So he would be convicted. he d get sentenced to jail quite possibly. it was dozens of felonies. not like espionage act felonies but still it was bad. if he doesn t resign he goes on trial. he gets convicted. and then sentenced to jail. then he is the vice president of the united states in jail. and from jail what the justice department is expecting about nixon comes true. nixon goes poof from the presidency. so now post nixon we ve got the new president governing from jail. from federal prison. or maybe now that agnew is president he tries to pardon himself from prison? but nobody really knows how that would work. can you do that? would people obey the order that he proclaimed himself pardoned? it would be chaos. so what do you do in that circumstance if you are the u.s. department of justice? what do you do as the justice department when you believe
He becomes president. doesn t mean he stays president. it depends on what he does. he is likely to be wrathful and vindictive. he will certainly try to kick the wheels off of the lady liberty s wagon. he doesn t necessarily remain president. he could be impeached depending upon what congress is in session. there s the 25th amendment that could be used. there are similarities. but i think there are fundamental differences as well. trump is not in office now. he is a contender. there are a lot of moving parts to this and we ll have to see what happens. i do think and i know that my colleagues think that we made the right decision at the right time for what for what was going on. these times are a bit different. there s a lot to play out yet. ron, in terms of the, when you say you and your colleagues believed that was the right
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Nominee. betting is that he will. he may or may not get elected. at the time of the election if he is the republican nominee, even if he is elected, he could have been tried for this espionage case. he could well have other indictments pending against him. it could even be possible he would be convicted and sentenced to jail and you d have the specter. here is where there is a similarity, rachel. you have the specter of president trump running the white house while doing time in the big house. that would be terrible. however, it is not watergate. we re not in a constitutional crisis. the fact that trump would become president if there is a fair election and he is elected, i know for mr. trump it is only a fair election if he wins, but if there is a fair election and he becomes president, that s democracy.
Continue to run for president not only after i m indicted. i will continue to run for president even if i m convicted. that is what trump is saying now. in agnew s case? you just heard him say it. i will not resign if indicted. very same kind of pledge. but think about how that would work in practical terms. i mean, think about that with the agnew case. especially given that, you know, with benefit of hindsight we now know that nixon was out. nixon didn t get to the end of his term. he was forced out by the watergate scandal. think about what that would have meant with agnew not resigning if indicted. all right? they ve got all the evidence against him. justice department indicts him. he says he won t resign if indicted so okay. let s say they pressed on. they went to trial. he would very likely be convicted on dozens of felony counts. they had very hard evidence against him.