Free Republic

After years of trying — in the words of the judge — “to get the damned rascal in this court,” it was a conviction that many welcomed. But those words were not from Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan, and the conviction was not that of former President Donald Trump. Rather they were from US Supreme Court Justice Samuel Chase, at the end of the 18th century, when America embraced political prosecutions to target critics and opponents. The man on trial then was James T. Callender, a muckraking writer critical of President John Adams. For accusing politicians of corruption, Callender...

The judge donated money — a tiny amount, $35, but in plain violation of a rule prohibiting New York judges from making political donations of any kind — to a pro-Biden, anti-Trump political operation, including funds that the judge earmarked for “resisting the Republican Party and Donald Trump’s radical right-wing legacy.” -snip Most importantly, the DA’s charges against Trump push the outer boundaries of the law and due process. That’s not on the jury. That’s on the prosecutors who chose to bring the case and the judge who let it play out as it did. -snip But when you impose...

CNN analyst Paul Begala said Friday on “News Central” that Donald Trump is an “obese flatulent old man with bad makeup and weird hair” when asked for his reaction to the former president’s conviction at the business record trial in New York. Begala said, “Donald Trump needs to pay himself hush money because every time he speaks, he’s losing. He did better during that trial than I thought he would do because he was gagged. And the gag order was perfectly constitutional. Happens in a lot of cases. He hurts himself when he goes on these hysterical rants. Yes, he...

On Friday’s broadcast of “CNN News Central,” Biden Campaign Co-Chair Mitch Landrieu stated that in order for 2024 Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump “to be President of the United States, he has to destroy democracy.” Landrieu said, “Yesterday a very sacrosanct principle that is necessary to sustain democracies was upheld, which is very simple, in America, that everybody is subject to the rule of law and nobody is exempt from it, not even somebody who was President in the United States. And yesterday was a very sober and somber day for our country. It’s not good for anybody...

BREAKING: The Trump campaign has raised a total of $52.8 million in the 24 hours following Trump's conviction in New York. The amount means the Trump campaign is raking in over $2 million an hour. The Trump campaign also reported that over a third of the donations came from new donors. "With more than one-third of these donors being new to the campaign, it is clear that more and more Americans are seeing through the Biden election interference and joining President Trump in the movement to save our nation," the campaign announced. Insane.

Alex Soros, the son of left-wing activist and billionaire George Soros, suggested Democrats mention that former President Donald Trump is a “convicted felon at every opportunity” they get. Soros wrote in a post on X that “repetition is the key to a successful message” and that Democrats want American citizens to “wrestle” with having to vote for a “convicted felon” in the upcoming 2024 presidential election.

Democratic pollster and former Clinton adviser Mark Penn said Friday during an appearance on Fox News Channel that he believes Judge Juan Merchan will sentence former President Donald Trump to serve some jail time because he's "trying to take him out of the presidential race." "So far, this judge has wanted to take, obviously, wants to take Donald Trump out of the presidency," Penn said during an appearance on "Your World with Neil Cavuto" on Friday. "So, for all this talk that, of course, he's a first time offender and not eligible ... he's convicted of things that could send...

Leftist District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s show trial delivered the Democrat Party’s dream: A felony conviction against their most hated political enemy. The prosecution and the trial also were also littered with legal landmines and “reversible error” that should make former President Donald Trump’s looming appeal a slam dunk, legal experts say. Historical and stunning but not surprising to many who have closely followed left-wing lawfare in recent years, the 12 angry Manhattan jurors after two days of deliberations found Trump guilty on all 34 trumped-up felony counts against him. Judge Juan Merchan has scheduled sentencing for July 11, just four...

What did the Democrats just do to America? In the sham trial, the activist judge, according to a lawyer in the courtroom, covered his mouth to mask his laugh during the reading of the verdict. The smiling Biden DOJ prosecutor who parachuted into New York to get Trump on the bizarre Letitia James victimless value-inflation case with the AG's office then hopped over to Manhattan to prosecute Trump based on the plot of a book written by a disgruntled DA who quit and then was rehired to help manage the case: a district attorney, who, like the attorney general, got...

One show trial down, three more to go. You have every reason to spend the next five months anticipating anything and everything to keep voters from installing Donald Trump back in the White House through a process formerly known in America as a “free and fair election.”Up to and including assassinating the candidate whom every indicator has winning in November.For the first time in our country’s history a former president, who is running for reelection, was just convicted of a crime in what prosecutor Alvin Bragg’s hometown newspaper admitted is a “novel and untested” application of an obscure state law....

