The desperate effort by New York Democrats to destroy President Donald Trump is the clearest example of the collapse of the rule of law happening today.
Arrogant and corrupt New York officials from the State Attorney General, to the Manhattan District Attorney, to various local judges are relentlessly attacking him regardless of due process, case law, or precedent. Every day, we see new sensational charges filed, special rules invented, gag orders issued, and absurdly high penalties assessed.
Of course, New York State Attorney General Letitia James is simply doing what she pledged in her 2018 campaign:
“I am running for attorney general because I will never be afraid to challenge this illegitimate president. … I believe that this president is incompetent. I believe that this president is ill-equipped to serve in the highest honor of this land. And I believe that he is an embarrassment to all that we stand for. He should be charged with obstructing justice. I believe that the president of these United States can be indicted for criminal offenses. And we would join with law enforcement and other attorney generals across this nation in removing this president from office.”
Keep in mind, this is 2018. Somehow, James criticizing the 2016 election winner as illegitimate isn’t an assault on democracy. After being elected, James acquired the full power of the State of New York and all the professionals in the Attorney General’s Office to launch a witch hunt against President Trump. Other Democrats in New York were undertaking similar commitments.
This use of the power of government to go after a single individual is precisely what the Founding Fathers feared. They had watched the King’s judges abuse the law to impose the King’s wishes and directions regardless of established law. Their experience of dictatorial judges who imposed the rule of power instead of the rule of law led them to make reforming the judicial system the second most frequently stated goal of the American Revolution (after claiming the right to control taxation through representation).
As Lord Acton warned in 1887, “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” The power of New York elected officials to guarantee re-election by pandering to the weird left, promising anti-Trump behavior, and protecting the corrupt elements of power from accountability has become virtually absolute.
In an honest world with a legitimate rule of law, the New York cases against President Trump would be laughed out of court. Consider this is a suit in which there are no victims, no one has lost any money, and no one has complained. Further, the judge – an openly, bitterly anti-Trump leftwing Democrat – asserted his own valuations against all professional advice and fined President Trump $454 million. How is it at fair trial if the partisan simply ignores all expert testimony?
Consider another case in which a woman claimed that sometime in 1996 – or another year (she could not remember the exact date) – she was molested by Trump in a department store. This case would normally not have gone to court, because 28 years had passed. But the Democrats in the New York State legislature simply opened the statute of limitations so she could sue Trump civilly. The New York Jury awarded her $83.3 million.
Here’s the danger for all Americans: If the system is corrupt enough to prosecute a former president and current presidential front-runner, it can go after any of us.
As President Trump goes back into court, we should all remember that.
For more commentary from Newt Gingrich, visit Gingrich360.com. Also, subscribe to the Newt’s World podcast.
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