Trump-Stormy Daniels settlement at heart of potential NY DA indictment didn't violate

Poor Richard Saunders said:
ROFLMAO.. NY law states that targets of a grand jury may be given the opportunity to testify if they so desire. Nothing was leaked to Trump. It would appear he was informed and given the opportunity to testify.
http://www.nyjuror.gov/pdfs/hb_Grand.pdf
https://codes.findlaw.com/ny/criminal-procedure-law/cpl-sect-190-50/
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That does not mean he will be arrested on TUESDAY. That indicates a knowledge of a specific plan to indict and arrest not just to investigate.
 
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ExpressLane said:
That does not mean he will be arrested on TUESDAY. That indicates a knowledge of a specific plant to indict and arrest not just to investigate.
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Trump lies, we all know that.

But, assuming he was telling the truth... big jump, it is not illegal to tell the target information about his pending arrest.
 
Phantasmal said:
I agree and if evidence shows Trump committed a crime, he should go to jail as well.
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Paying Stormy Daniels Hush money to prevent damage to the TRUMP brand and prevent his wife and family from finding out AND to help him out in the election . Is not illegal. Only campaign expenses that are solely campaign expenses and not also personal or business expense are regulated by the FEC. The FEC did not pursue Trump on the payment for a reason....it was legal.
 
ExpressLane said:
Trump-Stormy Daniels settlement at heart of potential NY DA indictment didn't violate campaign law: FEC expert

Prosecutors in the Manhattan district attorney's office won't have much of a legal leg to stand on if they indict former President Donald Trump on violating campaign finance law, according to a legal expert and former member of the Federal Election Commission (FEC).

"If the state charges are based on a supposed violation of federal campaign finance law, then the Manhattan DA is way off base," Hans von SpakovskyManhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's office will reportedly meet with law enforcement officials to discuss logistics for some time next week regarding a potential indictment, which stems from a years-long investigation into Trump's alleged hush money scandal involving porn star Stormy Daniels.

In the final weeks of the 2016 presidential campaign, Trump's then-lawyer Michael Cohen sent $130,000 to Daniels to prevent her from disclosing her alleged 2006 affair with Trump, who has denied the affair. Trump subsequently reimbursed Cohen.

It's been widely speculated that Trump could be charged with overseeing the false recording of the reimbursements in his company's internal records as "legal expenses."

Prosecutors are also expected to charge Trump with violating campaign finance laws by arranging the payments to buy Daniels' silence weeks before the 2016 election. However, experts have questioned the legal reasoning behind such a charge.

"A settlement payment of a nuisance claim is not a federal campaign expense," said von Spakovsky, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation. "The state DA has no authority to prosecute a federal campaign finance violation in any event."

Such cases, he argues, are within the province of the FEC, where he served as a commissioner, or the U.S. Justice Department, explaining that both agencies have known about the facts for years but have chosen not to prosecute Trump.

"So, the federal agencies with jurisdiction did not consider it a violation," said von Spakovsky, who's been following this case for years.

In 2018, von Spakovsky wrote that the payment to Daniels seemed to be a "nuisance settlement," which celebrities often make, especially when faced with the threat of a false or salacious claim.

"Critics of the president claim this not only was a campaign expense that should have been reported but a potentially illegal loan by Cohen. But the settlement was ultimately paid out of Trump's personal funds and had nothing to do with the campaign since their alleged one-night stand occurred 10 years before the campaign," wrote von Spakovsky. "No reasonable member of a jury would consider this to be a campaign-related expense that needed to be reported, or to which any other campaign finance rules in the Federal Election Campaign Act apply."....


"The alleged one-night stand between Daniels and Trump is far more of a stretch," wrote von Spakovsky. "Daniels had no connection to the presidential campaign of any kind and the encounter — if it occurred — didn't happen during the campaign itself. In any event, even if the Daniels payment were to be considered a campaign-related expense, unlike Edwards, the nominal $130,000 payment wasn't made by Trump campaign donors but by Trump's personal attorney (not the campaign's attorney) with whom he has a long-standing business relationship. . . . Even if one might be able to reasonably construe the payment to Daniels as somehow related to the presidential campaign, there still would be no violation since candidates are allowed to spend as much of their own money as they want on their own campaigns."


https://www.foxnews.com/politics/tr...ictment-didnt-violate-campaign-law-fec-expert

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If this pending arrest is hinged around this hush money payment to Stormy Daniels the case is doomed to failure. A Presidential candidate can do what they want with their own money. This case will not see Trump behind bars or saddled with a felony conviction if it hinges on this payment.
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It never made sense to me for NY state to be involved and the FEC guy makes that plain.
 
