NY: Trump on Trial!

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

I don't believe people realize what will happen if Trump gets arrested.  A lot of his supporters feel they have nothing to lose.  Plus, Trump himself is going to fuel the fire.  This is going to get very ugly....  

It got very ugly a long time ago, and it's going to keep getting worse unless our country proves it is willing and able to bring the rule of law to those who would destroy it.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/DougJBalloon/status/1637282221932560384

Saw this and it kind of crystallized something I've been mulling over.  I don't think an indictment will change very many votes in either direction.  Here's why:

Who will change their mind to vote for Trump solely because he's been indicted?  If someone wasn't already going to vote for him, an indictment is surely no plus.  Perhaps there are a few people who might do it as a root-for-the-underdog thing (although the idea of Trump as an underdog in life is rather laughable), but it's got to be a very small number.

Who will change their mind to NOT vote for Trump because of the indictment?  Most people who have stuck with him this long are solidly behind him regardless of any of his negatives, as in his famous "I could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue" quote.  He won't lose many, if any, diehard supporters over this.

The only place I can see it making a difference is among truly undecided voters, in either the primary or general election, trying to make up their minds at the last minute, and this could be the straw that tips them into voting for someone else or just sitting out.

On balance, I see at most a small negative electoral effect for Trump.

As I watch the beginnings of the Republican response to this, I think there may end up being another dimension to it: hurting the GOP downballot. From Republican leadership, down to the goofiest online nutters, they're all screaming at the top of their lungs about "How dare anyone hold Trump accountable for anything!?!!"

I suspect there's a segment of swing voters who wouldn't like the GOP spending a year and a half with its number one priority as "laws shouldn't apply to rich Republicans". The charges themselves may not hurt Trump's chances (as I've said elsewhere, they might even help a little). But IF the Republican Party goes to the mat for Trump on this and other charges - making it a major talking point, neglecting their duties, even sabotaging the government in protest - I think it has the possibility to hurt them significantly downballot  (especially if it leads to GOP nominees being pro-Trump, anti-law nutters).

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Yeah I don't know where he got Tuesday from anyway. They will probably give him a couple of days to surrender himself in NY.

I'd be really surprised if he turned himself in, despite what he says he'd love nothing more than a picture of himself in cuffs, so he can really sell the "martyr" angle.

While you're right that getting arrested on camera would help him sell his claims of martyrdom, I don't know if he can actually accept being arrested. As a technically legal matter, where he's surrenders, is arrested and immediately released, yeah, I can see him (barely) tolerating that as one more step in the legal dance he's spent his life doing.

But actually getting perp walked gets awfully close to facing consequences for his actions - something he never willingly does. I think there's a non-zero chance that he fights the arrest: demanding DeSantis protect him, holing up in Mar-a-lago (like a cult leader in his compound...), or even going on the run to someplace he thinks won't extradite him. (Although short of Russia, Florida is about as safe as he can be... IF DeSantis will protect him.)

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

I really don't understand why this is such a huge deal for some or why they're triggered. Just don't get it. Regardless of whether you like Trump's policies or not, at this point you need to accept that there's very strong evidence he broke multiple laws and on issues that aren't minor.

If he's really innocent as claims, let an investigation and trial happen. Whether he's a former POTUS or not is irrelevant. The law is the law. If anything, politicians should be held to higher standard that average Joe's, not to a lesser standard.

1) It's a cult.

2) Not being held accountable for their own abuses is a key part of the modern Republican identity.

3) Republicans political (and increasingly, personal as well) identities are built on a tower of lies. If they admit that any of their core beliefs are false, that risks the whole imaginary edifice collapsing.

4) Trump is deliberately triggering them. That's what his videos and tweets - helpfully spread by first the media, and then virtually everyone (I'm guilty here as well) - are designed to do. His supporters have been conditioned over many years to be triggered, and he's pulling that trigger as hard as he can.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Is it your argument that local DAs can use politically motivated prosecutions to interfere with national elections?

Even the most woke leftists acknowledge that Bragg has an extremely weak case

Which woke leftists are arguing this?

I am. Yes, Trump broke the law and should be punished accordingly - I do not think he should be allowed to walk away. However, unless Bragg goes in a different direction than expected, he will be arguing that:

1) Trump falsified business records,
2) to conceal a felonious donation to his campaign in the form of a technically-legal payoff to Stormy Daniels.

