Dershowitz’s Highly Questionable Attack On Donald Trump’s Impeachment
Alan Dershowitz, in his reputation-shattering attack on Donald Trump’s impeachment, insists that Trump committed no crimes, a requirement for impeachment and removal from office. He makes reference to the Constitution’s specific listing of treason and bribery as impeachable offenses, along with high crimes and misdemeanors. He correctly concludes that Trump’s impeachment on the basis of “abuse of power” and “obstruction of Congress” is therefore invalid. But, arguably, treason and bribery are exactly what Trump committed, and inexplicably, the House’s articles of impeachment do not include them! A big mistake. A new impeachment proceeding should be instituted with properly formulated articles. (An “abuse of power” would more properly be a case similar to nepotism. Whether that would be an impeachable crime is uncertain. As for “obstruction of Congress”, that is not the same as “obstruction of justice”, which would be an impeachable crime. )
Dershowitz insists that he loves the Constitution and his country, but if that were truly the case he would have worked with the Democrats to ensure their impeachment of Trump would be properly pursued. He would not have worked to oppose the impeachment and removal from office of a clearly guilty Trump. He has done immeasurable harm to his country, not just to his reputation.
Trump arguably committed bribery (or attempted bribery) by withholding congressionally approved urgent military assistance to Ukraine until its president Zelensky agreed to publicly announce an investigation into Joe Biden and his son Hunter for corruption. Such an announcement would benefit Trump personally in view of the November 2020 presidential election where Joe Biden appears likely to become the Democratic candidate, by damaging Biden’s image. That was a clear “quid pro quo” for the benefit of Donald Trump’s reelection prospects, not for the benefit of U.S. foreign policy. Astonishingly, Dershowitz made a false “quid pro quo” analogy to make the case that Trump’s quid pro quo was not bribery, giving the example of a U.S. president withholding aid to Israel until it publicly agreed to stop building new settlements in the West Bank. In his analogy, the “quo” is for the benefit of American foreign policy, not for the personal benefit of the American president through smearing one of his political opponents. With his false “quid pro quo” parallel, Dershowitz undermined his claim that he was not an advocate for Trump, but solely an academic intent on ensuring a proper interpretation of the Constitution. Indeed, his parallel is so obviously false, that one is led to question Dershowitz’s honesty. It appears Dershowitz was trying to pull the wool over Americans’ eyes! He shows that far from being an impartial academic, he is biased in favor of Trump to the point of making false analogies.
As for treason, Trump arguably committed that crime by betraying our allies, the Syrian Kurds, by suddenly and without prior notice withdrawing our troops who were assisting the Kurds against our and their military adversaries in Syria. Trump’s abandonment of the Kurds, apart from assisting our de facto enemies in Syria to the detriment of our national foreign policy interests and security, may also be seen as a possible “quid pro quo” to benefit himself financially given his financial entanglements with Russia and Turkey. That would be another case of bribery. In this case, he would have sacrificed our foreign policy interests and national security in exchange for some yet undisclosed financial benefits accorded by Russia and Turkey.
But that’s not all! By attempting to cover up his crimes, by blocking testimony from witnesses and documents from the impeachment proceedings, Trump is arguably committing the crime of obstruction of justice.
Lastly, Trump appears to have clearly broken the law (The Impoundment Control Act) by withholding congressionally mandated assistance to Ukraine, since presidents are not allowed to do so except for a clear justifiable reason in the national interest, not for his personal political benefit. Dershowitz strangely made no reference to this seemingly clear violation of the law. Was this a case of distracted overlooking, or an intentional omission in order to protect Trump?
Two important questions: Are those who protect Trump during the impeachment proceedings, while knowing of his crimes, committing obstruction of justice. Are they involved in a conspiracy to obstruct justice? In a cover-up?
There is also the “red herring” argument propounded by Trump’s backers that his impeachment and removal from office would be an illegal, unconstitutional reversal of the 2016 presidential election. It’s an absurd argument, since impeachment and removal is explicitly provided for by the Constitution, precisely in order to remove presidents when it is urgent to do so, to prevent them from further damaging the nation before the next election. Regarding Trump, it would be to prevent him from seeking further Russian help in the upcoming presidential election, which could be a case of both bribery and treason, as well as a violation of the law prohibiting the request of foreign assistance for one’s own election, which is another impeachable crime (“high crimes and misdemeanors”).
Finally, in answer to Trump complaints that many Democrats have wanted him impeached from the day he was inaugurated, it’s because they suspect that Trump is compromised and ”owned” by the Russians. This suspicion is reinforced by 1) Flynn’s lying to the FBI regarding his talks with Russians; 2) by Manafort’s Russian connections; 3) by so many Russians attending the Republican convention; 4) by Jeff Sessions hiding his contacts with Russians; 5) by Trump’s publicly requesting Russia for help in finding Hillary Clinton’s missing emails (“Russia, if you’re listening…”) during the presidential campaign; 6) by Trump’s private meetings with Putin with no American translator to take notes; 7) by Trump believing Putin more than our own intelligence services; 8) by Trump never criticizing Putin for the massacre of civilians in Syria; 9) by Trump never criticizing Russia for having interfered in the 2016 election to help him win against Hillary Clinton; 10) by Trump refusing to release his tax returns and his bank records, which could reveal illegal foreign financing and financial ties to Russia; 11) by Trump refusing to criticize Russia for invading Ukraine and taking some of its territory; 12) by Michael Cohen’s statements; 13) by the findings of the Mueller Report; 14) by the number of Russians purchasing real estate from Trump at inflated prices; 15) by Trump not making it a priority to defend against future meddling by Russia in our elections; 16) by Trump’s secret meeting in the White House with the Russian Foreign Minister and the Russian Ambassador, with no Americans present, only the Russian press and photographers who broke the news about the meeting; 17) by Trump never criticizing Putin for backing the corrupt Maduro dictatorship in Venezuela; 18) by Trump never criticizing Russia for having cyber-attacked Estonia and not respecting the three Baltic nations’ sovereignty. Additionally, those Democrats believed Trump was a pathological liar, a con artist, corrupt, and totally unqualified to be president. Taken all together, they felt that Trump was for “Trump first, Russia second, and America third.”
© Edward Sonnino 2020
January 31, 2020
