tl;dr?! I’m feeling a strong King Midas vibe this morning – incarcerate Individual #1/Prisoner #1 on his home floor of Trump Towers.
Individual #1 will likely become Prisoner #1 when he leaves is removed from office. He’ll resist. An orange jumpsuit would be too matchy-matchy with his skin and hair color. Bad look. We get it. Stretchy pajama pants and Roger Stone t-shirts it is!
As a grifted grifting grifter using the emoluments clause like it’s Opposite Day to it’s fullest, he’s taken enough from us already. But the challenges of security and the challenge of what constitutes cruel and unusual punishment remain.
Former POTUS’ retain a Secret Service detail when they leave office. This additional security to protect Prisoner #1 could be problematic. The lines dividing the authority and responsibility of Secret Service and New York State Corrections could be blurry and difficult to define. Messy.
Housing him in an existing prison facility could be construed as cruel for someone who regardless of his actual wealth, has resided in “the most expensive unit of public housing”1 for a few too many years. Would an existing facility need to be updated so as not to be cruel? Would we need to install gold toilets? Hmmm. I don’t think so.
So we propose that Prisoner #1 be confined to a few rooms of his residence in Trump Tower. Why?
- Prison. Trump Tower already sounds like a prison, yes? “Rapunzel, Rapunzel, throw down your hair piece …” Oh. Never mind.
- Security. Former Presidents have Secret Service detail. Secret Service can subcontract services to the New York State Corrections for work that they currently perform and are required to do once Former President/Individual #1 morphs into Former President/Prisoner #1. No muddy lines as to who has responsibility for his care and feeding.
- A view. The view is fabulous! Prisoner #1 can look but he can’t touch. In the movie Born Rich, Ivanka takes us on a tour of her preserved childhood bedroom. Pristine, fabulous views of, and on some of the most expensive real estate in the nation and she hasn’t lived there for years! Since I’m on this digression, there is room for Individual #1’s adult criminally grifted grifting grifter children too. Space wasted? Well, no more!
- Entertainment. FOX News and the cartoon channels available 24/7. Other electronic communication restricted.
- Food! Individual #1 can order whatever he’d like to eat from Trump Bar, Trump Ice Cream Parlor, Trump Cafe, and Trump Grill! All Trump all the time! Punishment? you tell me.
- Isolation. He is physically removed from the larger prison population and they are not subject to the cruel and unusual orange lying potty mouth.
- Who? Where? Security by obscurity. We don’t need to publicize that he’s there. Other presumably-non-criminal-residents-but-we’re-not-so-sure of Trump Tower can carry on. Not having a constant reminder, it will be easy to ignore him.
Standard prison rules and regulations apply, he is removed from society at large, he is removed from the prison population at large, he is not in any more danger than he is in now, and he is less of a danger than he is now. King Midas Prisoner #1 can view the kingdom he does not own and which ignores him which is it’s own golden punishment. Nothing worse than being ignored.
We won’t pay for a new gold potty. They’re already there. A hu-uge savings.
The rest of us of the US are faced with the unusual situation of how to extract justice from a POTUS whose punishment is imminent. New problems require new solutions. Location, location, location.
Cruel? Nope. Couldn’t be. It’s his residence.
1Footnote: Full credit where credit is due. The phrase “the most expensive unit of public housing” is used and taken from my reading The New Hampshire Gazette.