When 70-year-old President Donald Trump was sworn in Jan. 20, no one expected the press and liberal groups to stop going after the Washington outsider. Trump won a whopping 306 Electoral votes Nov. 8, becoming the 45th president, the largest Electoral College victory for a Republican since President Ronald Reagan. But since winning, the liberal press has been relentless invalidating his presidency, claiming Russian President Vladimr Putin got him elected. Now a group of liberal legal scholars claim that Trump’s multinational business interests violate the so-called Emolument Clause, prohibiting presidents from taking cash payments from foreign governments. Filing suit in federal court, a group of so-called liberal ethics experts want Trump to cease-and-desist in his overseas business dealings, including accepting cash from hotels and golf resorts.
Saying the lawsuit intended “to stop Trump from violating the Constitution by illegally receiving payments from foreign governments,” the lawsuit wants to stop Trump form renewing its lease with the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, currently a tenant at Trump Tower in Manhattan. “These violations of the foreign Emoluments Clause pose a grave threat to the United States and its citizens . . “ said the lawsuit, hoping to force Trump to divest his interests in foreign real estate. Voters knew before they voted about Trump’s global holdings, voting for him because he’s the best man for the job, not to punish him for his extensive foreign investments. “As the Framers were aware, private financial interests can subtly sway even the most virtuous leaders, and entanglements between American officials and foreign powers could pose a creeping, insidious threat to the Republic,” said the suit.
Taking market value cash payments at hotels, golf course or other resorts is not what the Framer’s meant when they inserted the Emolument Clause. When Congress passed the Logan Act in 1799, 33 years after the Revolutionary War, it was intended to prevent wealthy land barons or industrialists from selling out the country to Great Britain or other foreign governments. U.S. plantation owners continued to sell and take cash payments for tobacco and other crops from foreign governments following the 1776 Declarations of Independence and 1787 Constitution. Today’s lawsuit is designed to embarrass Trump and the GOP, more than any substance. When Trump announces his pick for the Supreme Court next week, most likely 49-year-old Associate Justice of the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals Neil Gorsuch, the lawsuit will be neutralized by adding a conservative jurist.
Taking money for rent at the Trump Towers doesn’t violate the Emolument Clause or the Logan Act. If Trump, on the other hand, granted special favors to China or any other foreign government in exchange for business interests with his enterprises, then a case could be made. Trump’s lawyers know he’s under the microscope with every liberal group trying to develop articles of impeachment. Several members of the Congressional Black Caucus, led by Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.) and Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) are busy working on articles of impeachment. What Democrats couldn’t do at the ballot box, they’re scheming to charge Trump with High Crimes and Misdemeanors. Calling royalties from Trump’s “Celebrity Apprentice” a violation of the Emolument Clause shows just how far liberal law groups are willing to contort the Constitution to prove their point.
Funded by liberal Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington [CREW], the lawsuit includes some of the most liberal legal scholars in the country, including Harvard’s Lawrence Tribe, UC-Irvine’s Erwin Chemerinisky and Supreme Court litigator Deepak Gupta, a specialist in consumer and workers’ rights. “When Trump the president sits down to negotiate trade deals with these countries, the American people will have no way to knowing whether he will also be thinking about the profile of Trump the businessman,” said CREW. Exposing their extreme prejudice against Trump, CREW wants to accomplish what Democratic voters couldn’t do on Nov. 8. CREW didn’t convince too many voters before Nov. 8 that Trump was unsuitable for president because of his business entanglements. Now that the election’s over, CREW wants to re-litigate Hillary’s campaign.
Exposing CREW’s political agenda doesn’t take rocket science. “We need travel now further than a few blocks from the White House, the Trump Hotel. There’s been controversy now about whether or not they’re pressuring governments to leave other hotels in Washington and come to heir hotel,” said CREW, stretching the Emolument Clause to the breaking point. “No one would have thought when the Constitution was written that paying your hotel bill was an emolument,” said Trump lawyer Sherri Dillon. Former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton had plenty of time to argue that Trump disqualified himself from president for all kinds of reasons, including his foreign business interests. After hearing all the arguments, Voters spoke Nov. 8. Filing its lawsuit over a bogus Constitutional argument, CREW exposes itself as another sour grapes liberal group out to get Trump.
A
