Flying SquidPence Says Trump Shouldn’t Be Disqualified Even If CONVICTED — Says ‘That Needs To Be Left To The American People’
𝕾𝖕𝖎𝖈𝖞 𝕿𝖚𝖓𝖆By that logic, we should then remove all barriers to run. If a convicted criminal can run, there’s no reason a 28 year old with no criminal background can’t.
BanditMcDougal(Getting this out of the way first: I’m not a Trump supporter.)
Convicted felons can and have run for President in the past. Some campaigns have even been run from prison. Disqualifying somebody from running for office because of a conviction is extremely easy to weaponize. It’s the next step in removing somebody’s right to vote because of a conviction (a thing we do/have done and shouldn’t).
I agree with you on the age thing, though. If you can vote, you should be able to hold office.
I think the charges are pertinent. Anything directly related to undermining the very democracy you seek to lead, should be disqualifying. Likewise anyone convicted of some voter fraud crimes should have their right to vote revoked. Now I don’t mean all crimes in this areas. But there are definitely some that should stick around
This is the correct answer, in my opinion. Someone that went through a tough patch earlier in life and was convicted of stealing a car or something? Largely irrelevant to their ability to govern, if previous crimes were compensated for (i.e. they served their sentence). Actively inciting a coup to forcefully stay in office? Yeah, that’s a deal breaker.
Regardless, if Trump gets convicted of any of these crimes, that mother fucker will be serving prison time. How can he possibly be president if he’s in jail? At least, for this 2024 cycle. Honestly, I don’t see him lasting another 10 years anyway, so I feel this whole debate will ultimately serve fruitless beyond the 2024 presidency.
Actively inciting a coup to forcefully stay in office? Yeah, that’s a deal breaker.
Sure, now you just need enough evidence to get 12 people (who statistically are going to end up including at least a couple of Republicans and at least one outright Trump supporter) to unanimously agree that he did that and go through the whole process before the election.
How can he possibly be president if he’s in jail?
Can’t use the criminal justice system to prevent an elected official from discharging their duties - the most legitimate use of this is to prevent the DC police from being functionally a third house of Congress by detaining people they expect to vote “wrong.”
So presumably a Trump convicted of crimes that don’t bar him from office (and there are enough different charges in enough courts that he could very well be in prison but not barred from office depending on what sticks) and then elected would be let out for the duration of his term, to the degree required to discharge his duties and put back in the hole at 12:01PM Jan 20, 2029 (like an especially prestigious example of work release). But that’s never a bridge we’ve had to worry about crossing before, so who knows what would actually be done.