Democratic Michigan Senator Elissa Slotkin is seeking to deter young college graduates from working for the Donald Trump administration by pursuing the prosecution of its current staffers should Democrats win a majority of seats in Congress at the midterm elections.
Speaking at an event at the University of Chicago on Tuesday, Ms Slotkin said she aimed to make working for the Trump administration “feel like a ton of problems” for young conservative graduates seeking employment in his administration.
“I want young people coming out of school to say, ‘Should I go work for the Trump administration? That sounds fun; I might get an opportunity’,” Ms Slotkin said. “I want them to be like, ‘Lord, that might be buying myself a ton of problems I don’t want, and so let me avoid participating in that.’ I want that deterrence message sent.”
She said she hoped that the prosecution of White House staffers in the East Wing would send the right message to potential hires.
“You have to go after people and projects that are just super egregious. So everyone knows the East Wing of the White House, right? people feel that in a way that’s different from a nameless contract at the Pentagon, or whatever,” she said at the institution.
She explained that while Mr Trump himself has immunity from prosecution, his staffers do not, which would make prosecution seamless to achieve.
Ms Slotkin said Mr Trump couldn’t have ruled the U.S. and implemented controversial policies without the backing of his staffers.
“But the people around Donald Trump who are doing his bidding and enabling this have no such immunity,” she said. “They have no immunity the way the president does. And to me, he couldn’t do any of this stuff without all of those people saluting and supporting it. So you go after the people who do his bidding.”
She explained that prosecuting Mr Trump’s loyalists was a priority on her to-do list if Democrats win the majority of seats at the midterm polls.
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