ExpressLane said:
That does not mean he will be arrested on TUESDAY. That indicates a knowledge of a specific plan to indict and arrest not just to investigate.
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Trump won't be arrested on Tuesday. His statement included the usual plea for donations. He needs your money. If you send enough then he won't be indicted on Tuesday. Then you will need to send more so he won't be indicted on Wednesday.
 
ExpressLane said:
Paying Stormy Daniels Hush money to prevent damage to the TRUMP brand and prevent his wife and family from finding out AND to help him out in the election . Is not illegal. Only campaign expenses that are solely campaign expenses and not also personal or business expense are regulated by the FEC. The FEC did not pursue Trump on the payment for a reason....it was legal.
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I’ll wait for the Grand jury. I haven’t seen all the evidence.
 
ExpressLane said:
Paying Stormy Daniels Hush money to prevent damage to the TRUMP brand and prevent his wife and family from finding out AND to help him out in the election . Is not illegal. Only campaign expenses that are solely campaign expenses and not also personal or business expense are regulated by the FEC. The FEC did not pursue Trump on the payment for a reason....it was legal.
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It is illegal if he claimed it as a business expense.
Paying money so your wife doesn't find out is not a valid business expense. Paying money to keep a porn star quiet is not a valid business expense. Paying money to keep the public from finding out when you are campaigning for office is not a valid business expense.

It is illegal to use campaign funds for your personal use. If Trump used campaign funds to prevent his wife from finding out that would not be a campaign expense. Using business money on the campaign is illegal if you don't report the money as a campaign contribution.

You are doing a good job of proving Trump likely broke the law:
It is illegal to spend campaign money for your personal benefit. Paying a porn star so your wife doesn't find out is a personal benefit.
It is illegal to claim a personal expenditure as a business expense. Paying a porn star so your wife doesn't find out is a personal benefit.
 
Poor Richard Saunders said:
It is illegal if he claimed it as a business expense.
Paying money so your wife doesn't find out is not a valid business expense. Paying money to keep a porn star quiet is not a valid business expense. Paying money to keep the public from finding out when you are campaigning for office is not a valid business expense.

It is illegal to use campaign funds for your personal use. If Trump used campaign funds to prevent his wife from finding out that would not be a campaign expense. Using business money on the campaign is illegal if you don't report the money as a campaign contribution.

You are doing a good job of proving Trump likely broke the law:
It is illegal to spend campaign money for your personal benefit. Paying a porn star so your wife doesn't find out is a personal benefit.
It is illegal to claim a personal expenditure as a business expense. Paying a porn star so your wife doesn't find out is a personal benefit.
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It is illegal to use funds for a campaign without disclosing that fact. That's what Cohen went to jail for.
 
Poor Richard Saunders said:
It is illegal if he claimed it as a business expense.



Paying money so your wife doesn't find out is not a valid business expense. Paying money to keep a porn star quiet is not a valid business expense. Paying money to keep the public from finding out when you are campaigning for office is not a valid business expense.

It is illegal to use campaign funds for your personal use. If Trump used campaign funds to prevent his wife from finding out that would not be a campaign expense. Using business money on the campaign is illegal if you don't report the money as a campaign contribution.

You are doing a good job of proving Trump likely broke the law:
It is illegal to spend campaign money for your personal benefit. Paying a porn star so your wife doesn't find out is a personal benefit.
It is illegal to claim a personal expenditure as a business expense. Paying a porn star so your wife doesn't find out is a personal benefit.
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TRUMP has a valuable brand tied to his name. Paying a NDA also is to help protect that brand name. So it would be an income tax deduction. But YOU HAVE ZERO IDEA if he took it off his income taxes. That would be a federal law and Alvin Bragg does not have the jurisdiction to enforce it. ZERO. The IRS has not said Trump filed a fraudulent deduction. This case is a big nothing burger. :laugh:
 
Concart said:
He was also guilty of conspiracy to commit campaign finance violations. Trump was his co-conspirator. So there is that.
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That case was never adjudicated. Cohen plead guilty to a non crime probably because they told him to for him to receive a plea bargain. They were anxious to make Trump appear bad. Notice the FEC never accused Trump of campaign violations.
 
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