President Donald Trump’s revenge campaign of criminal prosecutions against his political enemies is showing no signs of stopping. Just this past week brought new indictments against former FBI Director James Comey, who earned the president’s ire for his role in the Russia investigation, and the Southern Poverty Law Center, whose work fighting hate groups has irked the political right.
It is possible these cases will stumble, just like the administration’s past attempts to turn “Lock her up” into a governing philosophy. Judges and grand juries foiled previous efforts to target Comey, New York Attorney General Letitia James, and the so-called Seditious Six—Democratic lawmakers who filmed a video urging troops to resist illegal orders. Prosecutors also dropped a probe of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell last week in the face of Republican political pressure.
But even if nobody ultimately goes to jail, these investigations and indictments have been far from harmless. They have corroded our justice system by showing it can be wielded as a tool of harassment, intimidation, and vengeance. To undo that damage, we will need reforms that rebuild guardrails against abuse. Trump’s legal minions have been able to intrusively investigate his foes, rummaging through their private information using grand jury subpoenas, and repeatedly presenting charges to grand juries until something—anything—might stick.
They have been able to do this because federal prosecutors wield extraordinary power under a “presumption of regularity”; courts generally assume that the government’s lawyers act in good faith, follow norms of fairness, and keep politics out of charging decisions. That presumption rests on a reputation built over generations that the current administration has shattered.
