- USA TODAY Network Tennessee columnist Cameron Smith was born in Memphis and raised in Brentwood, and is a former political lawyer who worked for conservative Republicans.
“The American people are losing faith in this country, in our institutions,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said on May 14, criticizing the ongoing criminal prosecution of former President Donald Trump. “The American people are losing faith in our justice system.”
He’s right: trust in the American justice system is indeed weak…politicians are to blame.
New York District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s prosecution of Trump is untenable. Bragg has yet to explain who Trump misled with his business records, that it is illegal for candidates to pay to “catch and kill” damaging stories, and that Trump knowingly concealed “hush money” payments to cover up election crimes.
Mr. Bragg brought serious political pressure to the case. His predecessor, Cyrus Vance Jr., pursued the Trump Organization and its longtime chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, for tax evasion, but Mr. Vance retired without personally prosecuting Mr. Trump. The unusual structure of the case is sure to leave the impression to casual observers that politics are a driving force behind Mr. Bragg’s effort.
Trump’s criminal trialThank you to the brave New Yorkers who served on juries
Chuck Schumer and Mike Johnson are playing the same game
Unfortunately, the politically motivated prosecution of Bragg in New York is not the only force undermining our faith in the American justice system.
In 2020, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer stood on the steps of the Supreme Court after oral arguments in the case that would eventually overturn the abortion precedent in Roe v. Wade.
“To Justice Gorsuch and Justice Kavanaugh, you have created a storm, and you will pay the price,” Schumer said. “If you proceed with these terrible decisions, you don’t know what’s coming at you.”
Since then, one would have to be hiding under a rock to not be aware of the myriad Democratic campaigns attacking the legitimacy of the Supreme Court and its conservative justices.
Republicans like Johnson are purposefully undermining confidence in the American justice system. “We’re seeing the same thing. [political prosecution] “It’s a classified documents case, and the case is so egregious that the trial has been postponed indefinitely,” he said after attending President Trump’s trial in New York.
Johnson, who is also an attorney, knows the statements are so misleading as to be patently false.
In the Trump documents case, both the prosecution and defense agreed that a jury trial would not be ready in May — the prosecution suggested July, while Trump and his co-defendants suggested August or September.
Judge Eileen Cannon did not postpone the trial indefinitely due to the “viciousness” of the prosecution, but instead postponed it because there are numerous pending claims in the case involving national security documents that need to be addressed.
Tennessee Congressman Andy OglesFollowing Trump into desperation and undermining democracy
Trump’s surrogates defend him in the court of public opinion
In his efforts to support Trump, Johnson is working on a ploy of his own: If Bragg’s lawsuit is politically motivated, then all of the criminal charges against Trump are baseless.
For example, the documents lawsuit that Johnson refers to is on much stronger legal grounds than Bragg’s lawsuit.
It’s not politically expedient for Johnson or other Republicans to be nuanced and honest about that reality.
Johnson ceded the chair to President Trump, who defended him after Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, a MAGA staunch supporter, introduced a motion to impeach the Louisiana chair. President Trump has no intention of upsetting this dynamic by dissecting the facts of each of the cases against him.
Trump is now calling on his political allies to defend him in the court of public opinion.
“I have a lot of surrogates, and they speak very well,” Trump said Tuesday morning. “They come from all over Washington, they’re very well respected, and they think this is the biggest scam they’ve ever seen.”
Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville of Alabama, who worries about the “weaponization of the criminal justice system,” attended the New York trial as Trump’s emotional support. “The Republican nominee for president is experiencing emotional distress in a very depressing courtroom,” Tuberville said. “I’m happy to support President Trump. I’m his friend. I’m here as a friend, rather than as a supporter of him as a presidential candidate.”
The New York trial has a political ring to it, but Trump has also politicized the Justice Department.
While it’s fair to suggest that Bragg’s case should never have been filed in the first place, Tuberville, like Johnson, makes broad sweeping claims about the criminal justice system as a whole.
“Democrats are using our justice system to go after their political opponents and criminally prosecute them. This is a crime,” Sen. Rick Scott said on Fox News. “They’re just thugs trying to stop Donald Trump from running for president.”
Republicans have even suggested that the current judge on the case can’t be impartial because of his adult daughter’s business dealings. “What we really need to document is that the judge’s own daughter is raking in millions of dollars as a Democratic Party activist,” said former presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswami.
Marjorie Taylor Greene’s prankThis is exactly why the Hastert Rule in the U.S. House of Representatives must be repealed.
“I am working with the chairman,” Johnson added. [Jim] House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jordan [James] I have briefed the members of the Oversight Committee on steps to curb Special Counsel Jack Smith’s abuse of power.”
Hold on, how did you get from Bragg to Jack Smith?
I will be the first to say that the prosecution of Mr. Bragg smacks of politics. It is also by far the weakest case against Trump. Wouldn’t it be deeply politically biased to declare that Mr. Trump cannot be validly prosecuted in any court of law for any reason? Do we really want politicians who cannot be held accountable under the law?
The funny irony in all of this is that Trump has never hidden his desire to use the Justice Department to protect himself or punish his political opponents. Just ask former Attorney General Jeff Sessions how he would treat people who make legally rational decisions to maintain the prosecutors’ independence from politics.
Politicians are telling us what we want to hear
We don’t trust the American justice system because our political leaders tell us we shouldn’t. When Democrats don’t like the Supreme Court’s opinions, they question whether it is a legitimate institution. Republican politicians don’t want Trump to be prosecuted, so all the cases against Trump are political scams. It’s because we don’t question political scripts and want to believe them.
We pay politicians to represent us, and they soon get to tell us what we want to hear. Right now, what we want is for our side to be told that they’re right and that the other side is a threat to American democracy.
Even if he is overreaching in his prosecution, Bragg is an elected official and respects the people who put him in office. Johnson demonstrated political skill in defending Trump during his criminal prosecution if he wants to stay in the presidency. Of course, President Joe Biden has said the Supreme Court is “not a normal court.” Can we really expect him to praise the legal reasoning of an opinion that a majority of his constituents disagree with?
None of this means that the American legal system is broken, because it isn’t.
Politicians deserve a fair trial. So do we. Prosecutors have broad discretion, but we also have the right to an impartial jury. Appeals courts review trial court decisions for bias or misconduct by prosecutors, judges, and jurors. Over generations, we have built in safeguards to protect us from myriad human frailties.
The American legal system isn’t perfect, but it is capable of fair deliberation. The jury is still out on whether politicians can do the same.
USA TODAY Network Tennessee columnist Cameron Smith was born in Memphis and raised in Brentwood. He and his wife, Justine, are raising their three sons in Nolensville, Tennessee. Please send your outrage or support directly to smith.david.cameron@gmail.com or @DCameronSmith on X (formerly Twitter). If you agree or disagree, submit a letter to the editor at letters@tennessean.com.