That #2 is large, novel stretch. I don't think there's anything wrong in saying that I would prefer (not that such preferences ought to matter when it comes to enforcing the law) that the first charges brought against a criminal former President be something more robust.

I don't think Bragg is doing anything wrong (I think he is doing the right thing). But with what we know now, nailing Trump with this looks to be an uphill battle.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Watching CNN clips on YouTube (CNN's official channel). According to CNN's senior crime and justice correspondant Shimon Prokupecz, "we're getting indications that that actually absolutely is not true; the soonest, the earliest that we could see the (former) President ... indicted ... would be next week".

No idea how much credibility that has.

More than Trump's claim that he'd be arrested today,
https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2023/03/21/politics/republicans-trump-playbook/index.html

A source close to Trump's legal team told CNN on Monday that they do not have any guidance on the timing of a potential indictment beyond that they been told by the DA that nothing is expected Tuesday. While an indictment could happen as soon as this week, it is more likely that any potential court appearance by the former president would not occur before next week, a senior law enforcement official familiar with the ongoing discussions about security told CNN.

Trump is well on his way to transforming his crimes into a reality tv show.

Trump is so willfully ignorant about anything that he doesn't care about, it's easy to forget that he is quite talented at his personal flavor of hucksterism.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

*surprised pikachu*

Business Insider:

https://www.businesstoday.in/latest/world/story/us-attorney-who-is-likely-to-arrest-donald-trump-got-funding-from-george-soros-report-374010-2023-03-19

George Soros, a Hungarian-American billionaire who recently targeted India's Adani Group, is currently under attack in America for allegedly funding the attorney who is said to be preparing to arrest former US President Donald Trump.

Trump is facing a probe for allegedly paying a hush-money to adult film star Stormy Daniels and reports suggest that he may be arrested by next week. The probe against Trump is being led by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who according to reports got support from a political action committee that took money from George Soros.

Democratic donor backs Democratic politician. More at 11.

Genuinely don't know what you think this proves. 

Really? Translating Nazi-speak is pretty simple. He's "suggesting" that he prefers to believe there's an international Jewish conspiracy against Der FuherPresident Trump rather than acknowledge that Mr. Trump may have broken the law.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/CollinRugg/status/1638527927079034881

If this is true then this would be a massive own goal

>Fox News

Genetic Fallacy

Fox News has literally zero credibility. Get another source.

MSNBC is just as inaccurate so please don’t play this game .

"
Fox News won a court case by 'persuasively' arguing that no 'reasonable viewer' takes Tucker Carlson seriously"

Why is it always projection with Republicans?

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Trump did reimburse him for it though. He produced the check.

Wait. Seriously?

Damn, I think this case is toast.

No jury is every going to believe that Donald Trump actually paid what he owed someone.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

EVERYBODY KNOWS I’M 100% INNOCENT, INCLUDING BRAGG, BUT HE DOESN’T CARE. HE IS JUST CARRYING OUT THE PLANS OF THE RADICAL LEFT LUNATICS. OUR COUNTRY IS BEING DESTROYED, AS THEY TELL US TO BE PEACEFUL!

That's one of like a dozen of his freakout posts today, but that one appears to be a tacit approval of violence.

In a way, I'd rather see this now instead of later. In a better world, we'd never see it at all, but that option wasn't available once Trump was on the national political stage. Whether it was over his crimes or over a campaign, Trump was always going to call for violence when he didn't get his way, just like he did on January 6th.

But of all the scenarios where Trump calls for more terrorism and treason, this one is probably the most likely to fail (and hopefully destroy him). Calling for treason and an end to the rule of law, two years before an election, because he doesn't want to go on trial for lying about bribing the sex worker he cheated on his wife with sounds like the least persuasive call to arms he can make. I hope he keeps digging until he's well and truly buried himself for good.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

“Why & who would do such a thing? Only a degenerate psychopath that truely hates the USA!” the former president wrote.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/24/us/politics/trump-bragg-indictment-protests.html

The projection is getting frighteningly on the nose.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

So that's 3 separate implications of violence yesterday, which for me leaves no doubt what he's trying to do here.

