Donald Trump \u201cwas president for four years, and he didn\u2019t go after his political opponents. You know who did go after her political opponents? Kamala Harris, who has tried to arrest everything from pro-life activists to her political opponents \u2026 and used the Department of Justice as a weapon against people.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2014 GOP vice-presidential candidate JD Vance, during an interview with Martha Raddatz on ABC\u2019s \u201cThis Week,\u201d Oct. 13<\/p>\n
At almost the same moment Vance made this comment, in response to a question about whether Trump in a second term would \u201cgo after his political opponent,\u201d Trump, Vance\u2019s running mate, was on Fox News, speaking to host Maria Bartiromo about his concerns about the election.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think the bigger problem is the enemy from within,\u201d Trump said. \u201cWe have some very bad people. We have some sick people, radical left lunatics. And I think they\u2019re the \u2014 and it should be easily handled by, if necessary, by National Guard, or if really necessary, by the military, because they can\u2019t let that happen.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s a familiar pattern of a Trump surrogate playing down Trump\u2019s words and actions \u2014 and then Trump almost immediately blasting past the talking point. In this instance, he suggested he would use the military, not just the Justice Department, to go after political opponents.<\/p>\n
For context, Raddatz noted that Vance had said the second-most-important person in a second Trump administration would be the attorney general. She asked why he said that. He replied, \u201cYou need people to believe that if the attorney general prosecutes somebody, it\u2019s motivated by justice and law, and not by politics.\u201d She cut in: \u201cWould Donald Trump go after his political opponents?\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s when Vance asserted Trump didn\u2019t go after his political opponents when he was president \u2014 unlike Harris. Harris, of course, is vice president, without direct authority over prosecutors, so we\u2019ll assume he was using her as a proxy for President Joe Biden.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe didn\u2019t say people are going to go to jail because they disagree with me,\u201d Vance claimed. \u201cThat is, in fact, been the administration and the policy of Kamala Harris.\u201d<\/p>\n
We pressed the Vance staff for specific examples to make his case. We mostly received misleading statements, which we will examine below. As best we can tell, Vance appears to be absolving Trump because he was not successful at winning prosecutions of his foes.<\/p>\n
Extensive news reporting and government probes have documented how Trump repeatedly sought to influence or direct the course of Justice Department investigations, sometimes successfully. Specifically regarding political opponents, the website Just Security compiled a handy list of times when Trump sought to prosecute his perceived enemies. There are other examples listed in a recent New York Times report, which was titled \u201cAs president, Trump demanded investigations of foes. He often got them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s a quick list of what Trump did:<\/p>\n
Sought investigation of Hillary Clinton. The report by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III documented that Trump in 2017 pressed then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions to \u201cun-recuse\u201d himself from overseeing the election campaign investigation so he could order an investigation of Clinton.<\/span> By any reasonable measure, this list shows that Trump did \u201cgo after\u201d his political opponents \u2014 but he was notably unsuccessful in winning any prosecutions. His political opponents often had to hire lawyers, sit for interviews and cough up documents. But to Trump\u2019s frustration, no crimes were uncovered that warranted prosecution. Durham did manage to obtain one relatively minor guilty plea but failed twice when he went to trial \u2014 and none of the people charged by Durham were significant enough to be considered Trump\u2019s political opponents.<\/p>\n Trump has been indicted twice by federal prosecutors \u2014 for his alleged role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol and for allegedly mishandling classified documents. (The documents case was dismissed on procedural grounds, a decision under appeal.) But there is zero evidence \u2014 certainly no tweets or public comments \u2014 that either Biden or Harris requested that Attorney General Merrick Garland investigate Trump\u2019s action in either matter.<\/p>\n Regarding the Jan. 6 case, The Washington Post reported last year that the Justice Department took a methodical, bottoms-up approach that initially focused on the rioters and resisted a direct investigation of Trump. \u201cThe Justice Department\u2019s painstaking approach to investigating Trump can be traced to Garland\u2019s desire to turn the page from missteps, bruising attacks and allegations of partisanship in the department\u2019s recent investigations of both Russia\u2019s interference in the 2016 presidential election and Hillary Clinton\u2019s use of a private email server,\u201d the Post report said, adding that some Justice Department lawyers \u201chave complained that the attorney general\u2019s determination to steer clear of any claims of political motive has chilled efforts to investigate the former president.\u201d<\/p>\n The New York Times in 2022 reported that Biden privately also expressed frustration. \u201cAs recently as late last year, Mr. Biden confided to his inner circle that he believed former President Donald J. Trump was a threat to democracy and should be prosecuted, according to two people familiar with his comments,\u201d the Times reported. \u201cAnd while the president has never communicated his frustrations directly to Mr. Garland, he has said privately that he wanted Mr. Garland to act less like a ponderous judge and more like a prosecutor who is willing to take decisive action over the events of Jan. 6.