Scott Tibbs
Donald Trump is constantly stepping on rakes
By Scott Tibbs, August 28, 2023
Many conservatives are outraged by the prosecutions of Donald Trump on classified documents and "campaign finance" violations, but let's be brutally honest here: Trump made himself vulnerable to the prosecutions through his own behavior. A candidate who was not sloppy and unprofessional would have avoided one case, while a candidate who was not personally immoral would have avoided the other.
The weaker case is the prosecution of Trump for paying off Stormy Daniels for her silence right before the 2016 election. As I have explained before
here and
here and
here, these charges have no legal merit. But Trump is still to blame for putting himself in this situation. Had Trump not committed adultery with a porn star and then tried to cover it up, he would not have been a target. Charges would have been trumped up (no pun intended) anyway, you say? Sure. And he also made himself vulnerable. This was an unforced error.
What about the charges for inappropriate retention of classified documents? The case could be made that Trump should not be prosecuted for something that others have done, especially after the precedent set in 2016 with Hillary Clinton's vulnerable e-mail server. Paper copies of classified documents at Mar-A-Lago are far less vulnerable than an e-mail server that can be hacked from anywhere on Earth. I do not believe there was any nefarious intent here. But no matter what arguments can be made against prosecution in this case, this is yet another time when Trump stepped on a rake.
If Trump was not sloppy and unprofessional with classified documents, he would not be facing charges. He could have declassified the documents when he was President, but failed to do so. He could have fully cooperated, but he did not. Any employee who mishandles sensitive data in the private sector or most public-sector jobs would be subject to termination and perhaps even prosecution. We should expect at least the same level of professionalism from
the President of these United States that we expect from a Human Resources clerk or someone who deals with student records at a university.
Nothing excuses abuse of power, and we do need to stand up against politically-motivated prosecutions of anyone, including Donald Trump. But the fact is that Trump did bring unnecessary attention on himself by being sloppy and unprofessional with classified documents, and behaving in a downright wicked manner with a porn star. Those who pretend Trump did nothing wrong are ignorant, brainwashed or are just openly lying for political gain. We can recognize Trump's own culpability without compromising our stand against the weaponization of the justice system.
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