This is an adapted excerpt from the Oct. 11 episode of “Velshi.”
Donald Trump’s campaign of retribution is ramping up. One of the president’s perceived political enemies was just arraigned, another was formally indicted and criminal charges against a third appear to be imminent. It’s all happening out in the open as the retribution presidency that Trump promised on the campaign trail arrives.
On Friday, MSNBC broke the news that criminal charges are expected to be filed soon against John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser. Bolton has a long history of butting heads with the president, and he has remained a vocal critic ever since he was fired from the first Trump administration.
In August, federal agents executed a search warrant at Bolton’s home, looking for suspected classified records. Possible charges against him, which could come as early as this week, appear likely to involve his handling of classified information.
That news dropped shortly after a grand jury in northern Virginia indicted New York Attorney General Letitia James. She has been charged with one count of bank fraud and one count of making false statements. James forcefully denies the charges against her, and in a statement she called her prosecution “the president’s desperate weaponization of our justice system.”
James was the one who brought a civil fraud lawsuit against the Trump Organization, a case that she initially won. It resulted in a $500 million penalty that was recently voided by an appeals court. James has said she’s planning to appeal the decision.
That lawsuit damaged Trump’s reputation and image as a successful businessman, which is perhaps why James appears to be near the top of Trump’s enemies list, the second of his perceived foes to be indicted.
The first was former FBI Director James Comey. Late last month, he was charged with one count of making a false statement to Congress and one count of obstructing a congressional proceeding. On Wednesday, he was arraigned in federal court. Comey pleaded not guilty, and his lawyer added that they would move quickly to try to dismiss the case on the grounds that it was a vindictive and selective prosecution.
On top of that, the indictment filed against Comey is brief, barely two pages. We know it involves an allegation of lying to Congress, but the government has revealed few details about it.
It was just over three weeks ago that Trump posted a message on Truth Social addressed specifically to “Pam,” as in Pam Bondi, the attorney general of the United States, urging her to move faster in prosecuting his perceived enemies.
“What about Comey, Adam “Shifty” Schiff, Letitia??? They’re all guilty as hell, but nothing is going to be done,” Trump wrote. Two of the three people he listed — Comey and James — have since been indicted.
We have since learned a little more about that bizarre social media post. Reportedly, it was not a coincidence that it seemed to be addressed specifically to Bondi. The Wall Street Journal reported that the message was never meant to be pushed out to Trump’s 10.8 million followers, or the entire world. It was meant to be a direct message to Bondi.
According to additional reporting by NBC News: “Trump was surprised to learn he had actually posted the message to his Truth Social account, the source said, adding that the president reacted by saying ‘Oh,’ and then tried to shrug it off.”
The Comey and James indictments, which followed quickly from that accidentally public entreaty to the attorney general, were both brought by an attorney named Lindsey Halligan, who has never prosecuted a single case in her life.
Last month, Trump installed Halligan as the interim U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, but only after he pushed out Erik Siebert, the experienced career prosecutor whom he himself originally tapped to lead that office.
Siebert, who was also mentioned in the post addressed to Bondi, was pushed out when it became apparent that he would not pursue criminal charges against Comey or James. So he had to go. That was also mentioned in Trump’s message to Bondi.
Halligan, on the other hand, is a close Trump ally, a former insurance lawyer who was part of the president’s criminal defense team regarding his own handling of classified government documents.
She followed Trump to the White House, where she served as an aide, tasked with whitewashing the Smithsonian and getting rid of things that are not ideologically aligned with this administration, like how slavery was actually a bad thing.
Halligan had no prior experience as a prosecutor before taking on this role. The Comey and James cases were the first ones she ever presented in front of a grand jury, and she did it on her own. Her signature is the only one to appear on either indictment, which is widely seen as a sign of the weakness of both cases because it means that no other prosecutor in that office was willing to put their signature on them.
But that’s where Comey and James’ cases differ from the one against Bolton. Two people familiar with the case tell MSNBC that the acting U.S. attorney for Maryland has told colleagues she sees a reasonable basis to pursue charges against Bolton.
But Trump’s yearslong public feud with Bolton will still cast a shadow over the case and at least give the appearance that it’s an act of retribution by this administration.
The same can be said for the other people on the president’s enemies list. A number of them are already under investigation, including California Sen. Adam Schiff, who led the first impeachment proceedings against Trump in 2020, and Jack Smith, the special prosecutor who twice indicted Trump under the previous administration. There’s also pressure to open investigations on others, including former President Barack Obama and billionaire George Soros. This is far from an exhaustive list of individuals and institutions threatened with investigation or prosecution by the Trump administration.
There’s a saying often attributed to the chief of the Soviet secret police, an ally of Josef Stalin’s, that roughly translates to “Show me the man, and I’ll show you the crime.” Trump’s insistence on investigating people instead of investigating crimes is what retribution looks like, not justice.
This article was originally published on MSNBC.com
