The thousands of classified emails hosted on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s illegal server included 22 emails classified as Special Access Programs (SAP), intelligence that is only handled at the highest levels of government. If these or other classified emails were sent from the White House, Clinton’s server conspiracy may have ensnared the President in her security breach and put him in legal jeopardy. Since the Espionage Act 18 U.S. Code § 793f does not require intent, the President himself could be investigated for “gross negligence permit[ing classified information] to be removed from its proper place of custody,” if it were found that he emailed classified information to Clinton’s insecure private server. By the letter of the law, Obama’s emailing the Clinton server could be prosecuted. Just as Donald Trump has vowed to investigate Clinton, he would also love to indict President Obama. Indeed, Trump’s Presidential run is partly a vendetta against Obama that continues from the Clinton-Trump anti-Obama Birther smear campaign. It may be that Trump’s well-deserved humiliation by Obama at the White House Correspondent’s Dinner in 2011 is the inspiration for his campaign. An investigation of Obama seems guaranteed under Trump’s Attorney General. As of late May 2016, Clinton is tied with Trump in the polls, even before the effect of the damning State Department Inspector General’s report fully devastates public opinion of her. If this trend continues (historically, Clinton has never grown a lead in a campaign), Clinton as the nominee makes it very likely that Trump will be President. In this nightmare scenario, Obama and his staff will be almost certainly investigated for Espionage Act violations once they leave office. Of course, Obama does not want to be investigated for ‘leaking’ to Clinton’s illegal server. In effect, he and his staff could end up spending years in prison for the crime of trusting Clinton. To avoid this, he must do everything they can to avoid a Trump Presidency. To remove the electoral and legal liability that is Clinton, the Obama Administration must (quietly) make sure that Clinton is indicted. The party may be thinking they can replace her with Joe Biden or John Kerry after the indictment, but this undemocratic intervention will alienate voters, put the election in jeopardy, and risk the President’s indictment in 2017. Therefore, the only way Obama and the party prevent a future Trump witch hunt is to indict Clinton, disqualify her from the race, and allow a clean convention without any criminal candidates. This would ensure the election of President Sanders, who is leading Trump by 10% and would never pursue EmailGate to Obama’s door. In addition to Obama avoiding possible years of prison time during the Trump years, indicting Clinton will deliver justice for the only major scandal of his Administration: Clinton’s abuse of his State Department for her massive pay-to-play racket.

The Clintons have helped send enough Black men to prison: the President must make sure he’s not one more.