Someone said that he could still become president even if he went to prison. Is that true? I don’t understand how that would even work.
There’s some weird argument by his cult that it’s not in the constitution that a president can’t be in prison. It’s a lot of mental gymnastics, ignoring the fact that he traitorously stole classified nuclear documents from the US government, along with subverting democracy in the RICO case with the 18 co-conspirators.
You’re conflating two things here. There is absolutely nothing in the cotus that bars someone from becoming POTUS because they are in jail. Imo, there should not be, just like you should not lose your right to vote simply for being a felon.
However, there is something in the cotus that bard someone from being an officer of the state if they’ve been part of an insurrection. This, imo, should bar him, but I’m curious to see how the court cases play out.
Isn’t being a traitor to the US (RICO case + stolen documents + Jan 6th insurrection) against the constitution though?
This Chicago Tribune article goes into more detail.
Technically speaking, yes. Trump could be sent to prison tomorrow and still be elected President. There isn’t any “the President can’t be currently incarcerated” requirement. (Likely because the founding fathers thought it was self evident that a criminal shouldn’t be elected President.)
As for how it would work, nobody knows. It’s never happened. Would he get to go to the White House for 4 years and then have to return to prison to serve the rest of his sentence? (Assuming here that he couldn’t just pardon himself.) Would he need to conduct presidential business from the Square Cell instead of the Oval Office? Would a SCIF need to be set up in the prison so that Trump could review classified materials from his cell?
We would be in totally uncharted territory if this happened.
