Donald Trump’s Republican allies are calling for revenge lawsuits and other retaliatory measures against Democrats in response to his felony conviction in New York.
Just hours after a jury found Trump guilty last week, anger hardened into demands for action. Since then, prominent GOP leaders, both inside and outside of government, have demanded that elected Republicans use every instrument of power available against Democrats, including investigations and targeted prosecutions.
The intensity of the anger and open desire to use the criminal justice system against Democrats following the verdict surpasses anything seen before in Trump’s tumultuous years in national politics. What is different now is the range of Republicans who say retaliation is necessary and who no longer disguise their intentions with euphemisms.
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Stephen Miller, a former senior adviser to Trump who still helps guide his policy thinking, issued a directive on Fox News after a jury found Trump guilty of falsifying financial records to cover up a secret 2016 campaign payment to a porn star . Miller asked a series of questions to Republicans at all levels, including local district attorneys.
“Are all House committees controlled by Republicans using their subpoena power in whatever way is necessary at this time?” He demanded. “Are all Republican prosecutors beginning all necessary investigations now?”
“Every facet of Republican Party politics and power must be used now to confront Marxism and defeat these communists,” Miller said, using the generic slurs that Trump allies routinely use against Democrats.
Steve Bannon, Trump’s former chief strategist, said in a text message to The New York Times on Tuesday that now was the time for shadowy Republican prosecutors across the country to make a name for themselves by prosecuting Democrats.
“There are dozens of ambitious state attorneys general and district attorneys who need to ‘seize the day’ and take control of this moment in history,” Bannon wrote.
And Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, the top Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee who is in the running to be Trump’s running mate, wrote on Social Platform X that President Joe Biden was “a demented man supported by evil people and disturbed” and that now it was time to “fight fire with fire” – using flame emojis to represent fire.
Trump campaign officials did not respond to requests for comment.
Seeking retribution through the judicial system is not a new concept for Trump. In 2016, he repeated and encouraged “lock her up” chants against his opponent, Hillary Clinton, whom authorities declined to prosecute for using a private email server while she was secretary of state.
As president, Trump repeatedly told aides that he wanted the Justice Department to indict his political enemies. The Justice Department opened several investigations into Trump’s adversaries but ultimately did not bring charges — enraging Trump and contributing to a 2020 rift with his attorney general, Bill Barr. Last year, Trump promised that if he were elected again, he would appoint a “real special prosecutor” to “go after” Biden and his family.
Now, it remains unclear whether requests for legal retribution will amount to much in terms of actual prosecutions, at least in the short term. Without control from the White House, people close to Trump are urging district attorneys and attorneys general in red states to begin aggressively targeting Democrats for unspecified crimes.
A central tenet of his argument is that the four criminal cases in four different jurisdictions against Trump are illegitimate and nothing more than a political setup by the judicial system. They continue to advance the theory, without evidence, that all four cases are the result of a Biden conspiracy – implicitly or explicitly rejecting the notion that Trump was charged with crimes based on the evidence.
But based on their premise that the charges – and now the convictions in the fraudulent business records case – are baseless and were invented for political reasons, they argue that Republican prosecutors not only should but can do the same thing to Democrats. In short, after having accused Democrats of “lawfare” – or using the law to wage war against political opponents – Republicans say they should respond in kind.
Some veteran Republican lawyers have sought to disguise the need for such retribution as a matter of constitutional principle. Among those calling for tit-for-tat prosecutions is John C. Yoo, a law professor at the University of California, Berkeley, best known as the author of once-secret Bush administration legal memos declaring that the president can legally violate legal limits on torture. warrantless arrests and wiretapping.
“To prevent the case against Trump from taking a permanent place in the American political system, Republicans will have to bring charges against Democratic leaders, even presidents,” Yoo wrote in an essay published by The National Review.
He added: “Only retaliation in kind can produce the deterrence necessary to impose a political version of mutual assured destruction; Without the threat of prosecuting their own leaders, Democrats will continue to impeach future Republican presidents without restraint.”
Trump’s closest allies on Capitol Hill are less concerned with finding noble constitutional logic.
