Fact Check: Is Donald Trump a Dictator?

[UPDATE 1/25/20]
Jerry Nadler accused Donald Trump of being a dictator last night during his impeachment speech.  Here is an undiepundit.com fact check on that very subject from earlier this year: 
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The polemics flow like water over Niagara Falls. Every minute of every day there's a new rant by some politician, media personality, academic, or entertainer asserting that Donald Trump is:  
A Dictator!  A Fascist!  A Tyrant!  A Totalitarian!  Subverting our Constitution!  Hitler!  An Existential Threat!

The question is, is any of this true?  Can we prove or disprove these allegations?

Luckily, there's a whole branch of government dedicated to identifying this exact behavior.  At the top of that branch is the Supreme Court of The United States (SCOTUS).  No matter what happens in the lower courts,  the supremes always get the final say.  If there's ever a dictator living in the White House, he or she would have an historically bad losing record at the SCOTUS.

Astonishingly, Donald Trump does not!

Here’re the numbers from Trump’s last year at the SCOTUS:



From: “Trump’s Top SCOTUS Lawyers Post winning Term, But Barely” - Bloomberg Law

Donald Trump had a TOTAL win rate of 68% based on his only full Supreme Court session for which he had a confirmed Solicitor General.*

So how did Barack Obama do?

Overall, the (Obama) administration has managed a record of 79-96, a win rate of just above 45 percent.

Wait. OBAMA had a losing record?

How about the other Presidents?

That (Obama) audit doesn't look too good when compared to the record of his predecessors. George W. Bush achieved a record of 89-59 (60 percent)—and that's if you fold in all of 2000-2001, including cases argued when Bill Clinton was president in what was an unusually bad term for the government (roughly 35 percent). Clinton, in turn, had an overall record of 148-87 (63 percent), again including all of 1992-1993. George H.W. Bush went 91-39 (70 percent), while Ronald Reagan weighed in with an astounding record of 260-89 (about 75 percent).

While it looks like this is merely a tale of a downwards trend in recent years, Jimmy Carter still managed a 139-65 record (68 percent). Indeed, the overall government win rate over the last 50 years—I've calculated back to the early 1960s—is comfortably over 60 percent.

From: “Obama Has Lost in the Supreme Court More Than Any Modern President” - Cato Institute

And remember, Obamacare (ACA) is likely going back to the Supreme Court in 2020!

*Note: The Bloomberg graphic includes Trump’s amicus cases. The Cato analysis only includes cases in which the administration was a party. Using only party totals, Trump is still at 55% vs. Obama at 45%.

In summary: Donald Trump is doing about average and has a winning record at the SCOTUS.  Conversely, his immediate predecessor is the most overturned President in modern history and the only one with a losing record!

Remind me again who the dictator is?

Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's Full Statement - 12/19/2019

Howie Carr on Festivus and Impeachment - 12/18/2019

Donald Trump's Full Letter to Nancy Pelosi - 12/17/2019

Senator Lindsey Graham's Full Opening Statement - 12/11/2019

Attorney General William Barr's Full Interview on NBC 12/10/2019

Fact Check - The Truth About The IG Report

All you need to know about today's Inspector General report:

Fact Check: The Truth About Impeachment

But there’s documentation in criminal investigations and in counterintelligence investigations to explain the predication for the opening of a file, that is, the basis for the opening of a file. 

— James Freeman, WSJ, "The Unbelievable James Comey," 10 Dec. 2018

There's a lot of noise in the Trump Ukraine impeachment story, and it's deliberate.  Noise obscures the clear and obvious truth.  To help simplify things, here's the noise-free version, first from 30,000 feet, and then in high resolution from eye-level.

From 30,000 feet it looks like Donald Trump did exactly what he's been screaming Obama and Clinton did to him; that is enlist foreign actors to dig dirt on a political opponent.  Not only that, but Trump was outed by his own CIA,and made the request during a public phone call with Ukraine's leader!

