Adam Schiff: Trump Might ‘Face the Real Prospect of Jail Time’
Rep. Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said on Face the Nation Sunday there’s a good chance President Donald Trump will go to jail when he leaves office.
CBS anchor Margaret Brennan asked Schiff for his takeaway from the Michael Cohen sentencing memos, in which federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York seem to implicate Trump in the federal campaign finance violations committed by his former lawyer.
“My takeaway is there’s a very real prospect that on the day Donald Trump leaves office the Justice Department may indict him,” Schiff said. “That he may be the first president in quite some time to face the real prospect of jail time.”
Schiff added that amidst talk about who Trump might pardon, there might soon be a debate over the next president pardoning the current one.
The California Democrat said that the argument made by prosecutors in the Cohen sentencing memo — that “the rich and powerful seem to live by a different set of rules” — was “equally made” for the president.
In the sentencing memo, federal prosecutors argued Cohen should receive a “substantial” prison sentence for campaign finance violations and financial crimes, as well as lying to Congress in the Russia investigation. The crimes that seem to implicate the president involve the hush money payments to women accusing Trump of having affairs with them.
Brennan asked about Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani‘s argument that Cohen committed no campaign finance violation, given precedent. Watch Schiff’s response above, via CBS News.