The silver lining is that when it comes to more of Trump's incitement of terrorism and treason, this is probably the least effective time with the least-persuasive rationale that we could possibly get.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://www.rove.com/article/3-23-23-wsj

I just read Karl Rove's article, "Trump’s Indictment Won’t Win Him Votes"

Usually, Rove is the most astute political commentator whom I've read / listened to. But this article is weak.

The main reason, he says, that Trump's indictment won't win him votes is that "if the charge is filed and the former president doesn’t plead guilty, the case will be heard. With Mr. Trump running again, there will be political fallout, especially if more indictments follow."

And Rove also argues that Trump made a lose-lose mistake by calling on his supporters to "PROTEST! PROTEST! PROTEST!"

But in this same article, Rove admits that Trump is now front-and-center on mainstream news whereas he was, for a while, an afterthought. He acknowledges that Trump has raised a ton of money since the story broke. He explains that the indictment has put the other GOP primary hopefuls in a tough spot, as they struggle to respond to questions about Trump's indictment. All of these details would indicate that the indictment is helping Trump, contrary to the title of Rove's article

I think this is one of those csaes where two things can be true: the pending indictment (let's not forget that it hasn't happened yet) may be helping Trump among GOP voters *right now* for the reasons you mentioned.  But once things become more serious, it will hurt him in the future -- possibly among GOP voters, but definitely in the general electorate.

As we're seeing, it is not just the (possible) charges, it is Trump's response to them that can damage him. January 6th may not have resulted in impeachment or other direct consequences, but it hasn't been disappeared, either. Every time Trump screams and threatens violence he looks more unhinged. That will make the general, and maybe even the primary, harder for him to win.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

He’s now threatening “death and destruction” to the United States and its people if he’s charged with a crime.

Shame on every single Trump voter.

Sure sounds like a terrorist to me. I believe I heard Saddam use the exact same threat several times.

trump is owned by the russkis, red chinese, and the rest of the axis of evil

how his followers havent caught on to that yet is wild

They've caught on. They want in.

The things a fascist pretends to believe are not their beliefs. They're not bottoming for Putin because they're confused about who America's friends are. They're doing it out of ideological dedication to the post-liberal world. They fully expect a fascist America to dominate that world - at which point the marriage of convenience can end.

Assuming the Trumpists defeat the Americans, their plan is still stupid and suicidal. There's no way these imbeciles are going to emerge from murdering half of their neighbors and not get immediately obliterated by Beijing - who'll spend the whole time tech rushing military AI with the scientists their country didn't feed to dogs.

The MAGATs don't believe it, and wouldn't care if they did.

They don't want to murder their non-MAGAT fellow citzens wholesale (although they certainly want to be free to murder us on a whim), they want to enslave us. Oh, they're not going to call it slavery, but their vision of the future is one where they're on the top steps of the pyramid,  enjoying the fruits of the labor of those under them (who in turn have zero chance to compete with them). Because they believe that's their right as fascist, white-supremacist, patriarchal MAGATs.

They cannot conceive of losing. And if they're forced into a loss of global power and influence, they still won't care, as long as they're on the top here at home.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

This story died off quick as can be. 

It's still ongoing, but people aren't sure when it's going to end and if Trump will end up arrested. People stopped paying a lot of attention when they realized that Trump wasn't one or two days from being cuffed.

I think there was never an indication of arrest but Trump made it up so that when it didn’t happen he’d somehow look victorious against the deep state or whatever.

Trump made it up to distract from Judge Howard's finding that he'd likely conspired with his attorney to commit crimes, invalidating his attorney-client privilege, and forcing Corcoran to testify and turn over his records to the special prosecutor's Grand Jury.

In her sealed filing, Howell ordered that Evan Corcoran, an attorney for Trump, should comply with a grand jury subpoena for testimony on six separate lines of inquiry over which he had previously asserted attorney-client privilege.

Sources added that Howell also ordered Corcoran to hand over a number of records tied to what Howell described as Trump's alleged "criminal scheme," echoing prosecutors. Those records include handwritten notes, invoices, and transcriptions of personal audio recordings.

In reaching the so-called prima facie standard to pierce Corcoran's privilege, Howell agreed prosecutors made a sufficient showing that on its face would appear to show Trump committed crimes. The judge made it clear that prosecutors would still need to meet a higher standard of evidence in order to seek charges against Trump, and more still to prove his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

News of Howard's sealed finding broke late Friday afternoon, 3/17, after reports earlier the 17th that officials were "conducting security assessments" regarding Trump's possible arrest "as early as next week".

