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Rick Perry Indicted
Hot off the wire from the Associated Press:
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — A grand jury indicted Texas Gov. Rick Perry on Friday for allegedly abusing the powers of his office by carrying out a threat to veto funding for state prosecutors investigating public corruption — making the possible 2016 presidential hopeful his state’s first indicted governor in nearly a century.
A special prosecutor spent months calling witnesses and presenting evidence that Perry broke the law when he promised publicly to nix $7.5 million over two years for the public integrity unit run by the office of Travis County Democratic District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg. Lehmberg was convicted of drunken driving, but refused Perry’s calls to resign.
Perry’s general counsel, Marry Anne Wiley, defended the governor’s action.
“The veto in question was made in accordance with the veto authority afforded to every governor under the Texas Constitution,” she said. “We will continue to aggressively defend the governor’s lawful and constitutional action, and believe we will ultimately prevail.”
I am not a lawyer, and I assume there are Texas-based attorneys amongst the members of Ricochet, so I will let them address the legal details of what is going on here.
My quick take: this is an outrage. Those of us who are native Texans of a certain age will remember the false indictments brought against then-Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison in 1993 and 1994 by Travis County prosecutors, all of which were thrown out of court. It is, yet again, an instance of Democrats trying to criminalize political disagreement, revealing the essentially Stalinist attitude that so many in that party take toward dealing with their political opponents.
While I often give the Republican Party a hard time in my comments and Member Feed posts, this particular matter underlines why I so despise the Democratic Party and have never voted for anyone associated with it.
What say you?
Published in General
Let’s not forget Tom DeLay.
The Travis county grand jury is out of control and political. In Harris county (Houston) the grand juries are also out of control though not nakedly political. Both are a stain and a blemish on our great state.
http://bigjollypolitics.com/2014/08/15/harris-county-grand-jury-system-needs-reform/
Exactly what I was thinking.
It’s getting tougher every day not to hate Democrats. Really, their worst impulses have been unleashed since 2008.
The only Democrats you can trust are dead ones, and even then they’ll still vote.
Might be a good thing for Perry…. here’s a possible campaign line.
“I don’t think that abusive drunk prosecutors are the best people to run a “Public Integrity Unit”. Apparently my opponents don’t agree.”
And get Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD) on the record.
Rick Perry just got indicted because he is a ham sandwich. No, that can’t be right, maybe it was because he is an effective Republican Governor. First he threatened to veto funds for Ethics department run by the admitted and convicted DWI DA who refused to resign after her conviction. Then he actually vetoed the funds. The reason she refused to resign was because, you know, Democrat!
Am I to understand that they’re charging him with a felony for issuing a veto? Seriously?
Isn’t a governors veto power pretty much unquestionable? He can veto a bill for any reason he chooses?
This seems insane to me.
Wouldn’t it be just great if Gov. Perry could/would pre-pardon Himself?
When I read about this earlier today, what you’ve written here is what came to mind:
“My quick take: this is an outrage. <snip> It is, yet again, an instance of Democrats trying to criminalize political disagreement, revealing the essentially Stalinist attitude that so many in that party take toward dealing with their political opponents.”
Gobsmacking to say the least. Thank you for posting this.
It appears as if somebody is afraid of Perry’s future political ambitions. Romney was victimized in a more nuanced manner when Broadway produced The Book of Mormon in 2010.
I dare the smart-asses who wrote that play to write a similar one about Islam.
Obviously, this is awful and unjust, and Perry should be cleared, but I thought that it would be helpful to outline what the case is about.
There are two counts. The first is that he committed an abuse of his official capacity.
The statute there says:
The argument is that Perry misused the money to harm the DA and the PIU. I’m pretty sure that the latter argument fails, but the former may survive a motion to dismiss on the grounds outlined in count two (it is possible that, while defunding her job would be legitimate, defunding her so that she is forced to resign could be a problem).
tangent to this thread: did you see it? I never saw it because I felt like on some level it was just an in-your-face-opportunity to be blasphemous. I never really thought too much of it as politics, but now that you mention it, E, it rings true.
Helpfully, the definition of “misuse” seems relatively narrow, although hopefully we’ll get a Texas lawyer on to tell us the case law. Specifically,
The indictment doesn’t cite a law being broken, and I don’t see how D would apply; MWM’s point about the broad nature of veto authorities seems sound.
He’s accused of committing a felony for threatening to do a lawful thing: to veto spending (which he is allowed to do in Texas, apparently).
