None Dare Call It…

I’m just a plainspoken Colorado criminal defense lawyer, but the way I see it…

18 U.S. Code 2381 says anyone who owes allegiance to the United States, yet helps its enemies harm the nation, is guilty of treason. Russia hacked the U.S. election. Donald Trump helped, going so far as to beg them on international television to do it.

The question now: do we really have to kill him for it?

Treason is just one of the forty-plus federal laws that carry the death penalty. Arguably it’s not the only capital crime he’s committed. His immigration policy has certainly resulted in the deaths of aliens (8 U.S.C. 1324). He’s destroyed aircraft (18 U.S.C. 32-34). His plans to dismember health care may take the lives of thousands — maybe scores of thousands (18 U.S.C. 241, 242). He leaks classified information to spies while serving them cake (18 U.S.C. 794).

He’s a very bad boy.

If someone kills a journalist because the President of the United States has called the Fourth Estate the enemy of the people and repeatedly tweeted suggestions that news folk should be beaten senseless, he might be charged with 18 U.S.C. 1716. (Well, to be fair, that one could likely only be raised by a prosecutor with the stunningly flexible intelligence of, say, someone like Jay Sekulow.)

It seems increasingly likely that 18 U.S.C. 2332a may come into play if we get many more tweets about North Korea. And the President virtually promised during the campaign that he is more than willing to put himself at risk of 18 U.S.C. 2340A.

He’s a very, very bad boy.

But, let’s not kill him. Let’s not even lock him up. Let’s just send him back to The Apprentice, or the Miss Universe Pageant, or Access Hollywood, or anyplace the man feels comfortable in his creepy orange skin, among similarly low-minded rich white trash.