\u201d<\/p>\n When Trump announced he was running for president, Garland appointed a special counsel to take charge of the investigations of the former president so political appointees would not have a role. The two indictments were brought by the special counsel, Jack Smith. Garland also appointed a special counsel to investigate Biden, after it was discovered he had retained classified documents. No charges were brought. Garland also appointed a special counsel to investigate Biden\u2019s son Hunter on gun and tax charges. That prosecutor filed two cases that resulted in a guilty verdict and guilty plea.<\/p>\n As for Vance\u2019s reference to Harris going after \u201cpro-life activists,\u201d the campaign pointed to the indictment of antiabortion activist Mark Houck, who was found not guilty in 2023 on federal assault charges concerning a shoving incident with an abortion clinic escort in Philadelphia. Local prosecutors had declined to prosecute Houck, and a private lawsuit by the clinic escort, Bruce Love, was dismissed, but then the Justice Department brought charges anyway, using the 1994 Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act. During the trial, U.S. District Judge Gerald Pappert, an Obama appointee, referred to the FACE Act and asked prosecutors, \u201cDoesn\u2019t that statute seem to be stretched a little thin here?\u201d The jury issued a quick acquittal.<\/p>\n In November, Houck and his wife sued the Justice Department and FBI for malicious prosecution. The campaign also pointed to the case of another activist, Paul Vaughn, who was convicted of violating the FACE Act but given no jail time. We could find no link between Harris and the decisions to prosecute these men.<\/p>\n Taylor Van Kirk, a spokeswoman for Vance, first sent us this statement: \u201cThe double standard of the liberal media is laughable at this point. It is indisputable that under Kamala Harris and Joe Biden\u2019s DOJ, the Republican nominee for President was targeted and indicted, while under President Trump, nothing like that ever transpired against either of the Democrats he faced off with in 2016 or 2020. Actions matter and Senator Vance was 100 percent correct that despite pressure from many Republicans to indict Hillary Clinton for her mishandling of classified information, President Trump never crossed that rubicon the way Kamala and Joe did.\u201d<\/p>\n There are several factual problems with this statement. As we noted, a special counsel brought the charges against Trump. Under Vance\u2019s peculiar logic, Biden also directed the indictment and prosecution of his own son. Moreover, Vance, his spokeswoman\u2019s response suggests, seems to regard an inability to win a prosecution as evidence that Trump \u201cdidn\u2019t go after\u201d his opponents. The Trump campaign often portrays Biden as an incompetent old fool, yet in this instance the campaign suggests he\u2019s a cannier political operative than Trump, able to demand a prosecution with the snap of his fingers.<\/p>\n We made these points to Van Kirk, who then sent this statement: \u201cThe Washington Post is purposefully gaslighting the Trump-Vance campaign because this insufferable newspaper fails to clarify that Senator Vance was talking about political opponents under Trump\u2019s Administration never being indicted.\u201d<\/p>\n As additional evidence, the campaign supplied links to a CNN report that in November 2016, two weeks after the election, Trump backed away from a pledge to appoint a special counsel to investigate Clinton. As noted above, he changed his mind yet again, and Clinton was subjected to several criminal investigations. Not enough evidence was found to bring an indictment.<\/p>\n The campaign also supplied a link to an opinion article, co-written by former George W. Bush Justice Department official John Yoo, that was titled \u201cBiden DOJ crossed political Rubicon with Trump indictment.\u201d The article concerned the classified-documents case, noting that even if Trump\u2019s actions were criminal, his status as a former president should have been a consideration. \u201cThere are good reasons for prosecuting someone who has taken classified information, such as ending the risk of disclosure or deterring future lawbreakers,\u201d the article said. \u201cBut history has recognized weightier reasons for leaving former presidents alone.\u201d<\/p>\n Yoo did not respond to a request for comment. However, he and his co-author have also written critically on the Jan. 6 case and applauded the Supreme Court\u2019s ruling on presidential immunity as ending the \u201cpartisan, misguided efforts to use the criminal-justice system to eliminate viable presidential candidates.\u201d<\/p>\n The Vance campaign now says that when the candidate refers to going after political opponents he\u2019s referring to indictments. That wasn\u2019t the question he was asked.<\/p>\n The record clearly shows that while no indictment was brought against Trump\u2019s political opponents during his presidency, it wasn\u2019t for lack of trying. Trump demanded investigations of numerous people. The Justice Department dutifully conducted the probes. But not enough evidence was found to bring an indictment. In one case, the evidence was so lacking that the grand jury reportedly refused to indict \u2014 a rare occurrence.<\/p>\n In the case of Trump\u2019s indictments, a special prosecutor found enough evidence to convince two grand juries to issue indictments \u2014 with no discernible role by the president or vice president in either the launching of the probe or the issuing of the indictment. That\u2019s a world of difference, even though Vance tries to spin it as deliberate.<\/p>\n Vance earns Four Pinocchios.