It's difficult to see how former President Donald Trump will get a fair trial in Washington, D.C., and that's the reason special counsel Jack Smith, "a rabid zealot," brought his case there, Sen. Tom Cotton said Thursday.
"First off, there's very little balance in some of the nominees to that court for the D.C. circuit because there's no senator to check them," the Arkansas Republican said on the Hugh Hewitt talk show. "That's where Barack Obama and now Joe Biden have reserved their most ideological nominees because you don't worry about clearing them even through two Democratic senators."
In addition, Trump is to be tried by U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, and that will also pose a problem, said Cotton, considering how she's ruled in other Jan. 6 cases and some of the rhetoric she's used, let alone how she has handled some of the preliminary measures in Trump's case.
"She seems to think this is the case of her lifetime and that she's been waiting for years to get a case like this, where she can be the center of attention," he said.
The jury pool is also an issue, as Washington, D.C., is "obviously the most Democrat jurisdiction in the country," Cotton said.
"I think they voted 92-93% for Trump's opponents in the last two elections," he added. "You see time and time again Republicans getting convicted in that district on very flimsy evidence."
Meanwhile, Smith is pursuing "untested, far-fetched legal theories," said Cotton.
"It reminds me of Stalin's secret police. Show me the man and I'll show you the crime," he said. "He's basically saying if a politician engages in misleading conduct, you can charge him with a crime."
Cotton pointed out that when Smith pursued "far-fetched criminal theories against former Virginia Gov. Bob McDonald, "he got a conviction but it was reversed 8-0 in the Supreme Court."
He added that he doesn't trust Smith, who he believes is trying to make statements into crimes.
Al Gore and former President George W. Bush were not pursued after the 2000 race for pushing back at the results, said Cotton.
"It is a very dangerous unprecedented step to criminalize political speech," Cotton told Hewitt, particularly while Hunter Biden is "getting treated with kid gloves."
Cotton also discussed calls in the Senate from some Democrats to regulate the code of ethics for Supreme Court justices and said he's against that effort.
The Supreme Court, he said, was created by the Constitution as a co-equal branch of government, and different standards apply there.
"They already have a code of conduct," but the current call is "one more effort by Democrats to delegitimize the court," the senator said.
Democrats used the court for the past 50-60 years to win cases, said Cotton, but now they are "trying to undermine its legitimacy."
The senator also criticized President Joe Biden's response to a combined Russian and Chinese naval force that last week patrolled the Alaskan coast just outside U.S. territorial waters.
The fleet was made up of 11 Russian and Chinese ships, and Biden's response was to send four U.S. destroyers and P-8 Poseidon aircraft to shadow them, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.
"It was very weak, but in keeping with Biden," said Cotton. "He doesn't want to acknowledge provocations."
He compared the president with Western nations and aggressions in the two world wars involving Germany.
Cotton noted that the Chinese spy balloon, if not spotted by ranchers, would have gone unnoticed. China watches the U.S. defense budget and spending, so even if Biden is willing to send out strike groups in response to provocations, China is "still gaining power," he added.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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