A recent News Analysis from The New York Times quotes Justice Clarence Thomas in 1994 as saying, a felony is “as bad a word as you can give to man or thing.”
As many people are trying to abolish the registry, the felony would remain on a background check, regardless of the number of years since the felony occurred.
Pointed out in the analysis is that “the felony category is defined only by its punishments…A felony is any crime punishable by a year or more in prison.”
The NRA refers to “felony creep,” campaigns to criminalize everything, with 25 states barring some individuals with felony convictions from voting, Florida being one of them.
Ron DeSantis posted that “Trump hasn’t lost his voting right in Florida…This would be an easy case to qualify for restoration of rights per the Florida Clemency Board, which I chair.” DeSantis refuses to restore the rights of anyone convicted of a sex offense.
Trump has been convicted of 34 felonies; now he knows what it is like to be a convicted felon. After 900 years of varying usages of the word felony, could Trump be ushering in a new definition of this word that society will accept?
This article is behind a paywall, but I was able to access it one time only through my google account. Also listed as one-time-only access points are apple accounts and Facebook.
People said the same thing about Clarence Thomas when Anita Hill nearly cost him a SCOTUS bid. Thomas ruled in favor of the registry in Smith v Doe.
Don’t expect any epihanies from Trump. He’s done all he wants to do with his felony label, as a way to sell $2 bills or pieces of his jacket as part of his ongoing fundraising efforts, or in a questionable strategy to try to appeal to minorities.
I would like to see what would happen if Donald Trump was a registrant. Would he be forced to move out of Mar a Lago because it violates residency restrictions? Would he be arrested for failure to not listing temporary residences or out of state travel?he be arrested for not reporting someone’s car or his private plane? I wonder if he were on the registry if government would change the laws.
BWJ
Generally, if you already lived there, and they try and force you out, numerous people have won that argument while on the registry. Retroactively making you move from a house you already live in is a tough call. Heck, I live 40 feet from a School bus stop and have never been forced to move. Of course I was here before the bus stop.
What is funny, the parents walk their kids to the bus to make sure I don’t pounce, but once the kids are out of school, they play in the street in front of my house un-supervised. Good Lord.
I lived in Ohio right after my release from prison in Florida. The probation office wouldn’t let me live with my wife and children, but I could live next door to children and often passed them as I walked home from work. It’s absurd.
@ BWJ
“Shakes my head and shrugs my shoulders”.
Life often does not make sense.
Amen to that.
isn’t there a Florida law that all felons must register with the state?
775.13 (2)
hummm, makes me think he may be in violation of the law
Wasn’t Trump convicted on a Sexual Assault case in NY with thebporn star Stormy Daniel’s? If that dosent disqualify him from voting in Fl I dont know what does.
[Moderator’s note: Trump has not been convicted of a criminal sexual offense].
It was a civil case. Trump was found liable for sexual assault.
Bwj, you’re wrong. Trump was not found liable for sexual assault. A jury has ordered him to pay $83.3 million in damages to writer E. Jean Carroll for defamatory comments he made about her when he was president. There is a huge difference between sexual assault and defamation. I take issue with your error not because I support Trump but because I am wrongly on the registry because of false information.
Here’s the source:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.voanews.com/amp/jury-begins-deliberations-in-trump-sexual-assault-defamation-case-/7458971.html
Trump was hit with a five million dollar amount in a civil court for being liable in the sexual abuse of E. Jean Carroll. That’s from the AP.
Bwj, you once again misapprehend the civil case against Trump. This is a quote from CNN: “Carroll, a former magazine columnist, alleged Trump raped her in a department store in the mid-1990s and then defamed her when he denied her claim.” Also, “Some background: The verdict, awarding Carroll $83.3 million, was the second time over the past year that a jury has awarded Carroll millions of dollars in damages from Trump for his defamatory statements disparaging her and denying her rape allegations.”
This case was decided with a much lower standard of proof called preponderance of the evidence than in criminal trials, in which the prosecution’s contentions must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt.
As a FAC moderator put it: “Trump has not been convicted of a criminal sexual offense.”
By the way Bwj, the dollar amount was $83.3 million, not $5 million as you stated.
It is more accurate to say that Trump was liable for battery and defamation, but not that he was found guilty of battery and defamation. The jury could have found Trump liable of battery based on the preponderance of evidence for rape, sexual abuse or forcible touching, of which they found Trump was liable for sexual abuse. All three possible findings of illegal touching are forms of battery. So, any finding that Trump had engaged in any of these would be sufficient to hold him liable for battery.
It is more precise say, ‘The jury found by a preponderance of the evidence that sexually abused Ms. Carroll and therefore was liable for battery.’
I hope this helps your understanding of what actually happened. My point being, anyone can be accused of illegally touching another person and sued in civil court for it or even prosecuted in criminal court. That is the way our legal system works.
This is directly from an AP News article “A jury found Donald Trump liable Tuesday for sexually abusing advice columnist E. Jean Carroll in 1996, awarding her $5 million in a judgment that could haunt the former president as he campaigns to regain the White House.
The verdict was split: Jurors rejected Carroll’s claim that she was raped, finding Trump responsible for a lesser degree of sexual abuse. The judgment adds to Trump’s legal woes and offers vindication to Carroll, whose allegations had been mocked and dismissed by Trump for years.” I never said that Trump was criminally guilty of sexual assault/abuse. I said that he was found liable. Big difference.
There’s a lot of rapist, philanders and child molesters that are not on the registry as a result of not having a “criminal conviction” and Trump is one of thousands of them out there.
Don’t count on it. If he wins, all of it goes away and the power balance shifts back to the “bad people” killing and raping our citizens.
I think it is unlikely he’ll redefine the word “felon” because his case will be reversed on appeal.
I don’t think so.
He is guilty. He’s lucky that is all he has been convicted of so far.