That's how it looks from 30,000 feet, and that's the story Democrats want you to hear.  It looks pretty bad.  Maybe even impeachable.  But a funny thing happens when the same events are examined at eye level.

The detail that is missing from 30,000 feet hinges on one key word: "predication".  Was there a basis for what Donald Trump asked Zelensky about the Bidens?

Here's an analogy:  Consider the cases of two fatal shootings.  In both cases the victim was shot at point blank range in the back.  That's what happened from 30,000 feet.  Are both shooters guilty of murder?  Now consider that in the first case the victim had robbed the shooter and was fleeing.  In the second case the victim had stabbed the shooter and was lunging with a knife for his child.  Those are the details up close.  One shooter had a basis for using deadly force and the other did not.  Predication makes all the difference.

In the case of Obama and Clinton digging dirt on Trump, the search for predication came up dry.  Not only that, Obama and Clinton appear to have manufactured fake dirt and then looped it back to U.S. intelligence to create the appearance of predication.  That's what the Steele dossier, Stefan Halper,  Joseph Mifsud, and Alexander Downer appear to have been about.  Even after spending years and unlimited funds looking for valid predication,  Robert Mueller came up empty.  In essence, the Democrat spying on Trump in 2016 and 2017 was part of a "coup d'etat".  (Overthrowing an election in French.)

In Trump's case, he not only had demonstrable predication, but he also prefaced his request with that very justification during the Ukraine phone call:

There's a lot of talk about Biden's son, that Biden stopped the prosecution and a lot of people want to find out about that so whatever you can do with the Attorney General would be great.  Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it... It sounds horrible to me.   

(Full transcript here)

Here's what Joe Biden openly bragged about doing in Ukraine that piqued Trump's interest: (video below)

I was supposed to announce that there was another billion-dollar loan guarantee,  And I had gotten a commitment from Poroshenko and from [then-Prime Minister Arseniy] Yatsenyuk that they would take action against the state prosecutor. And they didn’t.

I said, ‘I’m telling you, you’re not getting the billion dollars.  I said, ‘You’re not getting the billion. I’m going to be leaving here in, I think it was about six hours.’ I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.’ Well, son of a bitch. (Laughter.) He got fired.

Mind you, the Ukrainian prosecutor that Joe Biden had fired, for $1 billion U.S. dollars, was investigating how Joe's son, Hunter Biden, came to be paid up to $8,000,000 by a Ukrainian energy company for sitting on it's board while knowing nothing about energy, Ukraine, or doing business in the region.  Talk about an actual quid pro quo!

Donald Trump was actually just doing his job as President of the United States.  It is the responsibility of Presidents to hold government officials accountable for corruption, bribery, extortion and wrongdoing according to the constitution.  Politicians like Joe Biden are not exempt from this accountability, even if they are running for President.  Moreover,  Ukraine and the U.S. have a treaty that requires cooperation for rooting out crime and corruption.  In other words,  had Trump NOT asked about the Bidens he would be ignoring his official duties and a treaty with Ukraine.

It all comes down to predication.  Trump had it.  Obama and Clinton tried to manufacture it and got caught.  That makes all the difference.  Everything else is just noise.

Will that stop Democrats from impeaching Donald Trump?  Not a chance.  They've been promising to impeach him since before he even took the oath of office!  

The Washington Post headline on the day Donald Trump was inaugurated read:

"The campaign to impeach President Trump has begun"-  Washington Post 1/20/2017

Eleven days later the lawyer representing the whistleblower in this Ukraine matter tweeted that the "#Coup has started".  He tweeted it twice to make sure the message wasn't missed:

The impeachment of Donald Trump has always been a coup d'etat.  Democrats have always based it on "orange man bad", and if you don't like it, "shut up".  It will proceed on that basis.  

Oh, and if that doesn't work they will attempt to do to him what they did to another Republican who did an amazing job as President and was despised by Democrats for doing so, Abraham Lincoln.      

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Here's "predication" in Joe Biden's own words:

Speaking of Dogs Hunting Terrorists...

