Trump Calls for Prosecution of John Kerry; Claims Violated Logan Act

Kerry is accused of telling Iran to "wait out Trump."

If John Kerry did indeed tell Iranian leaders what to do, he could be guilty of violating the Logan Act.

ABC News has more:

President Donald Trump went after former Secretary of State John Kerry again Thursday, calling for the former senator and top U.S. diplomat to be prosecuted for meeting with Iranian leaders and "telling them what to do."

It's an accusation that Kerry strongly denies and that legal scholars question the merits of as well. A source close to Kerry said that he has not talked to Iranian leaders since Trump withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal.

Trump's charges against Kerry come as his own administration has heightened tensions with Tehran. U.S. officials said Iran and its proxies were preparing an attack against U.S. forces in Iraq, sending an aircraft carrier strike group to the region and deploying Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to Baghdad in a show of force.

Senior Trump aides met at the White House on Thursday to discuss next steps, with concerns growing about a clash between the two sides. But the president said he was not interested in war with Iran; he wanted to talk to Iranian leaders, but it was Kerry who has blocked that, according to the president.

"John Kerry tells them not to call. That's a violation of the Logan Act, and frankly he should be prosecuted on that, but my people don't want to do anything," he said Thursday during a White House announcement on cutting costs for medical expenses.

John Kerry immediately made the rounds on TV to defend himself.

He appeared on Fox News.

Remember, John Kerry was Secretary of State when Obama gave Iran billions of dollars for the nuclear deal.

This is not the first time John Kerry has been accused of violating the Logan Act.

The Hill explains:

Kerry, who was head of the State Department during the Obama administration and helped negotiate the Iran nuclear deal which Trump pulled out of last year, and Murphy have met with Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif individually at conferences.

It is not the first time Trump has accused Kerry and Murphy of violating the Logan Act.

“If he knew anything about the law he’d know I did not negotiate with anybody. I’ve done what every senator and secretary of State in history have done and that’s just to continue to go to conferences abroad or have meetings in order to be well informed. We reached no negotiations,” Kerry said, before shifting attention to Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal attorney and adviser who has done personal consulting work for foreign governments while also working for the president.

“But what he ought to do is focus on somebody called Rudy Giuliani who has been out there very engaged in direct negotiations in an effort to subterfuge foreign policy,” Kerry said. “The personal attorney of the president of the United States should not be meeting with people who have now been indicted, who have broken the law and are now engaged in activities with the president’s personal lawyer."

But don't forget about Democrat Senator Chris Murphy. 

He has openly admited to secretly meeting with Iranian officials.

See it with your own eyes:

If it weren't for digital media, Senator Murphy's trip might have remained a secret.

We can't know for sure.

However, because The Federalist reported on this, Murphy was forced to admit he met with Iranian Forein Minister Javad Zarif.

The Western Journal explains the situation:

Thanks to reporting by The Federalist’s Mollie Hemingway on Monday, Americans are aware that Murphy took advantage of his attendance at the annual Munich Security Conference over the weekend in Germany to participate in a secret meeting with Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif.

Hemingway reported the meeting Monday, citing a source who’d been “briefed by the French delegation to the conference.”

Murphy’s office would not comment on the report — in fact, “tried to stonewall” sounds like a good way of putting it — until Tuesday, when the good senator released a description of it as part of a Medium post about the rest of his activities on the trip.

While no one has been successfully prosecuted under the Logan Act, the evidence isn't looking good for either John Kerry or Senator Murphy.

Only time will tell.

Fox News confirms that Senator Murphy met with Iranian officials.

It is also ironic that Murphy, who once called for investigations into Michael Flynn for violating the Logan Act, is now accused of doing the same thing.

Fox News has more:

No one has ever been successfully prosecuted under the Logan Act, but some critics suggested in 2017 that Michael Flynn, Trump's former national security adviser, ran afoul of the law in his dealings with Russia before Trump took office. Murphy himself called for investigations at the time. Trump on Wednesday argued the Connecticut senator and Kerry are now the ones in breach of that law, suggesting they face consequences.

"Kerry & Murphy illegally violated the Logan Act," Trump tweeted Wednesday. "This is why Iran is not making a deal. Must be dealt with strongly!"

Murphy met with Zarif while at the Munich Security conference, declaring, "if Trump isn’t going to talk to Iran, then someone should."

On Thursday Kerry also referenced the American drone attack that killed Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani in January, prompting Iran to respond by firing missiles on a base in Iraq, which caused more than 30 American troops to suffer concussions, according to the Pentagon.

“We went to the brink of war with Iran, the president farmed out to Iran the decision about whether or not we’d be at war because if Iran had responded in a way that they might have, we would have absolutely been at war in that moment.”