President Donald Trump is getting flack for his corrupt attempt to get the Department of Justice to award him $230 million in taxpayer dollars because he’s angry about his various investigations and criminal indictments.
Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland called Trump’s request a “classic impeachable offense” during an interview with Crooked Media Wednesday. Raskin said he’s launching an investigation into the corrupt and illegal payout and demanding every correspondence between the White House and the DOJ.
In a letter sent to Trump Thursday, Raskin and fellow Democratic Rep. Robert Garcia of California said that it’s “blatantly illegal and unconstitutional” for Trump to receive any payment from the federal government aside from his $400,000 salary.
“The Founders feared presidents like you might one day be tempted to use their powers to steal U.S. taxpayer funds. That’s why they enshrined a very simple rule into the Constitution, which is called the Domestic Emoluments Clause,” the letter said.
Indeed, that clause of the Constitution explicitly says, “The President shall, at stated Times, receive for his Services, a Compensation, which shall neither be encreased nor diminished during the Period for which he shall have been elected, and he shall not receive within that Period any other Emolument from the United States, or any of them.”
Raskin and Garcia slammed Trump’s attempted theft of taxpayer dollars, “especially at a time when most Americans are struggling to pay rent, put food on the table, and afford health care.”
They called the move “an outrageous and shocking attempt to shake down the American people.”
“If either of your claims had any merit, you could have taken them to court by now and litigated them publicly. You did not do that. Instead, you waited until you became President and installed your handpicked loyalists at DOJ, knowing that you could instruct them to co-sign your demand notes in secret behind closed doors, and then you could present the notes to the U.S. Treasury for cold hard cash courtesy of the American taxpayer,” Raskin and Garcia wrote in the letter.
“That isn’t justice, it is theft.”
As the minority, Democrats do not have subpoena power. But if they win back control of the House in 2026, they would once again hold that power. It’s something Trump fears so much that he’s forcing GOP-controlled states to gerrymander their maps mid-cycle to rig the midterms to favor Republicans.
But polling shows that Trump is so unpopular that his party’s corrupt gerrymandering schemes might not be enough. And if Democrats win the House next November, Raskin will use his subpoena power in this case.
“We want the entire paper trail,” Raskin told the New Republic. “We’re looking for any correspondence, memoranda, or records of conversations between the White House and the Department of Justice. If we had subpoena power, we would be going after that.”
Even Republicans know that Trump’s payment scheme looks bad.
Those who typically stand behind Trump have not been able to defend this, claiming that they’re not aware of all of the details and can’t comment.
Related | Wait, Trump is demanding how much from the government?
After trying to avoid criticizing Trump on Wednesday, House Speaker Mike Johnson was pressed on whether he’s okay with Trump taking $230 million in taxpayer funds.
“I’m not trying to dodge a question. I haven’t had time to get the details. It’s still on my things-to-do list,” he replied pathetically.
Given that Johnson isn’t negotiating with Democrats on government funding and is keeping the chamber in recess to avoid swearing in Democrat Adelita Grijalva, you’d think that he would have ample time to “get the details” on the payout scheme.
Even if he didn’t, what information does he need? You either think it’s okay for Trump to pocket hundreds of millions of taxpayers dollars or you don’t.
So which is it, Mike?
