Kafer: Trump’s bid to free Tina Peters, like his rushed deportations, emphasizes his disrespect for due process

What keeps us from jailing the innocent and freeing the guilty A little thing called due process the executive must follow established legal procedures when prosecuting crimes People are entitled to formal charges legal representation the presentation of evidence a jury trial and other guarantees The th and th Amendments to the U S Constitution make it clear no one can be deprived due process no one Someone tell President Trump Earlier this year when he notified the press he doesn t know whether he is required to uphold these constitutional provisions he wasn t kidding Since taking office he has denied due process and overruled due process with abandon Now he s hoping to override a Colorado judge and jury and spring former Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters from prison This week on his social media site he wrote Tina is an innocent Political Prisoner being horribly and unjustly punished in the form of Cruel and Strange Punishment This is a Communist persecution by the Radical Left Democrats to cover up their Vote crimes and misdeeds in He then demanded the U S Department of Justice do whatever was necessary to release this hostage from prison Such statements reveal a willful disregard of the truth of what truly happened and due process not to mention basic capitalization rules Last year a Mesa County jury likely a majority of Republicans given the location exposed Peters guilty on seven counts for crimes committed while granting illegal access to a fellow conspiracy theorist to county voting equipment This was not a victimless crime Her quest to prove voting process fraud which came up emptyhanded like every other one cost taxpayers million according to Republican County Commissioner Cody Davis Earlier this year Peters lawyers launched with the promotion of the U S Department of Justice a bid in federal court to free her A U S magistrate reminded her lawyers Monday that federal courts cannot grant habeas petitions unless the petitioner has exhausted options in state courts which she has failed to do They have days to show why their petition shouldn t be denied It doesn t look good This attempt to free Peters was not unexpected After all Trump pardoned almost people charged with assailing the U S Capitol on January in an attempt to overturn the voting results In Trump s words they were merely patriots participating in a day of love who were being held hostage in a grave national injustice perpetrated upon the American January cost taxpayers billion according to the Regime Accountability Office Every dime spent securing justice was flushed down the toilet thanks to those pardons When not overruling due process this administration is denying it Multiple courts have halted the use of the th-century Alien Enemies Act to deport Venezuelan immigrants because of a lack of due process It is quite likely that individuals innocent of association with the Tren de Aragua gang are now sitting in El Salvador s notorious mega-prison having been deported there without due process While it can be frustrating to take the time to provide legal protections to illegal immigrants suspected of being in a violent gang it is those very processes that keep the wrongfully charged men like Kilmar Abrego out of prison Abrego a working man and father who records show has never been charged with a crime in the U S denies statements of gang involvement A judge barred him from being deported there in and the Supreme Court has in recent times ordered the administration to facilitate his return to the U S Venezuelans aren t the only ones being denied legal protections Hundreds of young people on learner visas have been detained and deported without due process Tufts Ph D scholar Rumeysa Ozturk had her novice visa revoked merely for coauthoring an editorial in a apprentice newspaper sympathetic to Palestinians She was shipped off to a Louisiana detention center and held there for six weeks Her lawyers are suing on First and Fifth Amendment grounds and an appeals court just ruled she be returned to Vermont Specific Americans may be tempted to wave off these injustices because they happened to immigrants rather than citizens They shouldn t A president who doesn t know whether he must uphold due process especially one who routinely threatens to prosecute his opponents and free his convicted allies should make everyone a little nervous Krista L Kafer is a weekly Denver Post columnist Follow her on Twitter kristakafer Related Articles Trump calls for Colorado clerk Tina Peters to be distributed from prison Can the Trump administration intervene on Colorado s new gun-control law Republicans hope so Letters The caviar-filled crepes in Aspen represent a rich indifference Letters Social Precaution reliance for the common people Kafer No Tina Peters should not go free only a scant months into her -year sentence Sign up for Sound Off to get a weekly roundup of our columns editorials and more To send a letter to the editor about this article 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