It’s an outrage: the Dems are just looking to tarnish his name. First Walker, then Christie, now Perry…
“A Travis County grand jury Friday indicted Gov. Rick Perry on two charges related to his effort last year to force District Attorney Rosemary Lehmberg to resign after her drunken driving arrest.
Grand jurors charged Perry, 64, with abuse of official capacity, a first-degree felony, and coercion of a public servant, a third-degree felony….
“…The indictment stems from Perry’s threat last summer to withhold $7.5 million in state money from Lehmberg’s office unless she step down – a threat he later carried out by vetoing an appropriation in the state budget.
“Mary Anne Wiley, General Counsel for Perry, said in a statement following the indictment: “The veto in question was made in accordance with the veto authority afforded to every governor under the Texas Constitution. We will continue to aggressively defend the governor’s lawful and constitutional action, and believe we will ultimately prevail.”…”
“…It is beyond ridiculous that Travis County is pursuing the governor, after letting the seriously drunk, police-disrespecting DA stay in office.”
That’s the Democratic party in a nutshell: corrupt to the core, and willing to use any tool to stay in power.
Let’s hope it’s quick.
Count Two says that he attempted to coerce a public servant (the DA), to resign, through threats to defund her. The question there seems like one of Texas Constitutional Law; does the DA come under the Governor? If so, then Count Two seems as frivolous as Count One, since the governmental exception (c:) should apply.
To be fair, the guys who wrote the play kind of have written similar stuff about Islam; Team America and several South Park episodes were pretty strong on the issue, while the BoM is less hostile than one might imagine.
Criminalizing politics is becoming a national trend. Prosecutors in Wisconsin have taken it to a whole new level.
This is the same office that brought the charges against DeLay. Hopefully Republicans learned something from that: we can’t let crooked Democrats tarnish our strongest politicians.
I don’t think Wisconsin is worse than DeLay was and, although both are terrible, we’re nowhere near as bad as the constant abuse of Berlusconi, whose decade of power saw him in court one day in three (while simultaneously having to run a country through financial crisis, war, and other things one might have thought it would be helpful to let him focus on).
I say this not to defend the left, but to remind people of the stakes if we fail to volunteer, donate, and campaign to protect America from these kinds of abuses. Things can get a lot worse.
Oh, Trey Parker and Matt Stone were behind that? Then I retract my dare, for I remember them going hard after Islam in South Park. Too bad the management at Comedy Central wimped out and suppressed the episode in question.
Here’s the leading Texas Democrat in question…
“Video: Jailers had to restrain Lehmberg”
Classy broad
Although I think that BoM took a long standing tradition of Matt and Trey affectionately ribbing the LDS (going all the way back to Cannibal! The Musical) a little too far, so I don’t plan on seeing it, there are conservatives, Mormons, and Romney supporters who have raved about it. I’m personally fond of this song, which I think is unusually good at describing the way that we mentally construct paradises based on our own environment, but which also makes it clear that her view of the US as an earthly paradise is essentially sound.
The degree to which the video is compelling is extremely helpful, but while the Democrats are deeply unethical, I can’t pretend that I don’t feel miserable about this. Many millions of Americans and, if Perry does well in the primaries, even more foreigners, will only hear this story as “Perry shut down an anti-corruption drive”. Absolutely horrible for us; recall the enormous impact of the DeLay case on the 2006 elections and shudder at the reminder of the success that evil tactics can enjoy.
I thought their South Park episode on LDS showed a particular affection for Mormons, while at the same time doing as they do with every other institution, mocking them mercilessly.
Thanks for the info, JoE.
I say Wisconsin is worse because it was larger in scope; more targets and more prosecutors . Although no one was driven out of office like Delay, it is deeply troubling that Democrats officials are coordinating their attacks and going after whole catagories of opponents, not just individuals.
That U.S. political culture has not descended to Italian levels is a cold comfort. Better than nothing I guess.
This is the maddening Alinsky-Obama technique of destroying one’s opposition, rather than debating him. I agree, James. It’s terribly depressing.
Why is it depressing? I find it infuriating… It reminds me of the mordant joke after 9/11:
“There were three men sitting on a bench, one was a Texan wearing a cowboy hat, one was a Muslim wearing a turban, and the last fellow was an Apache with a feather in his hair. The Indian was sad and gloomy as he said, “My people were many, but now we are few.” The Muslim puffs up and said, “Once my people were few, but now we are many.” The Texan adjusts his hat, rolls a smoke, leans back and drawls out, “That’s because we ain’t played Cowboys and Muslims yet.””
Time to start playing cowboys and progressives… Impeach, indict, and stop pulling punches.
They’re fighting a war. You only win it by fighting back.