U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero wasted no time and pulled no punches in shooting down President Trump’s latest request for a stay on the Southern District of New York’s prosecutor’s office subpoena for his tax returns and financial records.
A federal judge DENIES Trump's motion to stay his ruling allowing Manhattan DA Vance to subpoena his financial records, including his tax returns.
Judge Marrero's also concerned about "further delay on the grand jury’s" probe.
Background, @CourthouseNews https://t.co/pkMdUNO9HY pic.twitter.com/ViE3blzk6f
— Adam Klasfeld (@KlasfeldReports) August 21, 2020
In his opinion, Marrero wrote that Trump’s arguments regarding the reasons the stay should be granted were inadequate and risked undermining the legal system when a president is investigated for a crime. Executive power does exist in some instances, but Marrero said that Trump is trying to abuse it.
According to Courthouse News:
‘Describing the White House’s expansive view of executive power as dangerous to democracy, a federal judge on Thursday rejected President Donald Trump’s second attempt to scuttle the probe of his finances in New York.
‘“As this court suggested in its earlier ruling in this litigation, that notion, applied as so robustly proclaimed by the president’s advocates, is as unprecedented and far-reaching as it is perilous to the rule of law and other bedrock constitutional principles on which this country was founded and by which it continues to be governed,” U.S. District Judge Victor Marrero wrote.’
BREAKING: A federal judge just denied President’s Donald Trump’s bid to temporarily block a ruling allowing a subpoena for his tax returns and other financial records.
— PoliticsVideoChannel (@politvidchannel) August 21, 2020
Marrero also ruled against Trump on Thursday on a separate appeal in the same case, a case on which the Supreme Court already ruled that a president can be prosecuted for criminal activity. Marrero has had to shoot down several arguments against providing the financial documents, including some of the more ridiculous and alarming ones.
‘Trump’s attorney William Consovoy told the Second Circuit that local authorities would be temporarily powerless to probe the president even if he shot somebody on the middle of Fifth Avenue.
‘“Short of that time lapse, they argued, ‘nothing could be done’ by the authorities to prosecute the crime,” Marrero noted, quoting the oral arguments from last October.’
BREAKING: A federal judge cleared the way for a New York prosecutor to get President Trump’s tax returns, rejecting an attempt by his lawyers to block a subpoena. https://t.co/Ox5gJaINPd
— The Associated Press (@AP) August 20, 2020
The judge said that Trump’s tactics amount to nothing more than attempts to delay the inevitable. Whether or not he chooses to accept it, he will be held accountable for the many lies he’s told the American people and will have to answer for the charges against him.
‘In the president’s flurry of appeals, lawsuits and challenges, Judge Marrero saw a pattern of delay tactics aimed at crippling the Manhattan district attorney’s investigation.
‘“That strategy potentially would enable the clock to run on applicable statutes of limitations, risk the loss of witnesses and evidence and thus possibly foreclose law enforcement concerning any crimes under grand jury investigation,” Marrero wrote today.’
Here's the Judge Marrero's decision throwing out Trump's challenge to Cy Vance's subpoena of his tax returns.
This is very bad news for Trump. https://t.co/tyJlRKg20X
— Mark Joseph Stern (@mjs_DC) August 20, 2020
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