Home » World » US Elections Donald Trump faces prosecution in the event of an electoral defeat

US Elections Donald Trump faces prosecution in the event of an electoral defeat

Trump jokingly spoke about his future at one of the October pre-election meetings in Georgia. “What do I do? I will say that I lost to the worst candidate in political history, “said the current president of the United States at the time. But then he added a little more seriously: “I won’t feel very well. Maybe I’ll leave the country. “

According to Juliette Kayyem of CNN his statements may not have been a joke. “It must have occurred to him that he was in danger of a state and federal investigation, from which he would no longer be protected,” Kayyem said. The fact is that Trump’s eventual departure will in many ways be reminiscent of the resignation of former US President Richard Nixon. He, too, left the Oval Office in 1974 after a series of scandals, and was only saved from prosecution by a pardon granted to him by his successor, Gerald Ford. Trump from Biden certainly can’t count on that.



From the White House to the dock

“The president survived the impeachment, twenty-six charges of sexual harassment and about 4,000 other lawsuits. His great fortune will probably end brutally if Joe Biden wins, “the American weekly wrote in early November New Yorker. The list of scandals that could cause Trump to end up in court or even in a prison cell is long. Some of them were recently published by the agency Bloomberg.

Among them, for example, there are suspicions of several tax evasions or misuse of money from donors intended to finance the presidential campaign. Incidentally, in 2018, Trump’s longtime lawyer Michael Cohen was convicted of this crime.

The president also faces criticism for abusing the presidency for his own enrichment. For example, during their official visit to the United States, Saudi politicians were housed in a Washington hotel belonging to the Trump family empire.

“The investigations have been going on for a long time, but Trump has so far been protected from charges by saying that, according to the Ministry of Justice, the incumbent cannot be charged with a crime. If he lost, this restriction would end in January, “confirms US policy expert Jiří Pondělíček from Charles University.


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On the other hand, of course, in the opinion of experts, there are options for how Trump can avoid the courts. “The threat of an investigation may become a bargaining point between Republicans and Democrats,” says Americanist Jan Benes of the University of Ostrava. “In exchange for postponing the investigation, Republicans, for example, will support some legislative proposals by Democrats,” Beneš explains.

Another possibility is the mentioned relocation abroad. The Trump family owns a network of hotels around the world. The former president could move to one of them. According to some sources, Trump allegedly considered going abroad in the event of a loss in his first elections in 2016.

However, Juliette Kayyem cannot imagine Trump “fleeing” from America. In addition, he would have to go to a country that does not have a convention with the United States on the extradition of prosecuted persons. “But most of these states are Muslim countries like Somalia or Chad, which Trump made enemies of as president,” Kayyem added.

TV show or re-candidacy?

Even if Trump escapes unscathed from all the scandals, Biden’s defeat could do him great personal harm and it is uncertain how his career will continue. The president’s business group has recently suffered significant financial losses due to a coronavirus pandemic. Magazine Forbes in september, he calculated that the value of trump’s assets had fallen by almost 20 percent year on year to $ 2.5 billion, or about 56.5 billion crowns. In the ranking of the richest people in the world, he fell by 64 places to 339. position.

There is a lot of speculation in the US that Trump could establish himself in the media industry, an environment that has never been foreign to him. “Everyone tells me they will have their own show on Fox News. I’d rather guess he’ll have it on RT (Russian state television), ”Said the respected American historian Timothy D. Snyder.

There is also talk of the possibility that he could run for president again in 2024. Such a scenario has already taken place in US history. Theodore Roosevelt, as a former president, ran for Woodrow Wilson in 1912, but lost. “Anyway, I can’t imagine never seeing him again after the defeat,” says Nicholas Lemann.


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Trumpism survives Trump

The last question that remains to be resolved is how the Republican Party should deal with the departure of Donald Trump. “By probably holding the Senate and various state congresses and governors’ seats, Republicans find it difficult to predict whether they will want to turn a little away from Trump, attract center voters more, and get rid of the Tea Party, or whether Trump will continue to be the party , ”Thinks the Americanist Beneš.

“Trump and the Republicans have managed to attract many new voters to the polls this year. The party will find it difficult to get rid of his influence at a time when he has so many supporters, “believes Jiří Pondělíček.

The New Yorker weekly reminds us that Trump is already growing young successors, for example in the person of his son Donald Trump Jr., or Missouri senator Josh Hawley, who present themselves in a similar aggressive-populist style. So there are indications that no matter how the elections turn out, the so-called trumpism will survive President Trump himself.

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