Is the USA a Banana Republic?

Some people use the term “Banana Republic” to describe the United States. According to Meriam-Webster.com, a banana republic is “a small dependent country usually of the tropics, especially one run despotically.” 

A despotic government is one that exerts “oppressive absolute power and authority … excess of law … a system of government in which the ruler has unlimited power.” 

Hans von Spakovsky at The Heritage Foundation used different words to describe what happened in Manhattan, New York, District Court. He called the court case and conviction of Donald Trump “Venezuela-on-the-Hudson” and gave the following explanation.

It’s hard to adequately describe what happened to Donald Trump in Venezuela-on-the-Hudson. Outrageous? A travesty of justice? A devasting blow to the sanctity of our justice system and its reputation for fairness and nonpartisanship? An American repetition of the Soviet show trials of the 1930s?

It’s all of those things. And you don’t have to be a Trump supporter to understand that.

A former president was convicted of 34 misdemeanors for paperwork errors (whose statute of limitations had run out) that were changed to felonies because he had supposedly violated another state law – nowhere mentioned in the indictment – that makes it a crime to use “unlawful” means to promote or oppose the election of a candidate.

And what was that “unlawful” means? Well, the defendant didn’t know because those other “unlawful” means (i.e., other crimes) weren’t mentioned in the indictment, either. The judge told the jurors that they didn’t need to even agree on what other crimes the defendant had committed, seemingly in conflict with hundreds of years of English and American jurisprudence, including the Constitution’s guarantee of due process of law.

No, said the judge, the jury could consider violations of tax law or a violation of federal campaign finance law or of some other unnamed law for listing as a legal expense – instead of as a campaign expense – a settlement payment made to an individual who represented by counsel in a perfectly legitimate, and perfectly legal, transaction. But no need for a unanimous decision on that issue.

A violation of federal campaign finance law? What were a local prosecutor and a state court judge doing bringing up a violation of federal law over which they have no jurisdiction whatsoever?

And if that was something the members of the jury – who know nothing about federal campaign finance law – could consider, why did the judge tell the defendant he would not allow Brad Smith, a former federal election commissioner and one of the nation’s leading experts on federal campaign finance law, to explain to the jury what is considered – and what is not considered – a campaign-related expense under federal law?

The judge acted like a member of the prosecution team throughout this case, a case so lacking in merit that the prior district attorney – the one who preceded the Soros-supported rogue prosecutor Alvin Bragg – refused to file it.

Judge Juan Merchan consistently ruled against Trump and allowed the prosecution to essentially do whatever it wanted, including admitting evidence and allowing testimony to matters that were completely irrelevant to the actual charges and whose only purpose was to confuse the jury and blacken the character of the defendant.

Legal authorities from both the Left and the Right have declared that the case should have never gone to court. It should have been thrown out by the judge – if the judge had been honest. Judge Merchan should have reclused himself and not presided over the case. The people in Manhattan should be ashamed for the decision made by the jury.

We will know if we live in a banana republic or not by how the appeals court manages the case. If they overturn the case, then there may be hope for our nation.