The indictment of the former F.B.I. director James B. Comey demanded by President Trump sent a shiver of fear through others on the so-called enemies list of the current F.B.I. director Kash Patel. But one other person who might have reason for concern is Kash Patel himself.
There will, presumably, come a time when the Republican Party is no longer in control. A precedent has now been set for prosecuting a former F.B.I. director disfavored by the current administration for allegedly lying to Congress. Democrats already are accusing Mr. Patel of having lied to Congress in his confirmation hearings when he promised not to engage in political retaliation.
Mr. Trump’s campaign to imprison, fire or otherwise punish his political foes and use government power to crack down on free speech he does not like has broken norms that stood for generations. But it has also established new standards for what a president can do that even some conservatives worry may come back to bite them. Power claimed by one party is then eventually available to the other. Limits ignored by one administration may no longer seem binding on the next.
If the precedent set by Mr. Trump takes hold, America may be entering a period when each new administration takes aim at the last one in a cycle of retaliation, a what-goes-around-comes-around pattern more familiar in authoritarian countries than in developed Western democracies. Even presidents more restrained than Mr. Trump may succumb to the temptation to follow at least some of his example.
“Conservatives should see this for what it is: shortsighted and dangerous,” said Sarah Matthews, a deputy White House press secretary in Mr. Trump’s first term who resigned in protest after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.
“If a Democrat wins in 2028, what’s to stop them from turning the D.O.J. on Trump officials or unleashing the F.C.C. on Fox News?” she said. “Trump is setting a precedent that will come back to haunt the right and they’ll have no leg to stand on if Democrats use the same playbook against them.”
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The post In Going After His Foes, Trump Sets a Precedent That Could Haunt His Allies appeared first on New York Times.
