, a 'Case' that has NEVER BEEN CHARGED BEFORE, HATES ME," wrote Trump, who has launched a campaign to regain the presidency in 2024. "He strong armed Allen, which a judge is not allowed to do, & treated my companies, which didn't 'plead,' VICIOUSLY."

Merchan did not reply to a request for comment.

The Trump Organization trial is not Merchan's only recent encounter with people close to the former president. Merchan also is presiding over a criminal case involving former Trump campaign and White House adviser Steve Bannon, who has pleaded not guilty to charges of money laundering, conspiracy and fraud related to a nonprofit that raised funds for building a wall on the U.S. border with Mexico.

Merchan has been a Manhattan criminal court judge since 2009 after prior stints on the state's Court of Claims, which hears cases against the state and its agencies, and family court in the Bronx.

The judge was born in Colombia and moved to the United States at age 6, growing up in New York City's borough of Queens, according to news reports. Merchan graduated from Baruch College and Hofstra University School of Law and began his legal career in the same District Attorney's office that is now prosecuting Trump.

Merchan presided over the 2012 case of the so-called "Soccer Mom Madam" Anna Gristina, which garnered lurid headlines in the New York media. Gristina was accused of running a high-end brothel out of her Manhattan apartment and eventually pleaded guilty. Gristina sued Merchan in 2021 to unseal records in her case as part of an effort to vacate her record. Her case was dismissed, according to court records.

In 2011, Democratic U.S. Senator Charles Schumer of New York recommended that President Barack Obama nominate Merchan for a federal judgeship in Brooklyn, saying he would have been the first Colombian-born federal judge, according to the New York Law Journal. Merchan was not nominated for the post.

Reporting by Tom Hals in Wilmington, Delaware; Additional reporting by Karen Freifeld; Editing by Will Dunham and Noeleen Walder

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Thomson Reuters

Tom Hals is an award-winning reporter with 25 years of experience working in Asia, Europe and the United States. Since 2009 he has covered legal issues and high-stakes court battles, ranging from challenges to pandemic policies to Elon Musk's campaign to end his deal for Twitter.

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Juan Merchan: Who is the judge overseeing the Donald Trump ... - Reuters

Donald Trump

New polls show DeSantis eight points up on Trump in Iowa, which will kick off the primary, and level in New Hampshire, the second state to vote

Donald Trump has increased his national lead in the Republican presidential primary but seems set to face a closer tussle with his chief rival, Ron DeSantis, in the crucial first two states to vote, new polls show.

On Monday, a new survey from the Center for American Political Studies at Harvard and the Harris Poll gave the former president a 26-point national lead over the Florida governor, by 50% to 24%, a four-point gain since February.

Former vice-president Mike Pence, who like DeSantis has not announced a run, was third, with 7%. Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor who declared in February, was fourth, with 5% support.

The poll followed the trend in a race which on Saturday saw Trump stage his first full campaign rally in Waco, Texas, beginning with images of the January 6 attack on Congress and a song portraying those convicted as political prisoners.

Trump has also focused on a reportedly imminent indictment in New York City, over a hush money payment to the adult film star Stormy Daniels, as he looks to whip up his base.

DeSantis is widely seen to be running a shadow campaign, promoting a book in key states. He also seems to be in a difficult position, needing to support Trump in the New York case while seeking to catch up in the polls via political attacks.

In return, Trump has begun to attack DeSantis in familiar, slashing terms.

As the Harvard poll indicated, DeSantis continues to struggle to make an impact on a national scale.

However, there was apparent good news for the governor from the website Axios, which published the results of two polls carried out by a Republican firm.

In head-to-head matches, Public Opinion Strategies put DeSantis eight points up on Trump in Iowa, which will kick off the primary in February 2024, and level in New Hampshire, the second state to vote.

Axios said: National polling has shown Trump significantly ahead of DeSantis, but these polls suggest DeSantis is performing better in the early states where voters pay closer attention.

