Fed Prosecution of Mayor Was Corrupted

Many folks want MORE federal enforcement tools against corrupt officials, yet today’s lawfare suggests maybe it’s time to put some breaks on breaking the law-breakers. Consider the Justices overturning an after-the-fact thank you tip.

As the WSJ’s Jess Bravin explained: “The 6-3 decision on Thursday is the latest in a series of high-court rulings reining in federal prosecutions targeting corruption in state & local government, which the justices increasingly have seen as holding public officials to a higher standard than Congress authorized.” In the present case, the Justices overturned the bribery conviction of an Indiana mayor who took $13,000 from a local truck dealership after it won a city contract. Explained the majority: The federal anticorruption law involved “applies only to payments for future official conduct, not gratuities for past acts.” In short, the pay-off was more akin to a tip given to a waiter? Well, it’s not quite that simple. Writing for the court, Justice Kavanaugh said the structure of the statute suggested it was meant only to cover bribery ahead of an official act … A separate law does forbid federal officials from accepting gratuities aka tips, but “Congress didn’t enact a second statute to cover local & state officials.”

Importantly, the state prosecutors themselves did not pursue any charges against the mayor under state law although they might have. The decision, Bravin points out, follows Supreme Court rulings last year that threw out a pair of corruption convictions stemming from the tenure of former Democratic NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo. In 2020, the court tossed two public corruption convictions in the NJ Bridgegate scandal. And, in 2016, it overturned the conviction of former Va Gov. Bob McDonnell.

Davd Soul