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Constitutional Lawyers Back Criminal Charges Against Trump-Vance in Ohio
"Trump and Vance's positions of authority do not immunize them from the consequences that would fall—and have fallen—upon anyone else."
Oct 18, 2024
Legal experts from an advocacy group and a civil rights law firm on Friday called for a county prosecutor to issue criminal charges against former President Donald Trump and Sen. JD Vance for their role in propagating lies about the Haitian community in Springfield, Ohio.
Constitutional lawyers with Free Speech For People, a Massachusetts-based advocacy group, and Hughes Socol Piers Resnick & Dym, a Chicago-based law firm, issued a joint letter to Clark County prosecutor Daniel Driscoll in support of a criminal complaint brought by Haitian Bridge Alliance (HBA), a San Diego-based rights group, on September 24.
The complaint alleges that Trump and Vance (R-Ohio), the Republican presidential and vice presidential nominees, disrupted public services, made false alarms, and engaged in telecommunications harassment and aggravated menacing.
Last month, Trump and Vance repeatedly claimed that Haitian immigrants in Springfield were stealing pets to eat them—the claims, which had no credible basis, were widely derided as racist.
The two Republicans' promulgation of the false rumors led to 33 bomb threats in Springfield, as well as other threats on individuals and elected officials, according to the HBA complaint; state troopers had to be deployed to the town, and some schools and public buildings were closed or evacuated.
Friday's joint letter argues that Trump and Vance repeated the dangerous claims after they knew them to be false and that their statements predictably caused security threats; it characterizes this as "severe criminal misconduct."
"Trump and Vance's continuous use of their national platform to spread dangerous falsehoods that foreseeably cause widespread civic disruption against already marginalized communities falls squarely within the criminal charges your office has been asked to evaluate," the letter says.
"Trump and Vance's positions of authority do not immunize them from the consequences that would fall—and have fallen—upon anyone else," the authors also wrote.
BREAKING: We just issued a joint letter w/ attorneys at @HSPRD in support of @HaitianBridge, urging the Clark County Ohio prosecutor to pursue criminal charges against Trump & Vance for dangerous, inflammatory, & repeated lies about the Haitian community. https://t.co/0M8JlB5IIh
— Free Speech For People (@FSFP) October 18, 2024
The criminal complaint, called an affidavit, was filed under a Ohio law that allows citizens to seek criminal charges. It asks that the prosecutor find probable cause to arrest Trump and Vance.
A panel of local judges referred the matter to Driscoll on October 4, but so far he's not taken public action or set a date for a hearing, which Subodh Chandra, the Ohio lawyer that filed the complaint for HBA, has said is a requirement before a complaint can be quashed. HBA is keen to have such a public airing of the facts, the Los Angeles Timesreported last month.
The letter from Free Speech For People and Hughes Socol Piers Resnick & Dym argues that free speech is not a valid defense for Trump and Vance in this case, as "the evidence overwhelmingly establishes" that their "speech was knowingly false."
"Trump and Vance made a calculated decision to repeat racist falsehoods... knowing their calls would activate their supporters and others into disruptive and violent action," the letter says.
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The GOP Has Already Cheated in the 2024 House Race
A Brennan Center analysis found that gerrymandering in 2024 will give Republicans approximately 16 additional seats in the House of Representatives compared to fairly drawn maps.
Oct 03, 2024
Gerrymandering is as old as the republic. In the very first congressional election, Patrick Henry drew a map to try to keep James Madison from being elected to Congress. (That was before the word “gerrymandering” was even coined.) Today, both parties do it with gusto when they can.
And now gerrymandering may decide control of the House of Representatives.
Once, gerrymandering was an art. Phillip Burton, the legendary Democratic House member from San Francisco who served from the 1960s to the 1980s, used to draw the state’s maps on a tablecloth at a Sacramento restaurant. He proudly called one misshapen district “my contribution to modern art.” Now, however, it’s a science. Digital technology has reshaped the drawing of maps. Partisans can craft districts to quash competition in a way that lasts throughout a decade.
Gerrymandering may be as old as the republic, but so is the fight for fair maps.
Once, there was hope the courts would step in. In 2019, however, the Supreme Court ruled that federal judges were barred from policing partisan gerrymandering. And while it is still illegal to draw district lines to discriminate based on race, judges have often winked and allowed politicians to racially gerrymander so long as they shrug and say, “It’s not about race, it’s just politics.”
Rampant district rigging has blocked fair representation in many states, especially in the South. Nearly all the population growth in the United States over the past decade took place in the South and Southwest, and most of that came from communities of color—the very voters who should be represented and who are being shut out of power.
Now, we know that there are direct partisan consequences too. All the map drawing, all the lawsuits, are done for 2024. The dust has settled. And the Brennan Center’s experts have analyzed the effects of gerrymandering. Attorney Michael Li and political scientist Peter Miller have checked and rechecked the data.
