Dec. 8, 2025: “Lawlessness: The Headlong Dive,” by IP attorney and author Timothy Trainer”
Dec. 8, 2025 — Check out the latest blog post by IP attorney and author Timothy Trainer • Be sure to follow Tim on Substack
How can anyone be surprised or shocked? The man who is at the head of government is himself lawless. In addition to being lawless himself, he silently admires other criminals based on their actions. And, yes, there’s evidence to support this.
There is no slow, gradual descent into lawlessness by the head of government or those he has appointed to top jobs. There has been acceptance of the lawlessness and an embrace of it by his GOP cult followers from the very start. And, it started well before Trump ever took office in 2017, but the habit and culture of Trump’s lawlessness is far too long a history to reprise it here. It is, however, worth mentioning some.
Despite Trump’s stated reason for wanting more uniformed officers on the streets to quell criminal activity, it’s clear from his own conduct that this is simply a political or vengeful decision that targets cities and states primarily run by his political opponents. It is also a way to garner support from his cult followers.
He contradicts his own stated reasons about the need to combat crime and drug use. Trump is so anti-crime and anti-violence that he recently pardoned Juan Orlando Hernandez, the former president of Honduras.
Hernandez was prosecuted in a U.S. court of law and convicted. What was Honduras ex-president convicted of and why has Trump pardoned him? Unlike those being blown out of the water based on questionable evidence at best, prosecutors who successfully got a conviction against Hernandez provided evidence in a court of law in the United States. The evidence against Hernandez included “intercepted phone calls, ledgers which recorded bribes paid by drug traffickers to Hernández, and photographs of Hernández with members of the Valle cartel at the 2010 World Cup.” While Trump pardons a man convicted based on actual evidence, he and his military kill based on shaky allegations, with no hard evidence ever being presented.
The more one looks and reads, the greater Trump’s anti-crime ploy rings hollow. The Washington Post found that Trump wasted no time in pardoning another convicted drug lord by taking that action on his first full day in office in January. Ross Ulbricht, the man who benefited from this pardon, was convicted in a court of law for “creating the largest online black market for illegal drugs and other illicit goods.” Trump pardons major drug traffickers despite his anti-drug rhetoric – The Washington Post. Trump may have campaigned on the issue of the terrible drug crisis, but his crackdown is really a crackdown against enforcing penalties against convicted felons who were proven to be involved in trafficking drugs. He has “granted pardons or commutations to almost 90 others for drug-related crimes”.
Of course, for a man who has been dealt multiple blows by the U.S. justice system, there are reasons for his disdain of law and justice. Given all the legal activity that surrounds the criminal-in-chief who is referred to as POTUS (President of the United States), some can be forgiven if they overlook a few of his legal transgressions. Let’s recall that he agreed to pay $25 million due to the fraud case arising from Trump University. Trump paying $25M after judge approves Trump University deal | AP News And, the New York state fraud case against Trump, though ultimately resulting in finding the financial penalty excessive, left intact the lower court’s finding of fraud by Trump et. al.
Trump’s entanglements that have resulted in findings of fraud extend beyond his profitable endeavors. A New York state judge ordered Trump “to pay $2 million to a group of nonprofit organizations as part of a settlement in a civil lawsuit stemming from persistent violations of state charities laws.” The payment resolves a case brought by the New York attorney general’s office after the Trump Foundation held a fundraiser for military veterans during the 2016 campaign. President Donald Trump ordered to pay $2M to collection of nonprofits as part of civil lawsuit – ABC News. Trump and his adult children were accused of “conflating charity with politics, repeatedly using charitable donations for personal, political and business gains, including legal settlements, campaign contributions and even to purchase a portrait of Trump to hang at one of his hotels.”
Beyond all the fraud cases, Trump’s life of lawlessness includes a jury finding him to have sexually abused E. Jean Carroll. Jury finds Trump liable for sexual abuse, awards E. Jean Carroll $5M | AP News. Her claims of Trump’s improper and illegal behavior toward women are not isolated as more than a dozen other women have accused him of sexual assault and harassment. There’s also this pesky criminal conviction where a jury found him guilty of 34 charges in a scheme to illegally influence the 2016 election through a hush money payment to a porn actress. Trump hush money verdict: Guilty of all 34 counts | AP News.
Given Trump’s affinity to criminal conduct of various types, it’s no surprise that within weeks of being back in office, he issued an executive order “Pausing Foreign Corrupt Practices Act Enforcement to Further American Economic and National Security”. Pausing Foreign Corrupt Practices Act Enforcement to Further American Economic and National Security – The White House. A significant reason for the 1977 Foreign Corrupt Practices Act is to stop bribery between individuals and entities engaged in business with foreign officials and governments. Criminal Division | Foreign Corrupt Practices Act Unit. Trump’s business playbook seems to ignore such limitations and accept or offer payments of all sorts. Putting aside or relaxing rules on bribery appears to fall within his business practices.
Unlike a cute rom-com movie like Sleepless in Seattle, the reality in the U.S. under this administration’s leadership is the nation’s head-long dive into Lawless in America. Indeed, we see a wholesale attack on the rule of law every day and, given the news of the U.S. seizure of an oil tanker just off the coast of Venezuela, U.S. lawless activity will extend beyond our borders. Is our international bullying a way for Trump to imitate Putin?
Photo by AnnaGibbs.com
About the Timothy Trainer: Writing books is a passion for attorney Timothy Trainer, who for more than three decades focused on intellectual property issues in his day job. He has worked in government agencies and in the private sector and his assignments have taken him to 60 countries around the world.
Tim found time to pen a few non-fiction tomes, including his first book, Customs Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights; the 15th edition was published in 2022. Thomson Reuters’ Aspatore Books published Tim’s next title in 2015, Potato Chips to Computer Chips: The War on Fake Stuff.
Fiction was a genre he always wanted to try. In 2019, Pendulum Over the Pacific, was released by Joshua Tree Publishing. “This political intrigue story is set in Tokyo and Washington, D.C., and centers on trade tensions between the U.S. and Japan in the late 1980s,” Tim explains.
In 2023, his first series hit bookstores: The China Connection.
In 2025, he published the sequel, The China Factor, which ranked #63 on the Amazon Asian Literature list in May.
