Former President Donald Trump revealed during a podcast interview with Lex Fridman that he purposefully avoided imprisoning former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in order to unify the country.

Trump stated that it would have looked "so bad" to imprison Clinton after winning the 2016 presidential election despite Clinton's crimes. Trump stated, "I thought it looked terrible to take the president’s wife and put her in prison. I want to bring the country together."

Trump understood that no matter how guilty Clinton was, imprisoning her would only deepen already inflamed political divisions in the country.

Back before the 2016 election, it was discovered that Clinton had used a private email server to hide communications from the public. This in combination with her handling of several different situations had many calling for her imprisonment.

To add to those calls was the deep state's protection of Clinton. The FBI notoriously declined to charge Clinton despite finding that she had broken the law multiple times. But Trump had higher goals in mind after he won the presidency in 2016.

Optically Dangerous

Trump was well aware of the optics of imprisoning Clinton after winning the election as the 2016 presidential election was truly monumental in terms of political polarization.

During the interview with Fridman, Trump was asked, "If you become leader again, you’ll have unprecedented power. Just on your own personal psychology, what does that power do to you? Is there any threat of it corrupting how you see the world?"

Trump responded by saying, "No, I don’t think so. Look, I’ve been there for four years. I could have done a big number on Hillary Clinton. I thought it looked terrible to take the president’s wife and put her in prison."

Democrats have been screeching and fearmongering about Trump becoming a dictator and tearing down democracy while forgetting that Trump was already president for four years and did none of the things they said he would.

Trump continued by saying, "I thought it looked so bad. Think of it, you have the President of the United States’ [wife] and you also had Secretary of State, right? She was. But you’re going to put the president’s wife in prison?"

Trump went on to turn the question by pointing out that while he didn't use his power to punish his political opponents, Trump has very much faced the full brunt of the law as Democrats seek to use the justice system to stop him.

Trump stated, "And yet, when I got out, they have all these hoaxes. They have all these dishonest hoaxes, just like they did in the past with ‘Russia, Russia, Russia.’ That was a hoax. The 51 different agencies or agents, that was a hoax. The whole thing was a hoax."

Democrats Tearing Down The System

Where Trump exercised restraint, the Democrat Party has done the exact opposite. Trump has been indicted multiple times in multiple states on sham cases that are pushed by leftist district attorneys who are open about their political motivations.

In the case of Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg, he and his team created an entirely new legal doctrine to prosecute Trump for a "crime" that had no victim.

Thanks to a leftist judge, whose daughter works directly for multiple Democrat politicians, Bragg's case prevailed and Trump is set to be sentenced this month.

Trump is right to complain about the Democrat Party turning America into a banana republic with their political prosecution of him. They are afraid they can't beat him on the ballot so they are using the justice system to deny Americans a choice.