Senator Kamala Harris Doesn’t Know How a Pardon Works
“Joe Arpaio was convicted because he committed a crime. He should not be pardoned.”
Progressives and #NeverTrumpers across the nation shriek that President Donald Trump should stop tweeting.
In fact, former undercover CIA agent Valerie Plame Wilson wants to crowdfund enough money to buy Twitter so she can close President Donald Trump’s account.
However, someone should really tell California Senator Kamala Harris to take a break from Twitter herself. For instance, her latest legal opinion of Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio possibly receiving a pardon from President Trump is a little thin on logic and reason.
Joe Arpaio was convicted because he committed a crime. He should not be pardoned. https://t.co/YGvQkK6Kae
— Kamala Harris (@SenKamalaHarris) August 23, 2017
The President of the United States is allowed to issue a pardon under Article II, Section 2 of the Constitution, which states that the President “shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment”. That means in order to obtain one, you have to have broken the law or likely to be convicted of doing so.
I’m not the only one who noticed the glaring non sequitor.
You don’t need a pardon if you haven’t been convicted. pic.twitter.com/MWipShfLyr
— Krystle Schoonveld (@TarheelKrystle) August 24, 2017
Did you tell this to Pres Obama who pardoned people who committed crimes? Hypocrisy.
— ASov (@AndreaSovich) August 23, 2017
Seriously, you're a Senator? If he wasn't convicted of a crime, or likely to be convicted, he wouldn't need a pardon. #DrainTheSwamp
— Michael A. Michail (@RealMikeMichail) August 24, 2017
In The Washington Times, Philip Wegmann offers an alternative explanation for the Harris tweet.
...[M]aybe Harris is just a legal monster. Sure, she might not oppose all pardons but as the Golden State's top cop, she certainly didn't mind breaking protocol to bolster her office's conviction record. At least that seems to be the opinion of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.
Two years ago that court refused to uphold a murder conviction in a case that the attorney general's office won previously using false evidence. Judge Alex Kozinski warned Harris to give up on the conviction "obtained by lying prosecutors." And if she didn't, he promised that the court would begin to "name names" and the result would "not be pretty."
Gearing up for her run for the Senate, Harris relented. But that episode encapsulates perfectly why pardons and clemency are necessary. So long as there are ambitious prosecutors such as Harris, convictions will continue to be flawed and sentences needlessly harsh.
Wegmann notes that Harris may be sloppy and ambitious. However, since she berated Justice Neil Gorsuch because he rules based on law and not feelings, the recent tweet seems consisted with her approach to law: Heavy on emotion and light on logic and reason.
Someone should really stage a Twitter intervention for Harris soon.
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Comments
Valerie Plame Wilson’s crowdfunding idea is simply a scheme to separate progressives from their money. All of the crowdfunding platforms have upper limits on how much money you can raise… if she used all of them and maxed them all out she would still be nowhere near 10% of the money she’d need to buy a controlling stake in Twitter.
Please Sign White House Petition Requesting Pardon for Sheriff Joe Arpaio here:
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/pardon-former-maricopa-county-sheriff-joe-arpaio
Why don’t you wait and see how his appeal process goes? Are you afraid that even conservative judges might look askance at someone showing contempt for a judge?
Where was this outrage when Slick was pardoning Marc Rich and Obumbler was opening prison gates for convicted criminals who subsequently committed violent crimes upon their release?
(crickets)
That was way different, they were actual criminals.
The subject of this article is Harris’s own ignorance of the law and (possibly) prosecutorial misconduct. Are you afraid to discuss THAT subject?
What’s wrong with letting the administration know that there’s support for a pardon? Afraid a display of support will make a difference? If you don’t think a display of support can make a difference, why do you care?
What is the point of signing this petition? Trump already knows about the case, and will either pardon him or not. Do you really imagine he’ll be swayed, even a tiny bit, by signatures on a petition?
As far as I can tell the only function a petition serves is to bring an issue to the attention of busy officials who might otherwise not be aware of it. That’s clearly not the case here.
Arpaio is a bully and a sadist. Many of the people who were trapped in his web were awaiting trial and simply couldn’t make bail. They had been convicted of nothing. I repeat – they had been convicted of nothing. Yet he proudly claimed that he humiliated them with pink underwear and fed them slop.
Putting up a sign with ‘Vacancy’ on it was unprofessional, tacky, taunting.
One can debate whether convicts in prison should have gyms or college courses. But those in Arpaio’s jail were entitled to decent treatment. He made a big deal about how the guilty needed to be punished. He needs a taste of his own medicine.
I once watched a TV program he shot inside his outdoor jail. An inmate who was passing made a contemptuous remark. Arpaio stopped long enough to insure that the inmate was harshly punished . Anyone who thinks the smallest infraction or any disrespect deserves harsh punishment should accept the same. He had contempt for a judge. The judge’s authority was every bit as lawful as his. Accepting a pardon would be hypocritical, but completely in character for a bully.
I am surprised he and Trump like each other. One might think they would stampede each other trying to get to the camera.
“Arpaio is a bully and a sadist”
Ummmm the bully was the Obama Administration who wouldn’t cooperate,and uphold FEDERAL LAW.
And when he took matters into his own hands, he was BULLIED by Obama’s DOJ into submission and eventually into court, where he was “convicted” by a bully of a judge instead of a jury.
Do you work for CNN because your posts are nothing but #FakeNews?
Anyway you put it, Arpaio broke the law. Every criminal has an excuse or rationalization.
The fake news was put out as click bait by kids in Macedonia. It turns out that the scammers targeted both liberals and conservatives. But the liberals were too smart to bite. The conservatives ate it up. So the scammers gave up targeting liberals – there was no money in it.
