This probably violates the rule about giving sufficient time before commenting or forming a conclusion, but the Tina Peters travesty is something I have been watching since the day she was unjustly convicted. I have been waiting patiently while an old woman who did nothing wrong wasted away in a miserable confinement, with nobody doing anything until Trump pardoned her, and there she is, still in prison. I’ve done enough silent waiting. My trust is being tested in a way that breaks my heart.
This is a big deal, not just in terms of the injustice it represents, but because of the perception it will likely create of the President and his administration not being able (or perhaps not willing) to enforce his lawful domestic orders. I think I can pretty confidently say that no amount of gung-ho Venezuelan drug-boat sinking or well-deserved Euro-tyrant power-slapping is going to help the President’s image if Tina Peters dies mysteriously in prison. That will become a stain on the back of the President’s pants that no amount of MAGA-strength multi-generational Tide will wash away because she is a central iconic figure in this whole stolen 2020 election mess, possibly the central iconic figure, and what’s been done to her is every bit as cruel and outrageous as what the Democrats did to the J6ers.
I believe, with all due respect, that the President needs to stomp his foot down and put an end to this wonton rebellion from Colorado officials. Don’t let it drag out another minute. There is no secret about the reason Tina Peters is in prison. Corrupt officials in Colorado needed to shut her up and make an example of her so others in their state would be afraid to tell on them, even though all their dirty secrets are already out in the open, and everybody knows what they did. Now they’re trying to use this to make Trump and his administration look like wimpy fools, as if there is no difference after all between them and the dynastic rich Republicans and treasonous RINOs in congress who do nothing but hold endless hearings, pretending they mean to get to the bottom of things while doing everything they can to preserve the sweet lucrative uniparty deal they have with the Democrats: “Say whatever you want to look patriotic and righteous as long as you don’t do anything to hinder our leftist domestic agenda. In exchange we won’t do anything meaningful to stop your foreign wars and insurrections, your forever conflicts based on ancient grudges, or your NGO coups that depose elected leaders in favor of dictators whom you think are better for democracy.”
Now the Colorado political machine will use tortured legal reasoning try to run out the clock, which means keeping Tina Peters in prison and suffering in ill health until she dies, or make her die quicker by the hand of a bribed fellow inmate or corrupt psychotic prison guard. It’s all deliberate, and I wouldn’t be opposed to the President deliberately sending in the military to surround the prison to get her out with extreme prejudice, and then arrest the prison officials who are defying presidential authority. Guantanamo for them. Federalize the prison if you have to, just do SOMETHING with some TEETH.
Having said that, I do trust President Trump. I understand there are timing issues to these things and that the president is committed to doing everything lawfully, but time is running out, law no longer exists as anything but tyrannical oppression in Colorado. If Pam Bondi doesn’t start arresting somebody of note (and not cosmetically slapping the hands of one or two less well-known offenders just to please the voting base), it’s going to erode all the trust and goodwill the President has built up in his supporters from being the only president in living memory who actually kept his promises. Perhaps it’s not fair that things can work out like that, particularly in light of the sheer volume of stunning things Trump has already accomplished, but they often do, and it’s probably going to happen in this case if it isn’t soon brought to a just resolution. People are paying attention to this, Mr. President. Find a way, and find it quickly.
One caveat: If I’m wrong, if tomorrow the President and his administration reveal a brilliant plan to get Tina Peters out of prison by Wednesday, I’ll apologize without feeling bad about my outrage over law-abiding American citizens being put in prison by vindictive soulless Democrats and kept there because distracted soulless Republicans will do nothing.
One: President Trump is about to reassert a federal authority concerning pardons that existed prior to Lincoln. Just like ‘a previous court’ was wrong about Roe vs. Wade, the states have been wrong for 150 years on presidential pardon authority. That is about to be challenged hard, and Trump will easily win just like he did when Colorado courts unanimously worked to remove him from the ballot, and the Supreme Court unanimously trounced the Colorado courts and put Trump on the ballot.
Two: The Clerk manages, collects, tabulates, reports, and protects election data for the US House of Representatives under federal authority. This has been forgotten and overwritten over time; it is about to be revisited.
No president has ever pardoned any person convicted of a state crime - it didn’t exist prior to Lincoln either. As a previous posted mentioned, we should tread very carefully about setting precedent in eroding state’s rights.
Instead, let’s see a red wave swallow Colorado and elect a MAGA governor who will then pardon Tina Peters.
100% agree. The fact that people want to just start yanking states rights away because it's inconvenient in this one case is just asinine.
How is he going to do that, specifically? I think you'd need a Supreme Court ruling, and the Supreme Court has consistently limited the President's pardoning power to federal charges.
And yes, the Supreme Court overturned Roe Vs Wade. On a federal level and turned it over to the individual states to decide abortion laws.
So on this, recent Supreme Court rulings actively work against President Trump being able to pardon state charges.