Donald Trump caught trying to bribe Republican Senators with cash over their impeachment votes
The House passed a resolution establishing the rules and procedures of its impeachment hearings today, making it even more clear that there will inevitably be an impeachment trial in the Senate – and a vote on whether to convict and remove Donald Trump. In a fit of timing, it’s just been exposed that Trump is trying to bribe certain Republican Senators ahead of that vote.
Donald Trump is using his donor network to flood vulnerable Republican Senators with cash who supported the recent anti-impeachment resolution, but the Republican Senators who didn’t support the resolution are being left high and dry, according to a remarkable new report from Politico. It’s clear that Trump is trying to reward certain Senators on his impeachment jury with cash, while trying to punish others by withholding the cash that he knows they need for reelection.
Politico didn’t go so far as to label this outright bribery, but one legal expert did. Richard Painter, the former Chief White House Ethics Lawyer, had this to say about the story on Twitter: “This is a bribe. Any other American who offered cash to the jury before a trial would go to prison for felony bribery. But he can get away with it? Criminal.”
The thing about career criminals like Donald Trump is that once they’re finally backed into the kind of corner where they’re fighting to stay out of prison, they’re forced to give up even the slightest pretense of pretending to follow the law. Trump is clearly pulling out all the corrupt stops in the name of trying to fend off the downfall of his presidency.
