作者：大卫·A·格雷厄姆唐纳德·特朗普是量子总统：既全能又微小、天真的傀儡，对其助手的所作所为浑然不知。
By David A. Graham Donald Trump is the quantum president: simultaneously all-powerful and also a wee, innocent figurehead, blithely unaware of what his aides are doing.
第一个特朗普，即那位宣称“我一个人就能解决它”的人，上周曾在椭圆形办公室，宣称自己拥有无限制的权力来迫害其政治对手。“我本来可以对希拉里·克林顿做非常坏的事。我本来可以对乔·拜登做非常、非常坏的事。我本来可以对贝拉克·胡赛因·奥巴马做非常坏的事，”他说。“我想做什么就可以做什么。”但就在联邦执法人员于昨日早上在华盛顿特区众议员伊尔汉·奥马尔（明尼苏达州民主党）的住所进行搜查之后，特朗普坚称自己完全未参与其中。
The first Trump, the one who declares that he “alone can fix it,” was in the Oval Office last week, asserting his unfettered power to persecute his political opponents. “I could have done very bad things to Hillary Clinton. I could have done very, very bad things to Joe Biden. I could have done very bad things to Barack Hussein Obama,” he said. “I can do whatever I want, if I want.”But after federal law enforcement conducted a search at the Washington, D.C., home of Representative Ilhan Omar, the Minnesota Democrat, yesterday morning, Trump insisted he was completely uninvolved.
在缺乏更多信息的情况下——此次搜查由国土安全部调查局（ICE的一个处理复杂调查的部门）的特工进行——这一行为令人深感不安。特朗普政府已部署一系列调查、搜查和起诉，其中许多显然是借口或政治动机，针对的是直言不讳的批评者。（这与2022年8月在马阿拉歌进行的搜查形成了关键区别，当时搜查出了许多装载高度敏感材料的箱子，存放杂乱无章。）
Without more information, the search—conducted by agents from Homeland Security Investigations, a division of ICE that handles complicated probes—is deeply troubling. The Trump administration has deployed a series of probes, searches, and indictments, many of which are plainly pretextual or political, against outspoken critics. (This is a crucial distinction from an August 2022 search at Mar-a-Lago, which yielded many boxes of highly sensitive material, haphazardly stored.)
黑人女性，包括新泽西州众议员拉莫尼卡·麦克伊弗、纽约州总检察长莱蒂西亚·詹姆斯以及联邦储备银行行长丽莎·库克，一直是特别但并非唯一的目标。此次搜查还打破了选举前60天内在高度政治化案件中不采取公开行动的惯例。试图恐吓或将反对党刑事化是威权主义的典型特征。
Black women, including Representative LaMonica McIver of New Jersey, New York Attorney General Letitia James, and Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook, have been particular but not exclusive targets. The search also breaks a norm against public action in highly political cases in the 60 days before an election. Attempts to intimidate or criminalize an opposition party are hallmarks of authoritarianism.
关于这次搜查，我们仍有许多未知信息，包括用于获取搜查令的证据是什么（尽管《纽约时报》报道称它“在检察官和最终批准该令的联邦法官之间存在重大来回讨论”）；特工可能发现了什么；以及政府可能正在考虑的指控（如果有的话）。一些报道称，检察官正在调查奥马尔已故父亲是否在移民申请中撒谎或遗漏信息。（该政府一直在尝试剥夺在申请中提供虚假信息的人的公民身份。）这位女议员童年时来到美国，17岁时成为归化公民。
There is much about the search that we do not know, including what evidence was used to obtain the warrant (though The New York Times reports it “was the subject of significant back and forth between prosecutors and the federal judge who eventually approved it”); what agents might have found; and what charges, if any, the government might be contemplating. Some reporting states that prosecutors are exploring whether Omar’s late father lied or made omissions on immigration applications. (The administration has focused on trying to strip citizenship from people who gave false responses on applications.) The congresswoman came to the United States as a child and became a naturalized citizen at 17.
特朗普如此描述时，他也表示自己对这起调查知之甚少。“我认为她是个糟糕的人，但这真的由司法部决定，”特朗普昨天说。“我与此无关。”（司法部告诉《纽约时报》，此次搜查是正在进行的调查的一部分，但拒绝进一步置评。）这是我之前识别出的一种模式：当面临艰难问题或强烈反对时，总统倾向于坚持律师负责，而他自己并不了解情况。
To hear Trump tell it, he also knows little about the probe. “I think she’s a terrible person, but that’s really up to the DOJ,” Trump said yesterday. “I have nothing to do with it.” (The Department of Justice told the Times that the search was part of an ongoing investigation but declined to comment further.) This is a pattern I previously identified: When faced with difficult questions or strong pushback, the president tends to insist that the lawyers are in charge and he’s not apprised of what’s going on.