However, there was better news for Trump when respondents were asked to choose from the whole field of declared and potential contenders. Then, Trump and DeSantis were tied in Iowa while Trump led by 12 points in New Hampshire.

Other surveys have shown similar potential for anti-Trump candidates to split the vote and give the former US president the nomination without majority support.

That was what happened in 2016. Then, the Texas senator Ted Cruz won Iowa before Trump swept to victory in New Hampshire. Trump was not seriously challenged thereafter.

The MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan was among observers to seize on the Axios report, which he called a reality check for those of us LOL-ing at DeSantiss poor performance this past week and poor polling at a national level, adding: State polls matter way more than national polls. Especially in early primary states.

But Simon Rosenberg, a Democratic strategist and pollster, warned DeSantis world not to get carried away by the Axios report.

Pointing to the GOP red wave poll BS last year in which polling suggested big Republican midterm gains but the GOP only took the House by a small margin Rosenberg said the Public Opinion Strategies surveys were not nearly as good for DeSantis as Axios portrayed.

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Trump builds national lead over DeSantis but faces closer race in early-voting states - The Guardian US

Welcome to FiveThirtyEights politics chat. The transcript below has been lightly edited.

nrakich (Nathaniel Rakich, senior elections analyst): Former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley is running for president. Former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan decided not to. Sen. Tim Scott is reportedly nearing an announcement. Former Vice President Mike Pence certainly sounds like a candidate.

All of these Republicans have something in common: They dont want former President Donald Trump to be their partys nominee in 2024. But theyre clearly taking very different approaches toward accomplishing that goal. Some, like Haley, apparently think its best to face him head on; on the other hand, Hogan specifically said he wanted to avoid another multicar pileup that could potentially help Mr. Trump recapture the nomination.

So for this weeks FiveThirtyEight politics chat, were debating what the best strategy is. If youre a Republican who wants a new direction for the party, should you try to lead the party in that direction yourself? Or should you throw your support behind the non-Trump candidate who currently appears to have the best shot of winning the nomination, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis?

alex (Alex Samuels, politics reporter): I think DeSantiss appeal to that wing of the party is that he might be their only option? No other Republican seems capable of giving Trump a run for his money at least not right now. And if you dont want a rematch of 2020, then, sure, DeSantis looks like the least of three evils (the third being another term for President Biden).

But if youre a voter who rejects Trump and his approach to politics, then why would an equally Trumpy candidate be the solution? Its easy to argue that Trump and DeSantis are two different sides of the same coin.

nrakich: So youre saying Haley/Hogan/Scott/Pence should run, Alex? And try to open up a third lane in the primary?

alex: The more the merrier, in my opinion. I understand the fear never-Trumpers have, especially given your reporting, Nathaniel, that Trump leads a multi-candidate field but would be in trouble in a two-way race against DeSantis.

I guess the flip side is: Do never-Trumpers actually want a candidate like DeSantis? Its not clear to me that he would run a wildly different primary campaign than Trump at least in terms of the message hes touting. And I cant imagine that DeSantiss own the libs culture-war messaging will appeal to the moderate wing of the GOP.

geoffrey.skelley (Geoffrey Skelley, senior elections analyst): I think two different things are in tension for Republican primary voters. If you dont want a Trump-like direction for the GOP, DeSantis isnt who you want hes largely doubling down on Trumps approach to politics while trying to put a more winning gloss on it. (Whereas Trump lost reelection in 2020 and contributed to Republicans underperformance in the 2022 midterms, DeSantis won a landslide reelection victory in Florida, which at least until recently was viewed as a clear swing state.)

But if you dont want Trump to win, DeSantis is clearly your best choice. Its still early, of course, and things could change, but early polls are decently predictive of how candidates perform in primaries, and DeSantis today is polling in the mid-to-high 20s in multi-candidate surveys. That puts him in a clear second position at this point.