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis hopes to raise at least $10 million as part of a multistate fundraising swing for former President Donald Trump, a man he fought in a bitter primary race but with whom he has now found a cautious truce. “I think we believe Biden needs to be beat, and the governor is willing to put the sword down,” a top DeSantis adviser said. “They have had several good conversations as recently as last week.” The fundraising events will begin as soon as July and likely run through September, the DeSantis adviser said, with multiple...

Senator J.D. Vance (R-OH) said Friday on CNN’s “Inside Politics” that what happened in former President Donald Trump’s New York City business record trial was the “definition of fascism.”Guest host Wolf Blitzer said, “Are you interested in being the running mate of a convicted felon.”Vance said, “Well, will the entire purpose of this trial was to allow the media and the Democrats to say exactly that. This is never about justice, this is about plastering convicted felon all over the airwaves when in reality the only thing that Donald Trump is guilty of as being in the courtroom of a...

President Joe Biden flashed a smug, toothy grin after a reporter asked him about former President Donald Trump considering himself a political prisoner at the hands of Biden and his cronies. “Can you tell us, sir — Donald Trump refers himself as a political prisoner and blames you directly. What’s your response to that, sir?” a reporter asked Biden after the 81-year-old concluded his remarks on Friday in which he defended the conviction of Trump. The reporter asked the question as Biden began to walk away after concluding his address. But after the question was posed, Biden stopped in his...

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan on Friday called on Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and prosecutor Matthew Colangelo to testify for the “political prosecution” of former President Donald Trump. Mr. Jordan, Ohio Republican, teed up a hearing where both men will testify in front of the Weaponization of Federal Government Subcommittee on June 13. “This hearing will examine actions by state and local prosecutors to engage politically motivated prosecutions of federal officials,” Mr. Jordan wrote. “In particular the recent political prosecution of President Donald Trump by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.”

The View hosts have reacted to the criminal conviction of former president Donald Trump - which excited Joy Behar so much that she wet herself. While the ladies of The View don't usually film the show live on Fridays, they all gathered today to react to the Republican's guilty verdict in his Manhattan hush money trial. 'I was at Costco buying 10 boxes of Keurig coffee,' Joy shared with viewers.

Long before Donald Trump's hush-money trial concluded, I predicted that his conviction was a forgone conclusion – despite the obvious weakness of the case against him. Had the prosecution been brought in another part of the country, or even in another part of New York State, which was more fairly balanced with anti and pro-Trump voters, I am in little doubt that the outcome would have been different. But instead, on Thursday, Trump became the first former president to be found guilty of a crime – convicted on all 34 flimsy counts of 'falsifying business records.'

U.S. — In the hours after being convicted on 34 counts of something or other, Trump issued a reminder to the media that the proper term to describe him is "justice-impacted individual." The term, commonly used by Democrats and journalists to describe convicted felons, now describes a 2024 presidential candidate, giving Americans an exciting opportunity to vote for someone unfairly targeted by the U.S. justice system. "I am a justice-impacted individual, possibly the most justice-impacted of any person in history," said Trump in a statement outside the New York courthouse. "This totally fake and phony Democrat witch-hunt conviction by 12...

FIRST ON FOX: Former Vice President Mike Pence reacted on Friday to the criminal conviction of former President Donald Trump in a New York City courtroom and said a "terrible message" has been sent. "The conviction of former President Trump on politically motivated charges is an outrage and disservice to the nation," Pence told Fox News Digital. "No one is above the law, but our courts must not become a tool to be used against political opponents," Pence continued. "To millions of Americans, this was nothing more than a political prosecution driven by a Manhattan DA who ran for office...

Lefty New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez started her town hall meeting in the Bronx tonight by mentioning the Trump guilty verdict. “He was found guilty on all 34 counts,” she said to applause. “The rule of law applies to everyone.” She defended the jury and the judge, saying the case did not amount to a partisan prosecution as Trump has claimed, noting that his own lawyers screened the jurors.

Megyn Kelly warns Democrats that they have opened "Pandora's box" by prosecuting former President Trump. "Who's getting indicted next? Joe Biden? Maybe Jill Biden? How low can we go? You may not want to see it, but that ship has already left port." MEGYN KELLY: This whole scheme, and here it is the proper word is corrupt. It's a before and after moment for America. What just happened today is a line we can't uncross, and these Democrats will rue the day they decided to use lawfare to stop a presidential candidate. I'm not talking about violence; I'm talking about...