Trump ‘won’t shut up,’ and that could tank his case against James Comey
From former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James to U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff, President Donald Trump hasn't been shy about wanting to use the full force of the U.S. Justice Department to go after his perceived enemies.
But now that Comey is facing a federal indictment that he's guaranteed to fight in court, Trump's own tough talk could come back to haunt him, and might even tank his chances of settling those scores.
Comey could make a successful bid to show that Trump's case against him is a vindictive prosecution and get it thrown out on that basis, legal experts told CNN.
Such requests are often unsuccessful, the cable news outlet reported. Both Trump and Hunter Biden made failed bids themselves.
This time, however, thanks to Trump's volcanic rhetoric, the former FBI director might now have the facts on his side to make a winning argument, according to CNN.
"It's a better case for Comey, because the president won't shut up," retired federal Judge John Jones told the news outlet. "And that's admissible, so he's got a fighting chance, I think, on vindictive prosecution."
The Comey prosecution is "clearly vindictive. It's clearly his enemies list," former federal Judge Shira Scheindlin also told CNN.
Trump told reporters last week that he expects other political opponents to be prosecuted following Comey's indictment.
"It's not a list, but I think there will be others," he told CNN's Kevin Liptak as he left the White House. "I mean, they're corrupt. These were corrupt, radical left Democrats. … No, there will be others."
Criminal defendants looking to convince judges to drop their cases with an argument of unfair prosecution usually face an array of obstacles, legal experts told CNN.
But with Trump's loud arguments and clear signs that Trump is pushing to erode the traditional divide between the White House and the Justice Department, those same experts said judges could be more sympathetic to them.
"He's made it so obvious that he's targeting them, regardless of the evidence, that I do think a judge would be far more receptive to probably both concepts, selective prosecution and vindictive," Scheindlin, who was appointed to a federal court in New York by former President Bill Clinton, told CNN.
Jones offered a similar analysis.
"You see the animus," Jones, who was appointed to a federal court in Pennsylvania by former President George W. Bush, told CNN. "What else do you need? It's a great test case to kind of examine the contours of a true vindictive prosecution claim – you know, 'I got indicted because the president [of the] United States doesn't like me and wanted me to be indicted.'"
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