“President Biden should be ready because on January 20th of next year, when he is former President Joe Biden, what’s good for the gander is good for the gander,” said Rep. Ronny Jackson, R-Texas, a close Trump ally, in an appearance on the pro-Trump network Newsmax.
Jackson said: “I will encourage all of my colleagues and everyone I have any influence over as a member of Congress to aggressively pursue the president and his entire family, his entire crime family, for all the crimes they are out there. there now related to this family.
Some of the rhetoric went even further.
“Not just prison, they should get the death penalty,” Laura Loomer, a far-right and anti-Muslim activist with a history of expressing bigoted views, said in a podcast after the verdict. Loomer, a former Republican candidate for a Florida House seat, is not officially part of Trump’s campaign. Trump, however, praised her as “very special,” invited her to travel with him on his private plane and met with her at his private clubs.
On social media, there was an explosion of violent rhetoric and threats against the judge in the New York criminal case, Juan M. Merchan, and the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, who brought the charges against Trump.
Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, a close Trump ally and chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, sent a letter this week demanding testimony from Bragg and one of his lead lawyers in the case, Matthew Colangelo.
Bragg’s office has not yet responded to the letter, but the demand appears to set the stage for a possible subpoena and legal fight. After the indictment last year, Jordan subpoenaed a former prosecutor from Bragg’s office, Mark Pomerantz, who ended up giving a statement about the investigation.
Jordan also proposed this week to block federal law enforcement grants from going to Bragg’s office and the district attorney’s office in Fulton County, Georgia, where Trump faces state charges for attempted subversion in the 2020 election.
House Speaker Mike Johnson went on Fox News and called on the Supreme Court to “intervene” and overturn the Manhattan conviction, granting Trump immunity from prosecution. In the Senate, a group of Trump allies signed a letter declaring they will oppose major legislation and Biden administration nominees, although they tend not to vote for Biden policies and nominees anyway.
But the most extreme calls, not just for oversight scrutiny and political obstructionism but also for revenge prosecutions, come from former senior Trump administration officials and those close to the former president, who are expected to play even bigger roles in a potential second term. . Its message is often apocalyptic.
There is no more room, they argue, for weaklings who fetishize decency and moderation.
Mike Davis, a former Senate Judiciary Committee lawyer and close Trump associate, is calling for an investigation of the investigators, similar to how the Justice Department under Trump used the special counsel investigation led by John Durham in a failed years-long attempt duration. find a basis to charge senior Obama administration officials with a crime because of the Russia investigation.
“The Republican attorneys general in Georgia and Florida and the district attorney in Maricopa County, Arizona, need to open investigations” into the prosecutors and investigators pursuing allegations of Trump and his allies, Davis said. He added: “So on day one, when he wins, President Trump will need to open a criminal civil rights investigation.”
Jeff Clark, a former Trump Justice Department official who was indicted in the Georgia election case for his role in helping Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 vote in that state, offered another suggestion. He called on “courageous” district attorneys in conservative areas to file cases in federal court against people involved in criminal cases against Trump under federal laws that allow people to seek monetary damages from government officials who violate their constitutional rights.
His theory is that the cases are a conspiracy to prevent Trump from effectively running for president. It remains unclear, however, why local criminal prosecutors would have legal standing to go to federal court and initiate such lawsuits. A spokesperson for Clark’s employer, the Center for Renewing America, a pro-Trump think tank, did not respond to a request for comment.
There is no room on this issue for moderate or traditional Republicans like Larry Hogan, former governor of Maryland and a key GOP recruit, to run for Senate in the blue state. Hogan erred unforgivably in the eyes of the Trump team when he implored Americans “to respect the verdict and the legal process” regardless of the outcome.
Chris LaCivita, a top Trump adviser, addressed Hogan in an X post: “You just ended your campaign.” And even though a Hogan victory could make the difference between Republicans or Democrats controlling the Senate next year, Trump’s daughter-in-law Lara Trump, who is also co-chair of the Republican National Committee, said on CNN that Hogan “doesn’t deserve the respect from anyone in the Republican Party.”
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