但他的说法很难令人信服。特朗普多次表示，他有“权利”指示联邦检察官调查他希望调查的任何人，尽管他通常坚称自己并未这样做，但证据表明情况并非如此。去年9月，特朗普在Truth Social上发帖，指示时任司法部长帕姆·邦迪对批评者采取行动，其中包括詹姆斯、前联邦调查局局长詹姆斯·科米以及参议员亚当·希夫。
But his claim is hard to believe. Trump has repeatedly said that he has a “right” to direct federal prosecutors to investigate whomever he wishes, and although he generally insists that he has not done so, evidence suggests otherwise. Last September, Trump posted on Truth Social instructing then–Attorney General Pam Bondi to take action against critics, including James, former FBI Director James Comey, and Senator Adam Schiff.
“我们不能再拖延了，这在毁掉我们的声誉和可信度。他们两次弹劾我，并起诉我（5次！），根本没有理由。正义必须得到伸张，现在就要！!!”他写道。随后几家新闻媒体报道称，这条信息原本是作为私人消息发送的。今年春天，邦迪被解职，据称是因为特朗普对他的报复行动进展太慢感到沮丧。
“We can’t delay any longer, it’s killing our reputation and credibility. They impeached me twice, and indicted me (5 times!), OVER NOTHING. JUSTICE MUST BE SERVED, NOW!!!” he wrote. Several news outlets later reported that the missive was intended as a private message. Bondi was removed this spring, reportedly because of Trump’s frustration that his attempts at retribution were moving too slowly.
2月，联邦调查局特工在佐治亚州富尔顿县的一个选举中心进行搜查，以寻找特朗普关于2020年总统大选被窃取的主张的证据。（他们的搜查令主要基于已被驳斥的说法。）第二天，特朗普直接与一些参与行动的特工交谈，这是一次前所未有的干预。
In February, FBI agents searched an election center in Fulton County, Georgia, in pursuit of evidence for Trump’s assertion that the 2020 presidential election was stolen. (Their warrant was largely based on debunked claims.) The following day, Trump spoke directly to some of the agents involved, an extraordinary intervention.
科米最终因威胁总统被起诉，原因是他在社交媒体上发布了一张他在海滩上发现的贝壳照片，照片上写着“86 47”，支持者称这一数字组合暗示着想把特朗普赶下台。司法部坚持认为该帖子构成暴力威胁（科米对此予以否认）。科米律师今年夏天公布的文件显示，特朗普在此案中深度介入，要求获取简报以及在科米被起诉前与其访谈的笔记。
Comey was ultimately charged with threatening the president, after he posted a photograph of shells he found on a beach that read 86 47, a set of numbers that supporters have said connotes wanting to remove Trump from office. DOJ has insisted the post was a threat of violence (which Comey has denied). Documents released by Comey’s lawyers this summer show that Trump was closely involved in the case, demanding briefings and notes from interviews with Comey prior to his indictment.
为了进一步印证奥马尔案是白宫主导的行动，特朗普前助理、斯蒂芬·米勒妻子凯蒂·米勒昨日在X平台上发布了关于此事的帖子，称：“承诺已作，承诺已兑现。”她随后删除了该帖子。
Adding to the impression that the Omar case is a White House effort, Katie Miller, the former Trump aide and the wife of Stephen Miller, posted about the story on X yesterday, saying, “Promise made, promise kept.”She later deleted the post.
但即便特朗普本人并未直接参与，他也通过自己的言论明确表示，他希望对奥马尔进行调查并予以惩罚。2019年，他曾暗示，进步派“小队”成员——其中包括奥马尔——应该“回去帮助修复他们来自的那个完全破裂且充斥着犯罪的地方”。几天后，他在一次集会上批评奥马尔后，目睹人群高喊：“把她送回去！”同年12月，他称奥马尔为“垃圾”，并表示索马里人应离开美国：“他们的国家臭气熏天，我们也不想让他们留在我们的国家。”
But even if Trump is not personally engaged, he has made clear through his statements that he wants Omar investigated and punished. In 2019, he suggested that members of the progressive “Squad,” which included Omar, should “go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came.”A few days later, after he criticized Omar at a rally, he watched as a crowd chanted, “Send her back!”In December, he called Omar “garbage” and said that Somalis should leave the U.S: “Their country stinks, and we don’t want them in our country.”
次月，当奥马尔在一场活动中遭到袭击时，特朗普指责她是自己策划的。今年3月，副总统万斯在接受采访时表示：“我们实际上认为，伊尔汉·奥马尔肯定犯有移民欺诈罪。”白宫传递的信息已经足够明确，甚至能让亨利二世国王脸红。
The next month, when Omar was attacked at an event, Trump accused her of setting it up. This March, Vice President Vance told an interviewer, “We actually think that Ilhan Omar definitely committed immigration fraud.”The message from the White House is clear enough to make King Henry II blush.
如果特朗普像公开证据所示那样，积极参与对政治对手的起诉，那么他的行为就是不恰当的，并且对法治构成损害。然而，如果他真的对正在发生的事情一无所知，那么他就不是他自己所宣称的那种英雄式的、强有力的领导人。他更希望公众得出哪种结论？
If Trump is as engaged in prosecutions of his political opponents as public evidence indicates, then his behavior is inappropriate and damaging to the rule of law. If, however, he truly knows nothing about what’s going on, then he’s not the heroic, powerful leader he claims to be. Which would he prefer the public conclude?