The report of an imminent arrest, including the Tuesday prediction, came from Trump himself very early on the morning of Sunday the 18th. Without that, the next week of coverage would have been "judge finds Trump likely conspired with lawyer to hide stolen top-secret documents" instead of "Trump facing arrest for lying about bribing the sex worker he cheated on his wife with" (and then not getting arrested).

It was a powerful and effective ploy, that largely worked. Whether it will make any difference in the end, I don't know.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

The number of people who still have a shiftable opinion of Trump or whose minds are set but might not turn out to vote is so small, I have a hard time seeing this have a huge political impact in the general. BUT, one group I really think this screws over is generic down-ballot R incumbents who will now have to answer to the Trump crazies about why they didn't "do something" to stop this and who probably won't get to see any sort of coattails even in a hypothetical 2024 Trump mega-landslide.

Not just that. Those same Republicans will also have to defend belonging to a party that is now publicly on the record as utterly opposed to rule of law.

There have yet been no charges released. None of those commenting know what Donald Trump is being indicted for. And yet, the GOP is clear that whatever the charges might be, they are opposed to them. Not because Mr. Trump is innocent - no, none of them are claiming that - but that the very idea of holding a powerful man to account is something they find unconscionable.

From Trump's supposed opponents like Pence and DeSantis, to party leadership like Speaker McCarthy and RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel, to the nuttiest of cultists they all agree on one thing: it is unacceptable to hold a Republican accountable under the law.

Republicans are the party of tyranny. No one should ever pretend otherwise again.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://twitter.com/mtgreenee/status/1641793406539030528
No way this ends poorly at all...

January 6 Part II. Lord help this country.

No civil war will be good. But if the GOP elects to start the civil war it has been threatening for years, over... <checks notes> the head of a criminal organization facing trial for lying about bribing the sex-worker he cheated on his third wife with, that would be the weakest possible rationale for terrorism, ever.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://mobile.twitter.com/hugolowell/status/1642536946520973312
Oh goodie this should be good

Probably more NFTs, or a similar grift. With a side helping of terrorist fatwa to his cult.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Trump wants the trial to be relocated to more conservative-leaning Staten Island because Manhattan is too unfair to him....

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-04-01/trump-indictment-latest-lawyers-may-ask-for-move-out-of-manhattan?leadSource=uverify%20wall#xj4y7vzkg

Did the Central Park Five get a change of venue when Donald was running full-page ads calling for their execution?

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

https://mobile.twitter.com/hugolowell/status/1642536946520973312
Oh goodie this should be good

Isn't there a chance he'll be issued a gag order at his arraignment, though?

Even if he is, do you really think Donald is going to obey a court order he doesn't like? He'll say what he wants to say, then let his unpaid lawyers try to run interference and drag things out. It's possible the courts are sick enough of his criminal act to throw the book at him if he does, but I wouldn't count on it. 

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

The NYT weighs in with an opinion piece by Ankush Khardori, "Trump’s Prosecution Has Set a Dangerous Precedent"

Yet (with the sort equivocation and omissions that are typical of the NYT's coverage of Mr. Trump and his party's many abuses), in over 1300 words, Mr. Khardori doesn't manage to mention what journalist Marcy Wheeler sums up in a single tweet:

The Bragg indictment of Trump may or may not prove to have merit. But it is all built on the fact that Trump not only didn't sell his peanut farm when he chose to run for President, but he continued to do corrupt things with his peanut farm the entire time he was President.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

LOL (this is the sort of thing that makes me not terribly worried about a civil war)

https://twitter.com/oneunderscore__/status/1643265444575313920

I'm not worried about an immediate uprising in respose to Donald being charged for lying about bribing the sex worker he cheated on his wife with. I am worried that one or more of the nuts who follow him will take his terrorism whistling seriously and succeed in launching an Oklahoma City-type terrorist attack.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Lmao he looks PISSED

Probably worried about where else they're going to match the fingerprints they're getting today.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

Trump's piercing glare is iconic

Makes for a nice contrast with this:


Trump seems to have a lot more spine when he's been caught flouting the law and lying to the American people than he does when confronting a dictator.