 According to a report by the Washington Post released yesterday, the Department of Justice is now officially investigating Donald Trump. Now, this investigation should have been opened months ago, but regardless, I'm still happy that it's happening, and I am cautiously optimistic about the outcome of this investigation because even if there is ample evidence to prove that Trump is culpable in a criminal conspiracy to overthrow the US government, I don't necessarily know that somebody with that much power is actually going to be brought to justice, but regardless, this is a step in the right direction. As Jake Johnson of Common Dreams explains, the US Department of Justice is directly investigating Donald Trump's actions as part of a criminal probe into the January 6th attack on the Capitol, news welcomed by lawmakers and washdogs who have accused the DOJ of dragging its feet despite having a strong case for prosecuting the former president. The Washington Post reported late Tuesday that prosecutors who are questioning witnesses before grand jury, including two top aides to Vice President Mike Pence, have asked in recent days about conversations with Trump, his lawyers, and others in his inner circle who sought to substitute Trump allies for certified electors from some states Joe Biden won. The prosecutors have asked hours of detailed questions about meetings Trump led in December 2020 and January of 2021, his pressure campaign on Pence to overturn the election and what instructions Trump gave his lawyers and advisors about fake electors and sending electors back to the states, the Post continued, citing unnamed people familiar with the matter. Some of the questions focused directly on the extent of Trump's involvement in the fake elector effort led by his outside lawyers, including John Eastman and Rudy Giuliani. The Post also reported that the Justice Department has seized the phone records of key officials and aides in the Trump administration, including his former chief of staff, Mark Meadows. Now to be abundantly clear here, this is positive news. This is good. I'm glad that it's happening. However, I am skeptical that this will still lead to Trump being prosecuted because of a memo that was recently released by MSNBC. So on May 25th, Attorney General Merrick Garland signed a statement where he claimed that the Justice Department must retain the bar rule and not prosecute anyone who's running for president so as to protect the perception of impartiality of the Justice Department. It's a bullshit rule. It's a made up rule. But yet this is what Merrick Garland signed. Now, in an interview with Lester Holt on MSNBC, Merrick Garland was asked about whether or not he would consider prosecuting Donald Trump in the event the evidence bared out that he was culpable. And Merrick Garland signaled positively so that he would affirmatively prosecute Trump if that's what the evidence led him to believe was necessary. Would a criminal referral from the committee carry a lot of weight? Would it be welcomed by the Department of Justice? So I think this is totally up to the committee. We will have the evidence that the committee is presented and whatever evidence it gives us. I don't think that the nature of how they style the manner in which information is provided is a particular significance from any legal point of view. That's not to downgrade it or disparage it. It's just that that's not the issue here. We have our own investigation pursuing through the principles of prosecution. You said in no uncertain terms the other day that no one is above the law. That said, the indictment of a former president of perhaps candidate for president would arguably tear the country apart. Is that your concern as you make your decision down the road here? Do you have to think about things like that? Look, we pursue justice without fear or favor. We intend to hold everyone, anyone who is criminally responsible for the then surrounding January 6th for any attempt to interfere with the lawful transfer of power from one administration to another accountable. That's what we do. We don't pay any attention to other issues with respect to that. So Donald Trump would become a candidate for president again. That would not change your schedule or how you move forward or don't move forward? Say again that we will hold accountable anyone who is criminally responsible for attempting to interfere with the transfer of legitimate lawful transfer of power from one administration to the next. Now keep in mind, this interview took place before we learned about the investigation by the DOJ of Donald Trump. However, this is a positive sign. The attorney general is saying that the president, former presidents, future presidents, they are not above the law. Am I still skeptical? Yes, because we rarely see public officials, elites be prosecuted for the same crimes that elites or that peasants rather are prosecuted for. So I'll be surprised if Trump actually is prosecuted and ends up in jail, but I'm not going to hold my breath here. But still, again, this is a positive sign. So I don't want to rain on anyone's parade, but I just would advise you to be cautiously optimistic here because Trump is an elite and we don't know what's going to happen. Yes, the evidence is very, very clear as the January 6th public hearings have demonstrated. But still, if Trump is an elite, I don't know what's going to happen. Now, I've got to point out that Lester Holtz's framing there was horrible, that prosecuting a former president or a future president would tear the country apart. That right there is propaganda framing that is destructive. Because do you want to know Lester what would destroy the country if Trump actually got a second term because he's already broadcasting what he would