She is an informed, law-abiding citizen, deemed honest and trustworthy by adversaries in court. She carries out her civic duties with devotion and integrity. She is worthy of self-governance.
Citizen Paula Duncan will forever be a footnote in history as Juror No. 0302 in the case of U.S. v. Paul J. Manafort Jr. tried in the Eastern District of Virginia, Judge T.S. Ellis III presiding.
For nearly three weeks, Paula Duncan heard a mountain of evidence in complex bank and tax fraud charges dating back more than a decade.
A reasonable person might ask what took federal investigators so long to make the case against Paul Manafort? For years, a greedy, vicious and dangerous tax cheat was walking amongst us and the feds did nothing!
The answer is as simple as it is appalling. The feds knew about at least some of these crimes but chose not to pursue them. It was not until Mr. Manafort worked for President Trump’s presidential campaign that the feds finally decided to pursue jail time for Mr. Manafort.
Remember that stunning display of prosecutorial corruption as you consider the honesty and decency of Citizen Paula Duncan.
“I did not want Paul Manafort to be guilty,” she told Fox News Channel’s Shannon Bream after the jury found Mr. Manafort guilty of eight of 18 charges.
“I did not want Paul Manafort to be guilty,” Citizen Paula Duncan said. “But he was. And no one’s above the law.”
It was startling honesty, especially in a day when our most powerful spy agencies and law enforcement bureaus have been weaponized by shameless and corrupt politicians to punish political enemies.
Especially in a day when the most powerful prosecutor in the land pursues a politically driven rogue “witch hunt” against a president elected to finally put an end to the corruption and dishonesty that pervades every dark corner of the federal government.
No one is above the law, she said.
But it was not Paula Duncan’s selfless civic duty that the media seized upon. Instead, it was something “deplorable” about her. She, like many Americans, is an ardent supporter of Donald Trump.
She drove back and forth for jury duty every day with a Make America Great Again hat in her back seat.
Hopeless partisans hyperventilating on “social media” were aghast that such a person could have been selected to any jury, let alone one that was designed from Day One to smear Mr. Trump by association.
Even Judge Ellis acknowledged that the whole case would not have been brought except in zealous pursuit of Mr. Trump’s downfall.
One commenter wondered publicly whether the virtue of finding Mr. Manafort guilty outweighed the toxic sin of Citizen Paula Duncan’s admission that she voted for Mr. Trump. Talk about a weak link in the body politic!
The Washington Post, meanwhile, complained that while Paula Duncan might have found Mr. Manafort guilty, she also expressed her doubts about Runaway Prosecutor Bob Mueller’s “witch hunt” campaign against Mr. Trump.
A “reflexive nod to Trumpism,” The Post groaned, ignoring Citizen Paula Duncan’s flawless service to her country.
Indeed, Paula Duncan has more honor and integrity in her small finger than the entire cabal of political thieves combined.
• Charles Hurt can be reached at churt@washingtontimes.com; follow him on Twitter via @charleshurt.
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