<\/p>\n (About our rating scale)<\/p>\n Send us facts to check by filling out this form<\/p>\n Sign up for The Fact Checker weekly newsletter<\/p>\n The Fact Checker is a verified signatory to the International Fact-Checking Network code of principles<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Donald Trump \u201cwas president for four years, and he didn\u2019t go after his political opponents. You know who did go after her political opponents? Kamala Harris, who has tried to arrest everything from pro-life activists to her political opponents \u2026 and used the Department of Justice as a weapon against people.\u201d \u2014 GOP vice-presidential candidate […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":11170,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11169","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11169","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11169"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11169\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11170"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nScolded Justice Department for failing to investigate Clinton. In both a radio interview and on Twitter in 2017, Trump urged an investigation. \u201cPeople are angry,\u201d he tweeted. \u201cAt some point the Justice Department, and the FBI, must do what is right and proper. The American public deserves it!\u201d<\/span>
\nCalled for investigations of Clinton and the debunked Uranium One conspiracy theory. A U.S. attorney was tapped to start the probe in late 2017, but it ended in 2020 with no action.<\/span>
\nDemanded an investigation of the Clinton Foundation. Little Rock prosecutors in 2018 issued a grand-jury subpoena for foundation records. The case was closed without charges just days before Trump left office.<\/span>
\nTrumpeted the firing and then near-prosecution of former FBI deputy director Andrew McCabe. \u201cAndrew McCabe FIRED, a great day for the hard-working men and women of the FBI \u2014 A great day for Democracy,\u201d Trump tweeted after McCabe was fired 26 hours before he was due to retire, depriving him of his pension. (He won it back after a lawsuit.) A criminal probe was launched into whether McCabe lied to FBI agents. No charges were brought, and there is evidence a grand jury declined to issue an indictment.<\/span>
\nDemanded an investigation of former president Barack Obama over debunked \u201cSpygate\u201d claims. \u201cI hereby demand, and will do so officially tomorrow, that the Department of Justice look into whether or not the FBI\/DOJ infiltrated or surveilled the Trump Campaign for Political Purposes \u2014 and if any such demands or requests were made by people within the Obama Administration!\u201d Trump wrote on Twitter in 2018. Various probes found no evidence.<\/span>
\nTold the White House counsel in 2018 that he wanted to order the Justice Department to investigate Clinton and former FBI director James B. Comey. The counsel refused, saying Trump had no authority to do so. The Justice Department under Trump conducted two investigations of Comey related to leaking, but no charges were brought.<\/span>
\nSought Internal Revenue Service investigations of Comey and McCabe. John F. Kelly, Trump\u2019s second White House chief of staff, told the New York Times that Trump repeatedly sought IRS probes of the two former FBI officials. Both men were selected for a rare and highly intrusive audit by the tax agency, at a time the agency was headed by a Trump appointee, but the agency insisted they were randomly selected.<\/span>
\nAttacked former secretary of state John F. Kerry on Twitter in 2018 for having contacts with Iranian diplomats, suggesting he had violated the Logan Act, which prohibits negotiations with a foreign government by unauthorized citizens. Almost immediately, the Justice Department ordered prosecutors in Manhattan to investigate Kerry. Geoffrey Berman, the U.S. attorney in Manhattan at the time, wrote in a memoir that a year later, when Trump again tweeted that Kerry had broken a law, the Justice Department followed up to find out why certain investigative steps had not been taken. When Berman\u2019s office decided there was no case, the Kerry probe was assigned to another U.S. attorney \u2014 who came to the same conclusion.<\/span>
\nIn 2018 on Twitter, demanded that the attorney general investigate a long list of subjects (such as the Clinton Foundation) and several people, including Clinton, Comey and McCabe. After the release of Mueller\u2019s report in 2019, then-Attorney General William P. Barr appointed U.S. Attorney John Durham to investigate the origins of the FBI probe into Trump\u2019s alleged Russia connections. The probe eventually included examination of Clinton and her inner circle, and how law enforcement agencies handled allegations of corruption at the Clinton Foundation. The Durham probe was a bust, with every case going to trial ending in acquittal.<\/span>
\nPressed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to open an investigation of Biden, who was planning to run for president. A rough transcript of a July 2019 phone call showed that Trump made eight distinct requests for assistance in a Biden investigation. By early September, Zelensky was so desperate for the aid that Trump had frozen to be released, he agreed to an interview with CNN in which he would announce a probe of Biden. But he canceled the interview after a whistleblower report on the Trump call became public \u2014 which led to Trump\u2019s first impeachment.<\/span>
\nThreatened to prosecute Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger if he refused to help Trump \u201cfind\u201d the necessary votes to overturn his loss of the state to Biden. \u201cIt is more illegal for you than it is for them because you know what they did and you\u2019re not reporting it,\u201d Trump told Raffensperger in a 2021 phone call. \u201cThat\u2019s a criminal, that\u2019s a criminal offense. And you can\u2019t let that happen.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nWhat Biden or Harris did<\/h3>\n
Vance\u2019s response<\/h3>\n
The Pinocchio Test<\/h3>\n
Four Pinocchios<\/h3>\n