Pieces of a Puzzle

One would have to be living under a rock to not know about the mess in the United States not even 2 months into Trump’s 2nd term. Every day is something new. Some commentators are of the opinion that it is a deliberate strategy designed to overwhelm citizens. People have long complained about politicians but I believe the majority of citizens see this term as something altogether different and very disturbing. Because it’s one thing after another affecting different groups of people it has been difficult to sort all the pieces into piles and then put it all together to form the bigger picture.  Like putting together a jigsaw puzzle without a picture of the puzzle to refer to as you go. 

There are lots of lawsuits going through the courts to address legality and constitutionality of various Executive Orders and activities in the Executive Branch. That is a good thing. Different groups have been negatively impacted by Executive Orders signed by a president refusing to execute funding allocated by Congress as is constitutional order. Trump may end up overwhelmed by the response to his attempts to overwhelm the people. There are a lot more of us. Rulings are starting to come down that support the claims of executive overreach. There are other constitutional issues which will no doubt come up, too. This constitutes one pile of puzzle pieces.

I watched a video of US Senator Chris Murphy presenting acts of corruption by the Trump Administration that occurred in the first 6 weeks of Trump’s 2nd term.  We are talking about 20 different events. He explained things much better than I do but here's the gist:

bitcoin

favorable treatment in exchange for campaign contributions

firing of Inspector Generals and heads of agencies who were overseeing investigations into Musk’s and Trump’s companies

DOJ targeting those who criticize Musk

DOJ dropping a case pending against SpaceX

Trump convening a meeting with golf people at the White House to broker a deal in which he directly benefits

memo by Bondi doing something with the foreign agent registration making it easier to get paid by foreign governments

quid pro quo in the Eric Adams case exchanging loyalty to Trump for dropped charges

DOJ pausing enforcement of laws regarding company bribes overseas

$400m order from State Dept for armored Teslas (the original contract was for a few cars and a much smaller price tag)

Musk infiltrates Dept. of Labor and accesses OSHA enforcement info (Musk’s companies had workplace violations)

Musk and Trump both have business interests in medical products and firings in the FDA likely affect regulation

70,000 people fired in the IRS (most of whom audit corporations and wealthy taxpayers)

Advertising on Musk’s social media platforms magically increase (apparently companies decided that was a good idea with Musk regulatory power)

RFK Jr. profits from suing vaccine makers and CDC cancels vaccine advisory committee meeting

merchandise being sold including MAGA merch on a Trump website and displayed in the Oval Office while Kash Patel and Musk sell their own merchandise

FAA cancels contract with Verizon and awards contract to SpaceX (Musk)

and finally people can pay millions of dollars to dine or meet one on one with the president.

This is only the first six weeks! We will categorize all of this as one BIG pile of…oh so tempting to substitute a different word for puzzle pieces!

Obviously, even if some of these things were not included there is a lot of activity openly engaged in that sounds an awful like corruption to this completely unqualified non-lawyer person. Looking at statute information there are plenty of options for charges including my personal favorite, Honest Services fraud.  I mostly like the sound of it. According to Wikipedia, honest services fraud was added by Congress in 1988 “to criminalize not only schemes to defraud victims of money and property, but also schemes to defraud victims of intangible rights such as the "honest services" of a public official.” 

The third pile relates to the love affair between Trump and Putin and Trump’s refusal to sit at the world democracy lunch table.  Again, I am not even close to being a legal expert but doesn’t this sound like treason? It might very well involve fraud, too. Regardless, it’s pretty ugly and major stuff. 

I am wondering who might be gathering evidence with an eye toward pursuing charges of fraud or other high crimes and misdemeanors. We know it will not be the Department of Justice. They, along with Republican lawmakers, are likely being bribed with promises of campaign contributions or threatened to not oppose Trump or Musk. I have heard the Trump administration being compared to the mafia. Considering the Trump-Putin relationship and Trump’s habit of bullying pretty much everybody, it is well within the realm of possibility. Obviously, most of this is reiterating information provided by various sources but again, I wonder what entities would be on this and what their plans may be.  Impeachment, of course. Are there any other options?  What kind of timeline might they be looking at?

Of course, Trump would try the whole presidential immunity thing again so it would have to be a very strong case to convince the Supreme Court (because everything is ending up there) he must be held accountable. Could that happen while he was still in office?

Readers, if you have expertise in the law or have done some of your research into this large topic I would LOVE to hear from you! As concerned citizens I know so many of us are asking the question, “Where do we go from here??”

Stay sane. Take care of yourself.

Source: Federal prosecution of public corruption in the United States - Wikipedia