Could President Trump be arrested for obstruction of justice?
The 45th President of the United States, Donald J. Trump, has technically admitted to breaking a federal law. Or, at least, his lawyer admitted to the crime for him. Obstruction of justice, an extreme federal crime, was admitted on @realDonaldTrump's Twitter.
Trump probably always knew somewhere inside of him that Twitter-fingers could be a fatal disease. He'd been incriminating himself of lies, consistently engaging himself in extremely controversial spectacles. Whether it's tweet-attacking the FBI and other major US intelligence systems like the Justice Department, or whether it consists of admitting to a federal crime, Trump did it all this past weekend.
At the start, he replied instantaneously to the news of Flynn's arrest by saying he 'felt badly' for his former National Security Adviser and said that Flynn's lies to the Vice President Mike Pence and to the FBI was the reason he had been fired.
Well, he might as well have thrown his entire presidency under the bus. Technically, obstruction of justice is a federal crime defined by any attempt to hinder the discovery, apprehension, conviction or punishment of anyone who has committed a crime.
Trump hindered the discovery of Flynn's crime of lying to the FBI when he was briefed and found out back in January, before punishing Flynn himself without consulting any legal official. Lying to the FBI is an extremely serious crime to commit for anyone, but hiding true facts and hiding a crime committed to purge a federal investigation bureau.
Not only those types of obstruction of justice did Trump admit to, but a huge development in the previous investigation of obstruction of justice, the Comey inquiries. James Comey, former head of the FBI, was dismissed by President Trump back last February. This was around a month before Trump found out about Flynn's crimes.
When Trump found out about Flynn's lies toward the FBI regarding the Russian inquiry into potential collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia's government officials, he urged James Comey to terminate the Russia investigation entirely.
Let alone that, he specifically mentioned Mike Flynn - the man he had learnt had just lied to Comey's investigators. He urged James Comey to 'let Flynn go' in an attempt to terminate the inquiry he feared may end up leading towards Flynn's crimes.
However, here comes the twist. Technically, Trump thought he was in the clear once his personal attorney had admitted to writing the tweet hailed for 'admission of obstruction' by not only critics but major Government officials. But he really wasn't.
Although his attorney attempted to pass it off as his own fault and, if anything, his own mistake and his own admission to obstruction of justice. But, in fact, it backfired with logical proof that Trump did know about Flynn - whether or not his attorney tweeted.
Another key incident backfired on President Trump this weekend. Trump's attorney, the same one that admitted to tweeting this, is extremely destined to try and save the US Presidency at all costs. Even if it means incriminating himself or ruining his credibility. Trump's attorney pushed forth an extremely controversial notice that was backlashed with a huge amount of hate from both sides of the political aisles.
He pushed forth the argument that the close-ring of President Nixon once ran by. The horrible method to defend a President accused of criminal wrongdoing by saying that if a President breaks the law, it should not be met with criminal charges. In my opinion, this is the first step to almost immediately destroy a Democracy.
Nixon had been accused of extremely devastating-to-his-career as President charges involving Watergate trial - a break in to a DNC office. This President has been accused of obstruction of justice; something Republicans brought forward to Bill Clinton that ended with his impeachment from the House of Representatives.
There is no debate; Trump can easily be impeached - especially now - for obstruction of justice by the House of Representatives. Although being impeached by the House doesn't mean removing a President from power, if 2/3 of the Senate votes to impeach the President following a successful vote in the House of Reps, he would be officially removed from his office. But bringing criminal charges is a different case.
For Bill Clinton, obstruction of justice didn't involve him hiding a criminal act of someone who worked with him - which is the reason not many even considered criminal charges. However, specifically in Trump's case, obstruction of justice is a federal crime that can result in a charge of up to 5 years in prison.
But could a President be charged of a crime and be indicted, plead guilty to jail time while still being in office? Well, Richard Nixon didn't even let it get anywhere near there before he resigned. But it wasn't unknown Nixon would've been impeached before any form of criminal charges anyways.
Although Trump's attorney is arguing that no criminal charges can 'constitutionally' be brought against President Trump, it is no question that any criminal charge against the sitting President would end up being decided by a courtroom judge. But here's one thing that probably won't happen: Mueller most likely won't rest until justice is brought to America following what he would obviously think was an unfair election, and unfair presidency. Revolving around crime of obstruction of justice as well as collusion.