And the good news for DeSantis is that most Republican voters probably want a Trumpy party, even if they choose someone else to lead it. Take Morning Consults primary poll tracker: Trump (54 percent) and DeSantis (26 percent) combine for 80 percent of the primary vote. And based on second-choice preferences, voters dont view them as intractably opposed choices, but rather as two sides of the same coin. The leading second-choice candidate for Trump voters is DeSantis with 46 percent (Pence gets 17 percent), and the leading second choice for DeSantis voters is Trump with 43 percent (Pence is at 16 percent).

So do you want a certain approach to politics or do you want to stop Trump? The latter seems more likely to bring about Trumps defeat than the former, in part because GOP primary voters prefer a Trumpian approach.

alex: I get that, Geoffrey! Never-Trumpers can make the case (as some Democrats have) that Trump is uniquely anti-democratic, so anyone who isnt Trump is marginally better. But I feel like just being slightly better than Trump wont be enough for them.

nrakich: Interesting. So theres a distinction between wanting to stop Trump vs. wanting to stop Trumpism.

geoffrey.skelley: Right. And because the GOP has been remade in Trumps image, it makes sense that most Republicans would like to choose either him again or someone like him.

alex: That said, I also think its too early to dismiss the possible alternatives to both DeSantis and Trump! Yes, DeSantis is doing well in the polls right now, but hes been slipping as of late. And theres evidence that people dont really know who he is or are still making up their minds about him. That could change, though, especially as he becomes more of a household name.

Trump, meanwhile, could self-destruct at any moment remember, he might get indicted in any number of investigations.

geoffrey.skelley: Alex, I do think theres not necessarily any harm in these other candidates getting into the race to see how things go. After all, were more than nine months away from actual voting in the 2024 Republican presidential primary. But if Republicans remain worried about Trump damaging the party in the general election and want to rally to one candidate, the also-rans need to get out of the way by late 2023.

This could definitely change, but Trump holds a pretty clear lead in primary polls that included at least him, DeSantis, Pence and Haley. So the fears that some Republicans have about Trump winning with plurality support once we get to the actual voting are certainly well-founded. After all, he did it in 2016.

But its also not a given that DeSantis can beat him head to head. While DeSantis briefly took a slight lead in polls that only included the two of them just after the midterm elections, Trump has regained a clear edge there, too.

However, DeSantis trails Trump by a bit more than 15 percentage points head-to-head, versus more than 20 points across the multi-candidate polls. So thats an argument in favor of getting out of the way if you want to derail Trump.

alex: Yeah, I think there might be a path to the nomination albeit a narrow one for candidates like Haley and Scott, who have been somewhat measured in how they talk about the former president. But I dont think theres a path for folks like Hogan or former Rep. Liz Cheney, who have openly denounced Trump. (I could make the same argument against Pence, too.)

nrakich: Yeah, Hogan hasnt polled above 1 percent in any national poll this year (one of which was taken after he announced he was not running). So what would have been the argument for him to run?

geoffrey.skelley: To me, the reason for someone like Hogan or Cheney to run is not to win. Thats not gonna happen. Its to make the case for a different sort of Republican Party. Its certainly a losing battle right now, but despite the short-term nature of politics, arguments about the direction of political parties are won over the course of decades, not years.

Just consider how long it took for the conservative wing of the GOP to truly capture the party. Sure, the party nominated Barry Goldwater in 1964, but then you get Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford. Its not until Ronald Reagan wins in 1980 that its clear that conservatives have taken over the GOP.

alex: Would someone like Hogan or Cheney also include Scott and Haley, Geoff? Or do you think they occupy a different lane?

geoffrey.skelley: I definitely view Scott and Haley as different from Hogan or Cheney. Scott and Haley have largely avoided being overly critical of Trump, whereas Hogan and Cheney have been publicly critical of Trump. Cheney voted to impeach Trump in his second impeachment trial and lost her primary because of it. Hogan supported that impeachment, too.

nrakich: Yeah, being anti-Trump like Hogan or Cheney puts a ceiling on your support in a GOP primary. But being kinda Trump-neutral means you could, theoretically, steal some of that support from Trump or DeSantis.

alex: Running for president also helps raise your profile! And its possible, too, that Scott and Haley (neither of whom is super well known) either want to lay the groundwork for a presidential run in 2028 or 2032 and/or are running for vice president.

