The problem is that Bragg has long been searching for a crime in the criminal code to fulfill his pitch during his campaign that he was the man for voters who wanted to bag Trump.
The falsification of business records in reference to the
$130,000 payment to porn star Stormy Daniels might have been a possibility, but it lacked two things.
First, it expired as a chargeable misdemeanor after two years ā and that was roughly five years ago
Second, it was a mere misdemeanor that could be brushed off by Trump even if they succeeded.
Prosecutors then created a Rube Goldberg approach and suggested that the misdemeanor was committed to conceal a federal election law violation ā a crime that the Justice Department declined to charge.
That theory has been widely ridiculed, even by many on the left. The bootstrapping of a federal crime under this statute appears unprecedented and likely unsustainable.
The reason that the Justice Department likely declined the case was that it had previously tried to show that
hush money paid to bury an affair was a federal campaign expense.
It failed in the case of Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards.
There are a host of reasons why a married celebrity like Trump might pay hush money separate from a presidential run.
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