THE ACTUAL LAWS TRUMP HAS BROKEN, JUST WITH THE UKRAINE AND CHINA AFFAIRS, COULD LAND HIM 10 YEARS IN PRISON
Take 18 U.S. Code § 872: “Extortion by officers or employees of the United States.” Or 18 U.S. Code § 610: “Coercion of political activity.”
Ryan Grim
October 10 2019, 7:00 a.m.
IN THE FACE of an overwhelming pile of evidence suggesting that President Donald Trump pressured a foreign country to damage a political rival, most Republicans have chosen either to remain silent or to deny outright that anything out of the ordinary occurred. Others have taken a more sophisticated route: Concede his wrongdoing, but argue that it’s not impeachable.
“Donald Trump should not have been on the phone with a foreign head of state encouraging another country to investigate his political opponent, Joe Biden. Some Republicans are trying, but there’s no way to spin this as a good idea,” wrote Tucker Carlson and Neil Patel recently in The Daily Caller. But, they add importantly, that doesn’t mean his error rises to the level of an impeachable offense.
They are, however, indictable. A variety of felony criminal statutes plainly implicate Trump’s behavior, and come with lengthy prison sentences — the types of sentences doled out for high crimes, to say nothing of misdemeanors. Indeed, many of them are straightforward. Altogether, if the impeachment inquiry is limited simply to Trump’s pressure on Ukraine, the charges could amount to more than 10 years in prison.