I think that former point is especially true for someone like Scott. But I really hate the running for vice president line, as I think its often used in a cheap way to marginalize both women and candidates of color.

geoffrey.skelley: And to get back to the it doesnt hurt to run at this point argument, DeSantis remains at least somewhat unproven. What if he pulls a 2012 Rick Perry and has a really rough debate performance that casts doubt on his ability to truly challenge Trump for the nomination? You dont know until youre in it.

nrakich: I think there are three reasons why DeSantis could be weaker than he seems. Hes unproven on the national stage, hes been slipping in the polls and the, uh ... whats the third one?

geoffrey.skelley: Haha, Nathaniel! Yeah, I think if theres another question about DeSantis, its his ability to play to the audience on the stump or in a crowd. I do think some of the coverage weve seen of that is frankly overwrought and just the media looking for anything to grab onto as everyone waits for DeSantis to announce. To be fair, it also reflects a higher level of scrutiny of DeSantis as a national candidate. Still, its easier to write that story than dig into the nuts and bolts of things like DeSantiss dont say gay legislation in Florida. But there could be something to it.

nrakich: OK, so I admit, I went into this chat thinking that we would conclude it was a fools errand for non-Trump-or-DeSantis Republicans to jump into the presidential race. But you guys have convinced me that it actually doesnt hurt so much if your goal is to move the party away from Trumpism.

But what if all you care about is stopping Trump himself? (Like, say, if you think Trump would lose the general election to Biden but another Republican wouldnt.) In that case, isnt it pretty clear that everyone else should get out of DeSantiss way?

geoffrey.skelley: Come fall, if polls arent too different from where they are now, then yes. Someone polling at like 5 percent in national polls in November 2023 aint winning this thing.

But its also on DeSantis to win over voters who like Trumpism but are ready to give someone else the job of winning the presidency because theyre worried about Trump losing or because they like what DeSantis has been doing in Florida. With DeSantis polling well as the second choice among Trump voters, you can see how that path could develop.

And if the people who are supporting the Haleys, Pences and Scotts of the world rally to the Trump alternative, thatll also help DeSantis. As Henry Olsen has noted at The Washington Post, much could depend on where an important group of GOP primary voters the somewhat conservatives end up moving once we get beyond the early states. Theyve traditionally decided Republican nominees. In 2016, they opted for Trump over former Ohio Gov. John Kasich (too moderate) and Sen. Ted Cruz (too conservative). This time around, it looks like very conservative voters may prefer Trump. So will somewhat conservatives latch onto DeSantis as a leading alternative? They could.

alex: Yeah, I think the argument for someone in that camp is that DeSantis doesnt have Trumps baggage, but his credentials are just as if not more ideologically conservative. So in that case, sure, why not DeSantis! And hes currently the only Republican whos competitive with Trump in the polls, so theres an easy argument for why hes the best non-Trump Trump opponent.

nrakich: Are there any non-electoral reasons for anti-Trump candidates to keep their powder dry?

[Editors note: Several minutes pass. ]

alex: Seems like everyone jumped in the more the merrier camp!

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Should Anti-Trump Republicans Clear The Field For DeSantis? - FiveThirtyEight

AManhattan grand juryinvestigating former President Donald Trump's role in a"hush money" paymentreconvened Monday and heard testimony from a central witness, according to sources familiar with the matter. But by the end of the day, the Manhattan district attorney had not communicated with Trump's legal team, according to Joe Tacopina, one of the former president's attorneys. Another Trump lawyer, Susan Necheles, also said there was no communication from the D.A. Monday evening.

