If so, then why?

  • SanguinePar@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    He can, because there’s no law against it. Probably nobody thought there’d ever need to be!

      • Pronell@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        Actually the thought is if the government can just imprison you to stop your candidacy, they have too much power.

        Thus they can continue to run.

        • dependencyinjection@discuss.tchncs.deOP
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          6 months ago

          I would say just don’t break any laws then, but laws can change and people are terrible.

          Edit: Pretty sure you’re all downvoting a misunderstanding.

          I’m saying I get why it’s a thing because people would convict their opponents. Not that I was actually saying well don’t break any laws.

      • essell@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        Remember, there is a mechanism that prevents criminals from winning elections and holding offices, it’s the one that’s the best one in a democracy. The voters.

        It’s not good to give governments the power to decide who does and doesn’t deserve to hold authority, it is good to let voters decide if someone’s crimes are relevant to the election.

        Sadly, it seems many Americans do not agree with me that trump is not suitable for office. Hopefully enough do that they decide not to vote for him

        • SkyNTP@lemmy.ml
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          6 months ago

          We’ve got these things called “social media” that are built expressly for the purpose of influencing people to buy more stuff (literally in the name: influencers). And if it can get people to part with their money, you can be sure the same tools can be used to get people to vote against their own interests.

          We thought the internet was a tool to spread democracy. We were wrong. The Internet is a tool used to undermine democracy, so long as people using the Internet are not strongly inoculated against organized interests, foreign, and domestic.

          • dudinax@programming.dev
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            6 months ago

            Who thought the intent was to spread Democracy?

            The Internet’s been both very good and very bad for Democracy. Without the internet, most people would be at the mercy of CNN or Fox to explain all the horrible things Donny Two Scoops has done.

      • HobbitFoot @thelemmy.club
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        6 months ago

        The concern of the founding fathers was that one state would have political reasons to rush a trial and get a legitimate candidate convicted of a crime in their court. If the conviction was legitimate, it was supposed to be handled by the Electors of the Electoral College.

        • Nougat@fedia.io
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          6 months ago

          If the conviction is legitimate, the Electoral College has ways to shut that down.

      • Boozilla@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        Our lack of laws around the POTUS are a glaring. It’s insane that a judge can preside over a case where the defendant is a former president who appointed them. Like Judge Cannon and 3 members of the SCOTUS.

      • Alimentar@lemm.ee
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        6 months ago

        Don’t forget, it’s not like he has a right to the presidency. The president is voted in. So technically speaking the people decide if the felonies make a difference or not

      • pdxfed@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        Also, you can’t vote in many regressive, discriminatory states but they’d like up in their Klan hoods to vote this felon into office as there is no restriction on becoming president. Rules for thee

    • YtA4QCam2A9j7EfTgHrH@infosec.pub
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      6 months ago

      My man Eugen Debbs ran from prison in the early 1900s. He was thrown in prison for speaking out again the war (the first amendment wasn’t much protection back in the day).

      It is good that he could run, since he was a political prisoner. He advocated for the common man against the corrupt institutions.

      • kautau@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        Agreed. There are situations where it totally makes sense to have a felon run for president. This isn’t one of them

    • not_fond_of_reddit@lemm.ee
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      6 months ago

      But the kicker is that he isn’t allowed to vote right? New York restore voting rights after you have completed your sentence if I remember correctly.

      • dhork@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        He’s a Florida resident now, but I believe they also take away the right to vote for felons until their sentence is complete.

    • jj4211@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      Keep in mind that the founding fathers were guilty of what would have been considered a lot of grave crimes by England, which was formerly the jurisdiction that applied to them.

      So they probably wouldn’t have had a huge appetite for blocking political rights of criminals given their recent standing.

    • Sean@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      If a convicted felon loses their right to vote, they should not be allowed to run for president.

    • SickofReddit@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      And if he wins again, he’s going to Pardon everybody who buys one from him. Including himself. Because there’s no law against it, and nobody thought that there ever needed to be for that either.

        • mcherm@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          He can appoint two new members to the Supreme Court and then have them rule that Trump, as President, is immune to being prosecuted or held responsible for any state or federal crime but like Bush v. Gore it isn’t a precedent and doesn’t apply to any other President.