do to destroy the country, more specifically destroy democracy. Jonathan Swan of Axios detailed Trump's radical plans for his second term, which includes purging thousands of civil servants and replacing them with Trump loyalists, which is the hallmark of authoritarian regimes. Trump is broadcasting his intent to consolidate power in a very radical way. And that should horrify everyone. It would tear the country apart. Now on top of that, remember in 2020, how Trump responded to the Black Lives Matter protests by threatening to use the insurrection act to crush these protests violently using the military. Well, he's saying that if he were to be elected this time, he would definitely do that and override the will of governors. Take a look. The radical Democrat politicians at the state, local levels, refused to protect public safety and instead turns criminals loose to prey upon the innocent, then the federal government will have no choice but to step in, not wait for the governors anymore. I was mandated, wait for the governors, but sometimes I couldn't do that. I was watching too many things happen in Minnesota. Minneapolis, what happened if we didn't send in the National Guard, they wouldn't have a city left. But you have to wait for the governors in theory. We shouldn't be doing that anymore. If a governor wants to have vast numbers of people killed and riots and all of the problems that we have, we're not going to wait any longer. We're going to pass legislation where we can immediately go in and help those people that are under siege and they have governors that don't know what they're doing. Under these circumstances, the federal government has the right, really they have the right to do what they want to do, but we can't do that. We can't give that. It's a duty for us to use every tool, every authority and constitutional power at our disposal to defend the citizens of our country. If we have a weak, foolish and stupid governor that is allowing the kind of things that you saw to take place, we have to be able to go in and we have to be able to clean out the mess and it has to be cleaned out quickly, strongly, has to go very fast. So he's telling everyone, he will clean out protests forcibly. This is chilling. This should horrify anyone who cares even a little bit about the First Amendment, because imagine you attend an abortion rights rally and it gets a little bit too big, perhaps a little bit too rowdy. Trump can send in the military and violently break that up. And look, in theory, this could hurt Second Amendment protests as well, QAnon protests, but we all know that this isn't going to be applied neutrally. It's going to be used to crack down on political dissidents, people who are against Donald Trump. This is rank authoritarianism. But Lester Holt is concerned about him being prosecuted and whether or not that would tear apart the country. Perhaps he was playing devil's advocate. Either way, it's a stupid way to frame the question, because Trump getting a second term would unquestionably tear apart the country more so than his first term. Now, would Republicans be pissed? Of course they would. They would melt down. They would screech about it. I think that Republican officials would secretly be relieved if he were prosecuted and went to jail, so they wouldn't have to deal with him anymore, because they have to pretend as if they support Donald Trump. When in actuality, we know that they don't. But yes, Republicans and Republican propagandists would be pissed. For example, this is how Charlie Kirk thinks that Republican Attorney General should react in the event Trump is indicted. This is why Republicans are ill-equipped for this moment. Republican Attorney Generals and governors should come out and say, if you indict Donald Trump, we will indict Hunter Biden immediately, and we'll figure out the charges later. Right? Okay, good. I don't give a fuck about Hunter Biden. You can indict him. I don't care at all. In fact, he probably should be indicted. But what Charlie Kirk here is saying, it's ostensibly stupid because if you ask people, would that be a proper exchange? If you will, you know, if we trade Hunter Biden for Donald Trump, if we're bargaining that way, then sure, most people would be okay with that. But what he's saying is actually pretty savvy because if Attorney General signaled that they would retaliate, if Trump is indicted and they would indict Hunter Biden, well, that sends a message to Joe Biden. And he might exert pressure on Merrick Garland to back away if it's going to be turned against his son as well. Now, I'd argue that it's going to be turned against his son anyway when Republicans regain control. So this shouldn't have any bearing on whether or not Trump is indicted. But this is what presidents have done. Remember when Obama said that he wants to move forward and not prosecute George W. Bush's administration for war crimes? Well, why did he do that? Because he did war crimes himself. So if you prosecute one president, odds are they could prosecute you or future president can prosecute you. So presidents have been afraid to create the standard, create this precedent because they're cowards and they're worried about their own asses. So this is why I'm really skeptical about whether or not this is going to lead to Trump being indicted and prosecuted. I just don't know. There's just, there's so many things working in his favor that it leads me to believe that it would take a miracle for him to get indicted and land up and end up in jail. But we'll see. That doesn't mean that I'm, I'm not going to support this investigation because it absolutely should have happened months ago. And I hope that it leads to him in jail. But as I stated, I'm not going to hold my breath, but I'm crossing my fingers.