Here’s what they found: Gerrymandering in 2024 will give Republicans approximately 16 additional seats in the House of Representatives compared to fairly drawn maps. That is well more than the margin of control in this Congress or in the one before it. There can be no question that this was done deliberately and with scientific precision—and comes especially at the expense of communities of color. In most of the gerrymandered states, there were hundreds or thousands of fair maps that could have been drawn.
What can be done about it?
One answer comes from Ohio. Seven times, the state supreme court there struck down unfair maps drawn by the Republicans. (The Brennan Center represented a broad coalition of Ohio voters.) Each time, partisan map drawers simply ignored the court. Then the state’s esteemed Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor, a prominent Republican, retired due to term limits. Now she leads a statewide drive for a ballot measure to create a strong, independent, citizen-led redistricting commission. This conservative stalwart teamed up with the progressive grassroots Ohio Organizing Collaborative. It’s a buddy movie for the ages.
Republicans tried to change the number of votes needed to pass a measure like this, but citizens rejected that sneaky move. Then state officials rewrote the language to say that the initiative was designed to support gerrymandering. No matter. Polls look strong, and there is a good chance that in Ohio, voters will untilt the legislature and congressional maps. Ohio would join Arizona, California, Colorado, and Michigan with their independent commissions. It is a prime exhibit of why voters should be able to overrule politicians.
There’s a national solution too. The Freedom to Vote Act would ban partisan gerrymandering in congressional redistricting. The John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act would strengthen that vital law against racially discriminatory rules. Both bills came achingly close to passing in the last Congress.
Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), at a Brennan Center event with Democracy SENTRY in Chicago this summer, announced that Democrats would make these voting rights bills the first order of business—and that they would change the filibuster rules so they could pass. The next night, Vice President Kamala Harris pledged to sign them (the only bills mentioned by name in her convention speech).
Gerrymandering may be as old as the republic, but so is the fight for fair maps. At the constitutional convention in Philadelphia in 1787, James Madison insisted on the provision used to give Congress the power to override local politicians. It used “words of great latitude,” he explained, because “it was impossible to foresee all the abuses” that might come. “Whenever the State Legislatures had a favorite measure to carry, they would take care so to mould their regulations as to favor the candidates they wished to succeed.”
Meanwhile, voters will go to the polls to choose their representatives—but too often, the representatives will choose the voters. And the Congress that would consider reform will be one disfigured by biased rules and manipulative maps.
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Residents Evacuated After 'Dangerous' Chemical Leak From Railcar in Ohio
"I tasted and smelled it," a resident said. "It was burning my throat and eyes."
Sep 25, 2024
Residents near a toxic chemical leak from a railcar in a small town in southwestern Ohio remained under evacuation orders on Wednesday even after the leak had been contained.
A leak of styrene, a chemical used in plastic and rubber production, was discovered Tuesday afternoon in Whitewater Township, Ohio, about 16 miles west of Cincinnati. Video showed the chemical spewing from the top of a railcar reportedly owned by Genesee & Wyoming, a U.S.-based multinational.
Local authorities told residents within one-half mile of the incident to evacuate—210 households, covering the towns of Hooven and Cleves, which have a combined population of roughly 3,800—and those just outside that area to seal up their homes and shelter in place. A local alert called the situation "dangerous."
By Wednesday, the leak had been plugged but roads in the area were closed, as were the district's schools, as air quality tests were undertaken.
There have been no reported injuries but styrene is known to disrupt the nervous system, causing symptoms such as "tiredness, feeling drunk, slowed reaction time, concentration problems, and balance problems," according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It is also a possible carcinogen, the CDC says.
"I tasted and smelled it," Marcus Greer, a Hooven resident, toldThe New York Times. "It was burning my throat and eyes."
A dangerous chemical leak in Ohio has prompted school closures and evacuation orders in Whitewater Township. pic.twitter.com/DDuI4Hgp1I
— TODAY (@TODAYshow) September 25, 2024
The cause of the accident is unclear. Local authorities have said that they are focused on immediate public safety concerns and will conduct a thorough investigation later.
There was no derailment or fire. Authorities initially said that they were concerned about an explosion, but by Tuesday evening they had said that was no longer a concern. They've used firetrucks to spray the railcar down with water to keep it cool, and have managed to separate the railcar from the rest of the train. Other railcars on the train were also carrying styrene.
It is not the first such incident in the area. A styrene leak from a railcar occurred in Cincinnati in August 2005 after it was left to heat up for five months, the Cincinnati Enquirerreported.
The incident that was on many residents' minds following Tuesday's accident was more recent. In February 2023, a Norfolk Southern railcar carrying toxic chemicals derailed in East Palestine, Ohio, setting off fires and leading to a controlled chemical burn of vinyl chloride, a carcinogen. Chemicals released that week spread to 16 states, later research showed. East Palestine is some 300 miles from Whitewater Township.
Following Tuesday's accident, local residents worried that they wouldn't get the cleanup help they needed.
"We are Hooven, Ohio," said Greer, a fourth-generation resident. "They will ignore us."
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