Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy says an indictment against fellow candidate and former President Donald Trump would be a “national disaster.”
The Manhattan District Attorney’s office on Friday asked for a meeting with law enforcement ahead of a possible indictment of Trump next week, Fox News reported.
The potential indictment stems from the years-long investigation surrounding Trump’s alleged hush money scandal involving porn star Stormy Daniels.
Ohio businessman and anti-woke crusader Ramaswamy was among the first Republican candidates to comment on the looming legal action, tweeting Saturday morning that “it’s “un-American for the ruling party to use police power to arrest its political rivals.”
“If a Republican prosecutor in 2004 had used a campaign finance technicality to arrest then-candidate John Kerry while Bush & Cheney were in power, liberals would have cried foul – and rightly so. Principles go beyond partisanship,” Ramaswamy wrote, adding that the American people should decide who governs.
A Trump indictment would be a national disaster. It is un-American for the ruling party to use police power to arrest its political rivals. If a Republican prosecutor in 2004 had used a campaign finance technicality to arrest then-candidate John Kerry while Bush & Cheney were in…
— Vivek Ramaswamy (@VivekGRamaswamy) March 18, 2023
Near the end of the 2016 presidential campaign, Trump’s then-lawyer Michael Cohen sent $130,000 to Daniels in a non-closure agreement to prevent her from disclosing her 2006 affair with Trump. Trump reimbursed Cohen through installments.
Trump’s campaign said Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg is another Democrat on a “witch hunt “ of Trump. The former president’s spokesman Steven Cheung accused the DA of being in the pocket of President Joe Biden and “radical Democrats.”
“President Donald J. Trump is completely innocent, he did nothing wrong, and even the biggest, most Radical Left Democrats are making that clear,” Cheung told Fox News Digital in a statement. “From Russia, Russia, Russia, to the Mueller Hoax, to Impeachment Hoaxes 1 and 2, and even the Unlawful Mar-a-Lago Raid, Democrats have investigated and attacked President Trump since before he was elected – and they’ve failed every time.”
Ramaswamy, one of several declared and presumptive rivals to Trump for the GOP nomination, said an indictment would mark a “dark moment in American history,” undermining public trust in the electoral system.
“I call on the Manhattan District Attorney to reconsider this action and to put aside partisan politics in service of preserving our Constitutional republic,” he wrote in the tweet.
“Prosecutors should apply the same standards as they would to anyone else: this wouldn’t have been a criminal prosecution in any other case (a misdemeanor at most). No doubt about it,” Ramaswamy added. “Our entire country is skating on thin ice right now & we cannot afford to politicize the justice system or else we will reach our breaking point.”
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M.D. Kittle is the National Political Editor for The Star News Network.
Photo “Donald Trump” by Donald Trump, “Vivek Ramaswamy” by Vivek Ramaswamy, and “Alvin Bragg” by Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.
