How were similar cases treated in the past? One case that keeps being discussed is the John Edwards case. Edwards was a presidential candidate; he had an affair with his videographer and had a child by her while his wife was dying of cancer. He paid a very large sum to the woman as hush money and was charged similarly with campaign finance violations. He specifically solicited money from wealthy donors to pay the hush money. Jury acquitted him on one charge and deadlocked on the rest; the DOJ dropped the rest of the charges.

Similarly the DOJ looked at the Trump hush money case and declined to prosecute.

Campaign finance laws in the US are a land mine and need reform. There is too much prosecutorial discretion and not enough clarity for people to know whether they are breaking the law. Campaign finance laws have become a way to fish for a crime against political enemies.

To wit: Bragg actively campaigned for his position promising to investigate Trump.

Rule of law should be about observing and then prosecuting crimes, not about spending years and millions investigating people looking for a crime that they committed.

Equality under the law matters greatly and when officials of any type use their discretion to obtain outcomes that are not in the fat part of the bell curve for how said discretion is usually applied to similar fact patterns it needs to be well justified.

We haven't seen the indictment yet so it may be well justified but the scuttlebutt so far does not seem to strongly indicate that.

> How does it show that? The campaign broke the law, was caught, and punished (fined).

> Degree of severity and attempts to conceal a crime are both considered serious factors in punishment a crime merits.

Which do you consider a more direct violation of campaign finance law with direct intent to benefit a campaign?

1. Paying a lawyer to pay a woman to not speak about an elicit affair from a decade prior.

2. Paying a lawyer to pay a private investigator to compile a negative dossier about your political opponent in the, at the time, current US general election.