Americans are distressed at how 2024’s presidential election is shaping up. Three unprecedented events are afoot, the most serious being election interference by prosecutors.
Major felonies – violations of federal bribery laws (18 USC 201), the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (15 USC 78), and federal RICO (18 USC 96) – are credibly alleged against President Biden, yet his attorney general does nothing. That is stunning, event number one.
Event number two, within discretion of the Democrat Party, is the odd demise – fading mental and physical condition – of their presumptive candidate. Americans re worried about that.
Event three is the four political indictments – two state, two federal – launched against the leading Republican candidate. On their face, all four are an extraordinary stretch of the law.
Studied from the view of history, state and federal caselaw, how laws are applied, and their impact on constitutional rights – the First, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and 14th Amendments – they are all plainly political.
Supporting that view, the New York indictment misinterprets federal election law, seeks to turn a state misdemeanor into a federal violation, apparently to disqualify the Republican candidate. The New York prosecutor won on a platform of finding a way to indict the Republican.
The Georgia indictment is also brought by a politically motivated prosecutor who wildly overreached, indicting 19 Republicans and lawyers for the Republican candidate, inferring criminality from traditional politics, emasculating state and federal constitutional rights.
At the federal level, as if actors were colluding, the aim seems to be preventing the Republican from campaigning, while intimidating lawyers and likely voters. The federal prosecutor brought indictments that would effectively eviscerate the First and Fourth Amendments.
In short, his first indictment involves raiding the former president’s home with impunity, using excessive force, excessive time, an illegal “general warrant” in violation of the Fourth Amendment, for administrative violations also committed by the sitting president.
His second indictment requires proof the former president did not believe his election was marred by irregularities around COVID, and if he can prove that, making a political speech the proximate cause of specific crimes, in effect criminalizing future political speeches.
What is more, the federal and state prosecutors are established political actors, known for Democrat activism and animus toward the indicted Republican candidate. The federal prosecutor was even reprimanded by the US Supreme Court 9-0 for a similar case against a Republican.
In cases like these, where prosecutors jump the rails, more likely than not motivated by wanting to do damage to a person, property, or reputation of the party indicted, two actions lie.
The first is a claim of prosecutorial misconduct, second for malicious prosecution. Unfortunately, both are involved, the first usually resulting in a slap on the wrist, second only possible when a defendant prevails on the merits, then looks to recover some of the lost reputation.
However, in this case, something else is afoot – transparent election interference, with the briefing and trial dates conspicuously opposite presidential primary dates. Perhaps not coincidentally, the indictments appeared on news days featuring alleged Biden infractions.
So, what is the remedy for audacious election interference by prosecutors, in effect abusing judicial process to interfere with a campaign of their political rival, their number one rival?
The answer is in the federal criminal code, 18 USC 595, which can be used by any federal prosecutor against anyone, including another federal or state prosecutor, for election interference.
The statute is perfectly fitted to cases against these prosecutors, based on what is known of their motivations, reputations, affiliations, and the half-baked indictments hustled through pliant grand juries, in some cases perhaps without witnesses.
The obvious nature of this triple-teaming, election interference gambit is an invitation to federal prosecutors – and perhaps states attorneys general on state laws – to end this bizarre chapter in American history, an attempt by Democrat prosecutors, a bitter Attorney General, and a worried, corrupt President, to throw an election.
In short, if federal and state prosecutors take a close look, causes of action appear to exist for bringing to justice the those abusing prosecutorial power to effect political ends.
This is the time for those of integrity to use these laws on the books to protect against a prosecutorial abomination – unconstitutional, facially criminal election interference.
Robert Charles is a former Assistant Secretary of State under Colin Powell, former Reagan and Bush 41 White House staffer, attorney, and naval intelligence officer (USNR). He wrote “Narcotics and Terrorism” (2003), “Eagles and Evergreens” (2018), and is National Spokesman for AMAC.