President Trump correctly acknowledged the dog injured in the successful raid on Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi Saturday.  Good for him.  But this is not the first dog that should be credited with helping eliminate a top terrorist.  When Barack Obama presided over the raid on Osama bin Laden, I compared his efforts to those of my Labradoodle.  The video below should be enough for a posthumous medal for sweet Rory, but I won't hold my breath...   

Fact Check: The Truth About The Trump Ukraine Controversy

But there’s documentation in criminal investigations and in counterintelligence investigations to explain the predication for the opening of a file, that is, the basis for the opening of a file. 

— James Freeman, WSJ, "The Unbelievable James Comey," 10 Dec. 2018

There's a lot of noise in the Trump Ukraine controversy.  This always happens with these things because the guilty party will forever muddy the waters... to confuse you.

Here's the simplified version, first from 30.000 feet, and then from eye-level.

From 30,000 feet it looks like Donald Trump just did exactly what he's been screaming Obama and Clinton did to him; that is enlist foreign actors to dig dirt on a political opponent.  And unlike Obama and Hillary who covered their tracks and were shielded by a complicit CIA, FBI, DOJ, etc., Trump was outed by his own CIA for making the request during a phone call with Ukraine's leader!

That's how it looks from 30,000 feet.  It looks very bad.  Maybe even impeachable.  But a funny thing happens when the same events are examined at eye level in much higher resolution.

The detail that is missing from 30,000 feet and that is apparent up close hinges on one key word: predication.  Was there a basis for what Donald Trump asked Zelensky?

Here's an analogy that explains predication:  Consider the cases of two fatal shootings.  In both cases the victim was shot at point blank range in the back.  Are both shooters guilty of murder?  Now consider that in the first case the victim had robbed the shooter and was fleeing.  In the second case the victim had stabbed the shooter and was lunging with a knife for his child.  Predication makes all the difference.  One shooter had a basis for using deadly force and the other did not. 

In the case of Obama and Clinton, the search for predication came up dry.  In essence, their justification for spying on Trump in 2016 and 2017 boiled down to "orange man bad", and shut up. 

In Trump's case, he not only had demonstrable predication, but he also prefaced his request with that very justification during the phone call.  (Full transcript here)

This is exactly what Joe Biden bragged about doing in Ukraine during a Council on Foreign Relations event in 2018:

“I was supposed to announce that there was another billion-dollar loan guarantee,  And I had gotten a commitment from Poroshenko and from [then-Prime Minister Arseniy] Yatsenyuk that they would take action against the state prosecutor. And they didn’t.

I said, ‘I’m telling you, you’re not getting the billion dollars.  I said, ‘You’re not getting the billion. I’m going to be leaving here in, I think it was about six hours.’ I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.’ Well, son of a bitch. (Laughter.) He got fired.”

Mind you, the Ukrainian prosecutor that Joe Biden had fired, for $1 billion U.S. dollars, was investigating how Joe's son, Hunter Biden, came to be paid up to $8,000,000 by a Ukrainian energy company for sitting on it's board while knowing nothing about energy, Ukraine, or doing business in the region.

It is the constitutional responsibility of Presidents to hold government officials accountable for corruption, bribery, extortion and wrongdoing.  Politicians are not exempt from investigation,  especially when they admit to the behavior being investigated!  Moreover,  Ukraine and the U.S. have a treaty that requires cooperation for rooting out crime and corruption.  In other words, Trump was just doing his job for which he had ample predication. 

It all comes down to predication.  Trump had it.  Obama and Clinton did not.  That makes all the difference.  Everything else is just noise.

Will that stop Democrats from impeaching Donald Trump?  Not a chance.  They've been promising to impeach him since before he even took the oath of office.  The Washington Post headline on January 20th, 2017, the day Donald Trump was inaugurated read, "The campaign to impeach President Trump has begun".

The impeachment of Donald Trump has always been predicated on "orange man bad" and shut up.  It will proceed on that basis.



Here's predication in Joe Biden's own words: