Rubio’s rationale for not asking for witnesses was about as bizarre as you could imagine.  He’s basically saying, “yeah, the standard for proof that he did it has been met but it would do more damage to convict him.”

So let’s apply that to some other offenses.

Guy murders his wife, threatens his daughters, but judge decides it would break up the family so he let’s the guy go home.

Man knocks over a convenient store, but since he’s got a day job at Walmart judge decides it would impact the guy’s family to take away that source of income. So the guy walks.

Another guy, white collar crime, embezzles a bunch of money from the company he works for and gets caught.  But judge let’s him off saying his accounting skills are valuable to that company and that they also need to continue his employment.

So heck, if the punishment for wrongdoing might inconvenience someone, definitely don’t punish them!

 

P.S. Andy Borowitz of course has a funny take on things.

P.P.S. Actually I guess this is really just the standard GOP reaction. Lamar is saying about the same thing.