Trump should be impeached

Donald Trump, the man who has drawn headlines for repeatedly skirting the unspoken rules of decorum during his presidential campaign, has also promised to break several actual United States laws if elected in NovemberR02;"R02;murdering terrorists" families and torturing suspected criminals among them. These are, of course, likely "high crimes and misdemeanors," and therefore grounds for impeachment under the U.S. Constitution. But even if Trump doesn"t make good on his boasts, has the GOP candidate already laid the groundwork for his Congressionally induced removal from the Oval Office? Don"t be so skeptical: His brief tenure as the face and leader of the for-profit Trump University suggests as much, according to a new working paper from University of Utah law professor Christopher Peterson. In his paper titled "Trump University and Presidential Impeachment," Peterson argues that fraud and racketeering accusations that Trump is currently facing in three ongoing lawsuits regarding his business school may count as high crimes and/or misdemeanors. Peterson, who recently took an academic hiatus to work in enforcement at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, knows what he"s talking about: The professor, who focuses on financial services and consumer protection, spent the past four and a half years determining the validity and reality of"and bringing cases against"banks and other financial providers, payday lenders, mortgage brokers. Or, as he aptly puts it, "deciding when a case has legs." There are three ongoing cases against Trump that could head to trial sometime after the November election, which collectively accuse him of fraud, false advertising, and racketeering. In his latest analysis, Peterson argues that, barring settlement, the fraud and racketeering allegations in The People of the State of New York v. The Trump Entrepreneur Initiative LLC; Low v. Trump University, LLC; and Cohen v. Trump University, LLC count as serious and imprisonable crimes in the states in which these cases are being tried, and could also be deemed grounds for impeachment by Congress. (Whether they would decide to act on that reminder is up in the air, however: Under U.S. law, the majority-Republican House of Representatives would have to initiate the motion to impeach Trump, while the Republican-majority Senate would try the impeachment.) If he were impeached, Trump would join Andrew Johnson, impeached and acquitted in 1868, and Bill Clinton, impeached in 1998 and acquitted in 1999, as the third president to face such action in history. As Peterson discussed in a phone call with Pacific Standard, a Trump impeachment would also be highly original: the first to include accusations of racketeering. Peterson talked to us about the strengths, obstacles, and sheer originality of the legal impeachment case against TrumpR02;"R02;and why he thinks Trump may be worried. How did it first dawn on you that these three ongoing Trump University cases might be laying the ground for impeachment if Trump is elected president? I do consumer protection cases for a living, and obviously it isn"t lost on me that Trump is running for president of the U.S., so I took a look at those cases to figure out whether there was something really illegal about what he did there. And as I was reading through the cases, I started to realize how serious the allegations are: The claims that he is currently facing are at the boundary of where a case is no longer really appropriate to be resolved as a civil matter, and needs to be addressed as a crime. Then you think, well, gosh, can we have a president who"s engaged in fraud? That led me to take a look at the impeachment statute and compare that to the alleged inappropriate behavior that presidents have engaged in in the past, and to think about whether this was comparable. What was the strongest legal evidence that you found to support a case for Trump"s impeachment? The most compelling evidence, in my view, are the stories that you hear from consumers themselves. The one that stands out in my mind is from a mom of a kid with Down syndrome. She"s hoping to make a better life for her kid, decides she can"t really afford an expensive Trump Gold Elite mentorship package, but [a Trump University instructor] talks her into buying one anyway, because [the person] convinces her that if she pays $25,000, she"ll make it back in 60 days. And then, after she parts with her $25,000, her mentor disappears and become what another consumer called a "phantom mentor." Here"s what she wrote: Donald Trump received $25,000 of my money. For $25,000, I have received a lifetime membership to nothing! No one contacted me and I have not been able to contact anyone because the phone numbers have all been disconnected. There is no Trump University. That"s fraud. You can"t take $25,000 from somebody and then disappear into the night. It doesn"t matter if that"s Trump, if it"s Hillary Clinton, if it"s Mickey Mouse, there"s no one in the U.S. that is allowed to do that; doing it rises to the level of a crime if it"s true. Thankyou and make this argument quick.... :) :)