felony
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Source: Fulton County Jail / Fulton County Sheriff’s Office
Recently, the campaign for President Joe Biden released an ad highlighting the fact that his presumed opponent in the 2024 presidential race, Donald Trump, is a felon now that his hush money trial resulted in him being convicted of a whopping 34 felonies.
Meanwhile, the New York Times is getting dragged up and down the internet for making the somewhat common media mistake of using equivocating language in a headline for something the publication could have just stated straight out.
“Biden Campaign Ad Paints Trump as a Felon,” the NYT’s headline read.
The issue with the chosen headline was obvious—Donald Trump is a felon. If Trump is such a yuge felon that if he had 33 felonies expunged from his record, he would still be a felon. The pro-Biden ad couldn’t “paint” Trump as a felon any more than it could paint Trump as a man whose skin looks like it faded after it was painted bright orange.
To be fair, the media is often accused of trying to “paint” Trump as a racist despite the fact that Trump does the best job of that simply by providing the media with the words that come out of his own mouth. Still, when it comes to the Times‘ misguided headline, which, frankly, should have been caught by an experienced editor and revamped before it was published, there’s a clear degree of rich, white privilege at play here. A regular-degular felon convicted of a blue-collar crime wouldn’t be afforded the luxury of headlines that would go out of their way to “paint” them as anything less than the felon they are. It wouldn’t even be a thought to call them anything else. It should be the same for Trump or any other member of the most privileged class in America who also happens to be a convicted felon.
Anyway, the Times eventually caught on to the backlash and changed the headline to something more appropriate: “Biden Campaign Ad Calls Attention to Trump’s Felon Status.” But by the time the change was made, it was too late. The internet had already gotten ahold of the original article title, and the dragging had already commenced.
It’s OK to call Trump what he is. A bigot. A compulsive liar. A would-be election thief…
A felon. We can definitely call him a felon. We can call him that 34 times, in fact.
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Source: The Washington Post / Getty
Things are not looking too good for the President of the United State’s oldest living son.
On Thursday (Dec. 7), Hunter Biden was indicted on nine tax charges in California after a special counsel investigation into the business dealings, according to the Associated Press. In all, Biden—who was already facing federal firearms charges in Delaware alleging that he broke laws against drug users having guns in 2018—is looking at three felonies and six misdemeanors under the new filing.
Special Council David Wiess said in a statement that Biden “spent millions of dollars on an extravagant lifestyle rather than paying his tax bills.”
From AP:
The charges are centered on at least $1.4 million in taxes Hunter Biden owed during between 2016 and 2019, a period where he has acknowledged struggling with addiction. The back taxes have since been paid.
If convicted, Hunter Biden, 53, could receive a maximum of 17 years in prison. The special counsel probe remains open, Weiss said.
In response to the indictment, Biden’s attorney, Abbe Lowell, accused Weiss of “bowing to Republican pressure” by prosecuting President Joe Biden’s son for alleged infractions he wouldn’t have prosecuted otherwise. “Based on the facts and the law, if Hunter’s last name was anything other than Biden, the charges in Delaware, and now California, would not have been brought,” Lowell said in a statement.
Lowell might be on to something, especially regarding the Delaware charges. Republicans are so anti-gun regulation that they fall all over themselves to defend guns after mass shootings, and under Donald Trump, an Obama-era regulation that would have made it harder for people with mental illness to buy guns was rolled back. Certainly, right-wing Second Amendment advocates would stand against a person being prosecuted for owning guns just because he has a history of drug use—unless we’re talking about the son of a Democratic commander-in-chief, of course.
As for the charges in California, where Hunter lives, Thursday’s filing details how the accused allegedly spent money on drugs, strippers, luxury hotels, exotic cars and, “in short, everything but his taxes.”
As AP noted, the “indictment comes as congressional Republicans pursue an impeachment inquiry into President Biden, claiming he was engaged in an influence-peddling scheme with his son.” Of course, there has been zero evidence presented that indicates the president had anything to do with his son’s alleged activities, or that Joe Biden accepted any bribes or abused his role in office in any way, as his opponents have claimed. But Republicans aren’t likely to let facts get in the way of a good political prosecution, which is what they claim all the indictments of Trump are.
Anyway, Lowell indicated that he plans to fight the new charges against his client and that he will motion for dismissal of the Delaware charges next week, calling them “unprecedented and unconstitutional.”
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