Don’t believe me? Believe the kids https://www.wired.com/2017/02/veles-macedonia-fake-news/
That kind of explains the mentality of a Trump supporter. They will believe anything if it coincides with their preconceived belief. If it contradicts their fixed beliefs they label it #fakenews even though they are the consumers of fake news and a fake candidate.
“Mirror mirror on the wall… who has the greatest projection of all”
He severely “punished” a prisoner for being disrespectful. Hum… the rack? “Hot box”… Caning? Beatings? Jail is not a vacation spot and maybe .. just maybe.. for the first time they are having to tow the line with the requirements of society? Strict? Yes… Unpleasant? Maybe needed.
Isn’t it a goal of all this to convince a person not to be a criminal?
No, the only goal of detaining a person who has not been convicted of anything, and is therefore presumed by the law not to have done anything wrong, is to ensure he will show up for trial. Punitive measures for such detainees are completely illegitimate.
“That kind of explains the mentality of a Trump supporter. They will believe anything if it coincides with their preconceived belief. If it contradicts their fixed beliefs they label it #fakenews even though they are the consumers of fake news and a fake candidate.”
Tell me this doesn’t apply equally to both sides. Obviously, in the situation you mentioned, the click bait was more appealing to one side than the other. Just like Harris’ comments are more appealing to one side. She knows how it works, she’s just playing to her base. A base that’s just as willing to ingest what they want to hear.
He didn’t break any laws. A judge told him to stop enforcing the law and he chose the higher calling to do his job and enforce the law.
That is simply a lie.
The subject of the article is the ignorance of Kamala Harris. Joe Arpaio can neither help nor hurt her in that department.
“Yet he proudly claimed that he humiliated them with pink underwear and fed them slop.”
Well, no. He did not. “Slop” has a meaning, and a baloney sandwich is not “slop”.
Our troops in the field live in far worse conditions, and sometimes would PAY for a nice baloney sandwich out of their meager compensation.
I may be mistaken, but “pink underwear” is also false. IIRC it was pink outerwear.
Mox nicht.
I’m pretty sure Harris doesn’t know how a lot of things work.
Please Kamala – run for President in 2020!
Oh, dear me, NO! She could actually get elected.
That’s true.
But imagine how hard the DNC and the media will have to work to make Kamala look brilliant.
Just another affirmative action lawyer !
This is the big problem with diversity goals and affirmative action in law schools. Eventually these people become lawyers and are capable of doing real damage. Damage to the politic and damage to clients. Real people suffer in the real world because of some misguided notion that race is more important than ability.
Valerie Plame Wilson wants to crowdfund enough money to buy Twitter so she can close President Donald Trump’s account.
Blatant, naked censorship. Yes, consider her Progressive bona fides established.
Fortunately, a futile fantasy. In practice, I suspect Trump would buy Twitter himself first.
Come.. come… Harris is a rising star with great California credentials… why Willie Brown, the consummate politician, put his seal of approval in…excuse me.. on her in the years leading up to her be being elevated in Democrat politics.
The legal guild continues to fail us.
She’s gotta be dumber than a box of rocks. She was California’s attorney general before being elected senator.
Just says what you need to know about the California electorate (excusing, of course, those parts of California that are actually Red State California).
Red State California consists of “Jefferson” and the area around my condo. 😉 😀
What about the drug dealing scum that jug ears pardoned? For this moron to not see any issue with pardoning drug selling thugs but to go after a law officer who was using every means he could to control the illegal invasion has to be convicted and jailed? No wonder California is as screwed up as it is. She was their AG! I am still fuming over the way she treated Jeff Sessions in his confirmation hearing. She treated him like he was a street thug who was about to be convicted. This idiot has no class or common sense.
Yes! X Potus commuted 1715 sentences, 330 at the very last minute. More than the last 12 presidents combined.. Following Sen. Kamala Harris’s skewed logic, they should not have been commuted because they were in prison.
Of course MSM will raise holy hell about Sheriff Joe..
And let’s not forget the weasel’s most odious pardon: traitor Bradley Manning.
Harris is no blinding spark of intellectual light, but she’s not so dumb that she doesn’t know what a pardon is.
This is just another brick in the Democratic plan to associate Trump with foreigners, criminals, boogey-men and assorted ne’er-do-wells in the minds of the militantly unreflective. When one of the dimmer voters hears “Trump” they want him to think “The Russians!” or “The Nazis!” or, now, “Convicted criminals!”. Not a terribly clever trick, nor a new one—they put great faith in a similar bit of Pavlovian response before the election, hoping that voters would equate Trump with an imaginary “War on Women!”—but they’ll keep at it because it’s pretty much all they have.
Krazy Kamala: and this hysteric was attorney general of California. Imagine?
Re today’s “arguing with a troll” count – and remembering that when you argue with a fool, you then have two fools arguing – we have 9 fools today, including the troll.
A new name perhaps? Kamala Kazi!
I like Karamel Kolored Harris. This babe is half Indian (dot not feather) and part Jamaican. She was raised by a doctor and a professor. No real street black experience. At most she is about 1/4 black and none of that has anything to do with American blacks.
So why does everybody keep calling her black? Are we back to the one drop theory? How can any American black identify with her? She has no street creds.
Because she is more of a person of “color” than American Blacks who have more “white” blood in them than she.
The irony is that “people of color” coming to the USA have better success…. which if there was true racism couldn’t be.
That’s because the immigrants haven’t had the Democrats pounding it into their heads for decades that they are “victims”. Since no one has inculcated them with victim-hood they go ahead and succeed; they just don’t know any better!
Kamala Harris is a nearly direct result of affirmative action and Democrat kneepads. This is the future?!?
Future? Dude, we’re living this now!
Joe got his pardon.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/08/25/sheriff-joe-arpaio-wins-pardon-from-trump.html