OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
Fox News host and New York City resident Greg Gutfeld dropped a bombshell during “The Five” on Wednesday when he threatened to leave the Big Apple and move to Florida after a Democratic judge fined former President Donald Trump more than $350 million in his civil fraud case.
During a show segment, Gutfeld noted that Attorney General Letitia James said that the money collected from the fine would be “paid to New Yorkers” before asking the panel: “What does she mean by that?”
“No, we’re not getting paid, we’re not getting paid because there is no victim. Where is the $355 million gonna go if Trump owes the bank zero? The bank agreed he owes them nothing because he fulfilled the contract. He broke no laws,” Gutfeld said.
“You know, people, whenever they bring up Trump, they always say, ‘No one is above the law.’ Well, what law? Apparently, this is a first, as Kat Timpf pointed out yesterday. It’s about being below the law. Trump is below the law, meaning you can punish him for not crossing into illegality, much like the rest of us,” he continued.
“Trump is 100% innocent in this. It can’t be fraud because who is it against? When I’m in a contract negotiation, I can pretty much present anything I want, because the other side will assess it and come back with their number, and then we agree. There’s nothing hidden in a contract,” he added.
“I think this is all an act to keep Trump off his game. That’s all this is. But this is why we all need to move to Florida, Fox, because I never thought that my politics and political choices would affect my privacy, my speech, and my livelihood, but that’s how it is these days,” he added.
“They’re gonna do what they did to Trump, they’re gonna do to you and me, and how soon before I get arrested for public indecency? And this time, I will be innocent,” Gutfeld quipped.
WATCH:
Greg Gutfeld roasts the NY judge and DA Letitia James for essentially stealing $350 million from Trump in a fake case of fake fraud. He also says it may be time to move to the free state of Florida. pic.twitter.com/p5Ac0Aq5Zl
— USA Features Media (@UsaFeatures) February 22, 2024
A Northwestern University law school professor has sounded off following New York Judge Arthur Engoron’s massive fraud finding against Trump, calling it the most “unjust” act in U.S. politics since an 1804 dual between Revolutionary War figures.
“The civil fraud judgment against Donald Trump is a travesty and an unjust political act rivaled only in American politics by the killing of former Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton by Vice President Aaron Burr,” Steven Calabresi wrote for Reason’s Volokh Conspiracy.
In July 1804, Burr fatally shot Hamilton in a duel in New Jersey, following a prolonged and acrimonious political rivalry between the two. Burr was charged with murder for his actions, but the case never made it to trial.
In his op-ed, the Northwestern Law School professor and Federalist Society co-chairman called on the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene over the “grossly excessive fine” and “Kafkaesque civil trial.”
Calabresi wrote that, at most, Trump is guilty of tax fraud.
“The New York State laws used to go after Trump have NEVER been used in this way, historically, and while Trump may owe some back state taxes, if Judge Engoron is right, not a single bank claimed that it had been defrauded by Trump in the loans it had made to him,” he wrote. “This is truly a victimless crime.”
Trump spokeswoman and attorney Alina Habba has vowed legal vengeance against James following the ruling.
In an interview on Friday with Fox News host Sean Hannity — the day of Engoron’s ruling — Habba said that “the biggest message” she could give is that Engoron and James were “not going to get away with it.” She also suggested that James may have coordinated with the Biden administration.
