Former resident Donald Trump reportedly invoked the Fifth Amendment during a deposition held in New York on Wednesday in an ongoing civil lawsuit by New York Attorney General Letitia James.
“I once asked ‘if you're innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?' Now I know the answer to that question,” Trump stated. “When your family, your company, and all the people in your orbit have become targets of an unfounded, politically motivated Witch Hunt supported by lawyers, prosecutors, and the Fake News Media, you have no choice.”
Leftists are already trying to spin this in a negative way against Trump. Even the former prosecutor and chief impeachment counsel Daniel Goldman tweeted a false statement. Goldman ought to be ashamed of himself for having tweeted something that could be misleading those who aren’t aware of the facts.
He tweeted, “The Fifth Amendment ensures that people are not forced to incriminate themselves. But you don’t take the Fifth if you didn’t do anything wrong.”
We have rights and lawyers in particular should be aware of this and not demean the exercise of these rights, or act as if pleading the Fifth is an admission of guilt. Given the allegations against Trump by multiple Democratic initiatives, this is the most sensible way to respond.
If Goldman and others want to claim the response Trump made proves his guilt, maybe they'd like to look at how Hillary Clinton's IT guy pled the Fifth 125 times in the investigation into her emails?
Goldman is currently running for Congress which suggests he's looking to reach out to leftists through his tweet, however Goldman is merely demonstrating that he has no ethics by doing it.
We've seen that it's not an issue of guilt or innocence with regards to Trump. It's to lessen his influence. They were after him long before he was elected by launching the Russia probe. They were discussing the possibility of seeking to impeach him before he even did anything as president. They FBI even had a lawyer file a false statement regarding the Trump team in a request for a FISA warrant. Recently an unprecedented action was taken by the FBI to raid Trump's Mar-a-Lago residence.
It wouldn’t be smart for Trump to not use the Fifth. It's especially important in this particular instance, given the fact that James ran with the intention of getting Trump. He was after the man but not for any particular crime, which is a troubling strategy.
Donald Trump's son, Eric Trump, recently posted an ad that included remarks James made regarding Trump in the past.
Why should you expect to receive any sort of fairness or objectivity from someone who behaves in this manner? It's also a mistake when you're supposed to be an impartial attorney general.
