Americans have a strange view of presidential accountability
On August 8th, after a dozen FBI agents showed up unannounced at Mar-a-Lago, the Florida residence of ex-president Donald Trump, MAGAworld began calling for civil war. “Tomorrow is war,” tweeted Steven Crowder, a Trump supporter with 5 million YouTube and 2 million Twitter followers. Another MAGA Tweet invoked civil war directly: “The Feds are currently RAIDING Mar-A-Lago. This could very well be the equivalent of the FIRST SHOT fired upon Fort Sumter. I believe they want a civil war. What other outcome can this bullsh!t lead to?”
For many Americans — including a lot of Democrats — it is unimaginable that even a corrupt, criminal American president like Trump could ever serve a day in jail. For starters, it has never happened. But there is also the matter of presidential pardons which seem to have kept Richard Nixon out of jail. Or maybe we simply regard presidents as untouchable monarchs. While Trump was campaigning in Iowa in 2016 he joked, “I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose voters.” He wasn’t wrong.
In general White America views the punishment of criminal presidents and prime ministers as something that only happens in unstable, undemocratic — meaning non-European — parts of the world. After the FBI’s raid on his father’s compound, Donald Trump Jr. tweeted: “This is what you see happen in 3rd World Banana Republics” — a view shared by Ron DeSantis. Even former Democratic presidential hopeful Andrew Yang went out of his way to attack the investigation of the corrupt ex-president.
But America has never had any qualms about holding former leaders of other nations to account. When deposed Lybian president Muammar Qaddafi was captured, mutilated, and murdered, then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton joked, “We came, we saw, he died.” When Iraq’s Saddam Hussein was tried by a US-approved regime and executed, President Bush wrote, “Saddam Hussein received a fair trial. This would not have been possible without the Iraqi people’s determination to create a society governed by the rule of law.” But when it comes to corrupt American presidents, no such rules of law ever seem to apply.
In fact, the rules by which one foreign despot is a friend and another an enemy seem to boil down to anti-communism and global alliances — and not the rule of law. Joe Biden’s fist bump with Saudi murderer/dictator Muhammad bin Salman while doubling down on sanctions on Cuba’s rulers are a good contrast. America continues to praise Brazilian and Indian democracies as the “largest democracies in the world” (other than our own) — despite their authoritarian character and because of their overt anti-communism.
Indira Gandhi was a corrupt prime minister whose family was Indian royalty and was spared any jail time. The “scourge of communists” and Naxalites, Gandhi issued a series of dictatorial decrees, imposed censorship, suspension of civil liberties, and arrested political opponents (including current PM Modi), which eventually led to her assassination by her own security detail. In fact, long before Modi, Indira Gandhi’s rule marked the beginning of the end of Indian democracy — precisely because she was never held to account.
Upon coming to power, Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro, a Republican darling, vowed to purge Brazil of political opponents. “These red outlaws will be banished from our homeland. It will be a cleanup the likes of which has never been seen in Brazilian history.” Bolsonaro, of course, is the product of the U.S. looking the other way at Brazil’s far right (and anti-communist) military, which never really went away.
Hungary’s Viktor Orban, the GOP’s new idol and another virulent anti-communist, grabbed power this year by declaring a state of emergency and now rules by decree. Judging by his prominence at two recent CPAC conferences, Orban’s Fidesz party is the new model for American democracy.
So while we love anti-communist despots and refuse to prosecute our own criminal leaders, other western-oriented nations have somehow managed to hold their leaders to account.
Norway actually executed its Nazi collaborationist Prime Minister Vidkun Quisling for high treason. French Prime Minister Francois Fillon was convicted of fraud and misuse of funds. The French President Fillon served under, Nicolas Sarkozy, was likewise jailed for corruption, influence peddling, and bribery of a federal magistrate. Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert went to jail on corruption charges. Former Israeli President Moshe Katsav served time in prison on rape charges. And Israel’s best-known PM Benjamin Netanyahu is now facing prison on multiple charges of corruption and bribery.
Canada’s Lieutenant Governor of Quebec, Lise Thibault, served time in prison for misuse of public funds. The Premier of Western Australia Ray O’Connor was sent to prison on charges of fraud. Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond was arrested on sexual harassment charges. Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates was sent to prison for corruption, tax evasion, and money laundering. Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borissov was recently arrested on multiple corruption charges. British Virgin Islands PM Alturo Fahie was arrested on drug smuggling charges. South Korean Finance Minister Choi Kyoung-hwan served time in prison for an influence-peddling scheme that also took down the South Korean president Park Geun-hye. Puerto Rican Governor Wanda Vazquez was charged with conspiracy, federal programs bribery and wire fraud by the DOJ.
Given the hesitancy to prosecute a popular leader with a large following, Americans may end up following Italy’s lead. Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was convicted of tax fraud and corruption charges and sentenced to four years in prison, which due to his age he never actually served. Berlusconi was also barred from public office, a ban which only applied to Italy and did not affect his ability to serve as a member of European Parliament. It was a resolution that probably made no one happy.
But if Democrats really want to preserve democracy, Trump must be prosecuted. What the nature of that punishment consists of can vary, but if we simply close the books on Trump’s multiple crimes, then we should also empty the jails and prisons because then the rule of law will have absolutely no meaning.
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