A convicted drug dealer who was freed by President Donald Trump and later accused of attacking a nurse and groping a nanny was sent back to federal prison on Monday. Jonathan Braun, a Long Island man who reportedly violated the terms of release after he was charged with several new crimes, has been ...
Are we really doing Willie Horton style “look at this monster our opponent let back on the streets” tactics. This is how we end up with every politician being afraid to pardon anyone or even let them off on parole because there opponent or the press will yell at them if they ever so much as run a red light.
This guy wasn’t even sentenced for rape or murder or anything violent:
Trump was right to pardon him, marijuana offenses are BS. Yeah the guy fucked up after he got out but that’s not Trump’s fault. There’s a million things we can criticize trump for, this isn’t one of them.
Weed is definitely comparatively tame to hard drugs but 220,000 lbs of anything is insane. That’s not just some dude trying to make a living.
Besides Trump is the last person in the world that needs less scrutiny on the people he pardons. Just today the news broke that he pardoned Giuliani and others who tried to help him steal an election. The dude is literally pardoning people who commit crimes on his behalf. If you find yourself saying something that could reasonably be interpreted as defending his use of pardons then there’s a good chance you’re on the wrong side of the issue.
Do you think this guy should still be locked up for smuggling weed in a state where its now legal? I don’t and I’m not going to compromise my morals just so I can disagree with trump on every issue. If you are taking the stance that anything trump does is automatically bad then your letting your politics be defined by him and becoming a sort of reactionary. Your politics should be defined by what you believe in, not what the other side says.
I also believe that trump pardoning his co-conspirators is wrong because it’s corrupt, not just because Trump is doing it. Criticize an action on its substance, not just who is doing it.
220,000 pounds. It’s not about marijuana, it’s about him being a large scale illegal drug dealer. If Trump wants to first pardon everyone in the US who has minor charges for marijuana, great. And then much later he can go and deal with the major drug dealers.
But look, you asked for criticism based on substance, and the substance here is that the guy had political connections. In other words, this is classic corruption. And I know you know that.
It’s kinda complicated, but I do have to say… smuggling on that scale something more is going on. If you told me someone is smuggling 200,000 lbs of cigarettes from a state where they are cheap into a state they are expensive… I’d say there’s a 99.99% chance somewhere in the line there’s some major violent crimes done to enable it. An opperation that large isn’t just a couple guys providing for their friends, that’s clearly dealing with some form of organized crime or gangs… that most likely aren’t holding their territory by friendly agreements.
I think there’s a significant difference between someone who caught a case for having an ounce on them and a guy busted with enough weed to fill a swimming pool, regardless of my personal feelings about marijuana. Framing it the way you are makes it sound like he’s the former and that doesn’t capture the scope of what he was up to.
Either way this guy is clearly a shit head. If you want to make the argument that all marijuana charges should be pardoned and expunged then I suggest you find a different poster boy for the campaign because this guy is not helping your case.
“It was only 220 tons of weed!”
This is the guy who’s in charge as the US obliterates random fishing boats while claiming they’re smuggling drugs. The point is dragging you into an alley and beating you to near death and you’re still completely missing it.
*110 tons but yeah.
Yeah. That’s only like 3 tractor trailers (assuming they’re not just running overweight too)
Trump blowing up boats is bad
Trump commuting non violent drug offenses is good
You can hold these two opinions if you’re mature enough to understand no one is a pure hero or villain and can do both good and bad things