David Pecker, the former CEO of American Media, Inc. (AMI) and publisher of The National Enquirer, was spotted entering the building where the grand jury was meeting and testified before the panel Monday afternoon, two sources said.

click to expand

Just weeks before the 2016 election, Pecker played a key role in connecting a lawyer for adult film star Stormy Daniels, who claimed she had an affair with Trump, with Michael Cohen, Trump's then-attorney. Cohen ultimately secured a non-disclosure agreement from Daniels in exchange for $130,000.

AMI was the parent company of The National Enquirer. In August 2016, the magazine bought the rights to the story of a woman who said she had an affair with Trump, but the outlet never published her account. The company lateradmittedthe "catch and kill" tactic was designed to suppress the story and help Trump's election prospects. Pecker was CEO of AMI until 2020.

The grand jury last convened to discuss the Trump investigation on March 20, when it heard from attorney Robert Costello at the request of Trump's legal team.

Trump, who is again running for president, assailed the investigation during a campaign rally Saturday in Waco, Texas, claiming he's under investigation "for something that is not a crime, not a misdemeanor, not an affair." He has denied the affair and all allegations of wrongdoing in relation to the payment.

Trump previously incorrectly predicted his arrest would be last Tuesday, March 22, calling for protests that day. Tuesday came and went without an arrest, and with little unrest beyond a sparse group of supporters who rallied intermittently across the street from Manhattan Criminal Court.

A significant law enforcement presence has descended upon the Lower Manhattan neighborhood surrounding the court and district attorney's offices, with police barricading sidewalks and removing garbage cans around the buildings. Trump has repeatedly lashed out on his social media site, including warning that an indictment would lead to "potential death & destruction." He also posted an altered image on Truth Social depicting himself holding a baseball bat next to a photo of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg. The post was later removed.

There have been at least two hoax bomb threats made to Manhattan courts in the week since Trump's call for protests, and on Friday a mailroom employee at the District Attorney's Office in Manhattan opened an envelope addressed to Bragg that contained a white powder and a note. The powder was later determined not to be dangerous.

"Alvin, I am going to kill you," the note read, a law enforcement source said.

After the threat, 177 former federal prosecutors signed on to a statement condemning threats against Bragg and his office.

"As former prosecutors, we denounce efforts to intimidate the Manhattan District Attorney and we call upon all to support and protect prosecutorial independence and the rule of law," they wrote.

It is unclear when the grand jury will be asked to vote on a possible indictment.

In early March, Bragg's office invited Trump to appear before the grand jury a move that in New York often signifies prosecutors are nearing an indictment decision. The investigation appears to be focused on whether the Daniels payment involved the falsification of business records and violated state campaign finance law.

The Manhattan case is one of at least four criminal investigations involving Trump. In Fulton County, Georgia, a special grand jury interviewed 75 witnesses as part of its six-month-long inquiry into efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn the 2020 presidential election, which Trump lost.

A report by the Georgia grand jury was given in January to Fulton County Fani Willis, who has not announced any charging decisions related to that investigation.

In Washington, D.C., on Friday, Trump attorney Evan Corcoran testified for more than three hours before a federal grand jury convened by special counsel Jack Smith. Corcoran testified after a federal judge ruled certain of his claims of attorney-client privilege were invalid under the "crime-fraud exception."

Smith is investigating potential mishandling of documents with classified markings as well as Trump's role in the January 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol.

Trump has denied wrongdoing in connection with all of the probes, and accused investigators of conducting a "witch hunt."

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Graham Kates is an investigative reporter covering criminal justice, privacy issues and information security for CBS News Digital. Contact Graham at KatesG@cbsnews.com or grahamkates@protonmail.com

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Manhattan grand jury investigating Trump hears from key witness David Pecker - CBS News