NY: Convicted Felon Donald Trump!

[The Mikado]

If Trump even spends one day in prison for any of his crimes, then it would be one of the greatest things to happen in American history.

Hopefully, he serves at the very least a year in prison.

I still don't see Trump serving even one day in federal prison, even with a Democratic president. The pressure the latter will be under to pardon, let alone commute, Trump for the supposed "good of the country" would be enormous and I definitely don't see a centrist like Biden withstanding it. It's just like with the former Confederate leaders and Nixon.

Is...this a joke? You know Biden was in the Senate when Ford pardoned Nixon and was one of the most vocal critics of it at the time, right?

Why the hell would anyone think he's pardon Trump? That's just a real sign of just how you don't know the first thing about Joe Biden and his career.

EDIT:

I'm not saying it's impossible Trump gets pardoned, but I think it's impossible Joe Biden pardons him. Trump can (and would!) get pardoned if a Republican (himself or someone else) wins the Presidency.

In fact, IF Trump gets convicted (which we've established is not a sure thing), the election becomes a literal matter of freedom or captivity for him and you'd better believe he'll pull out all the stops and fight like hell.

[The Mikado]

Given this case starts a week from Monday can we update the thread title?

[The Mikado]

Along those lines.

He won't be campaigning in any states that he needs to win, which helps Biden

He has Wednesdays and the weekends. As a practical matter, he rarely did his rallies outside the weekends.

Yes he did no campaign events today. The Biden campaign actually pointed this out, since he keeps complaining how it's unfair the trial is keeping him off the campaign trail.

Trump's next scheduled rally is Saturday May 11th (not this Saturday, not next Saturday, but the Saturday after). In Wildwood, NJ of all places.

For a guy complaining this trial is keeping him off the campaign trail, he's not trying to make up for lost time.

I've pointed this out elsewhere, but northeastern Pennsylvania is like RIGHT THERE from New York City and is the key region that'll probably decide the state. He could probably finish his trial on a Tuesday and fit in Tuesday evening and Wednesday events in Scranton and Wilkes-Barre and be back for Thursday trial.

[The Mikado]

Like, what do defendants who have been convicted of this crime usually get as a penalty? Isn't there a recommended sentence for each class of felony in the state?

They're seeking this as a Class E felony, which in NY is apparently up to 4 years but a first offender wouldn't get anywhere near that. I tend to agree with people who think giving Trump jail time will be impossible but even if it wasn't we'd probably be talking like 12 months?

Anyway, that's an argument for the sentencing phase if we get a conviction.

I do think people are unprepared for how quickly this trial is moving and how late in we already are. The prosecution is indicating it plans to rest Tuesday of next week (the 21st) and the defense is saying that they think their case would take about a week, so we'll probably have a verdict the first or second week of June? That's a lot closer than I think people are mentally ready for.

[The Mikado]

Tomorrow might be Trump's best shot of the entire trial, arguably even more than the Defense case later on. Putting Cohen on cross has a lot of potential given how much Cohen has lied about all sorts of things over the years.

[The Mikado]

I'm probably going to jinx it, but here it goes: is it me? Or is this trial going unusually well for the prosecution?

Sorry all. I did jinx it.

Acquittal or hung jury is of course going to happen. Trump probably gets re-elected, and everything continues to suck.

What the hell, man?

Obviously this isn't a slam dunk but this trial very much leans towards the prosecution.

[The Mikado]

Biden has stayed silent on Trump’s trial. The verdict will change that.
Biden will speak at some point after the verdict, whether it be a conviction, acquittal or hung jury.

Joe Biden plans to break his vow of silence and publicly address the criminal trials Donald Trump is facing when a verdict is reached, four people familiar with internal deliberations told POLITICO.

Biden intends to initially address the verdict in a White House setting — not a campaign one — to show his statement isn’t political, according to the people, who were granted anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

If the jury convicts Trump, Biden’s team will then argue that the result shows Trump is ill-suited for office and that it demonstrates the extremes to which the former president would go to win again. The campaign’s social media team is considering leveraging the line of attack further, with discussions underway about referring to the ex-president online as “Convicted Felon Donald Trump.”

His team is also preparing for a barrage of Republican and Trump attacks if the former president’s acquitted or if there’s a hung jury.

https://www.politico.com/news/2024/05/24/biden-trump-trial-verdict-00159981

That's the real benefit of the verdict, especially if it's a conviction, Biden and other Democrats can finally not have their arms tied behind their back about this.

People have asked why Biden hasn't been talking about this case but Biden really really doesn't want to give Trump a free "tainted jury pool" line for appeals.

Back in 1970 Richard Nixon as President casually commented that of course Charlie Manson was guilty during the middle of the trial process. Nixon said that Manson was “guilty, directly or indirectly, of eight murders without reason.” Manson's attorneys through the whole appeals process made the case that Manson's verdict should be thrown out as a public statement by the US President was incredibly prejudicial and not something the jury could avoid. Manson's strategy eventually failed but it was a pretty strong argument with a real chance of getting him off the hook.

If Biden were to come out and say "of course Trump's guilty" or publicly comment on the details of the case that'd be the biggest gift he could hand Trump.

All this ends after the verdict comes down.

[The Mikado]

Trump team increasingly sees acquittal as unlikely, sees their only path through hung jury.

They seem to think 1 juror may be on their side. Hard to tell if it's just desperate spin at this point though

https://twitter.com/MarcACaputo/status/1795563214308082144

Having your ”face light up” at the sight of JD Vance is not something a normal person does. Also “reacting favorably” to seeing Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, a first term Congresswoman literally no one knows? IF this reporting is accurate, it’s going to be a hung jury.

Anna Paulina Luna is literally a former model. I could easily imagine a male juror "reacting favorably" to seeing her for non-political reasons.

[The Mikado]

Jury speculation is foolish but I think there's a few reasonable assumptions that CAN be made:

1. If every Juror thinks Trump is guilty they'll probably come back today/tomorrow
2. If they don't come back within 36-48 hours (my personal thought is before Lunch tomorrow), then 1+Jurors are not convinced of guilt.
3. The longer deliberations go on the odds of a hung jury go up.

anything more than that just devolves into silly fanfic imo.

This seems basically right though I'd put a little longer timeframe on 2. I think that if there's no verdict by Friday hung jury on at least some counts becomes very likely.

Btw that gets at a potential cause of delay: juries are supposed to try to get verdicts on all counts and you could end up e.g. with the jury getting to guilty on the 9 counts involving checks with Trump's signature but no consensus on the other 25 counts and they'd have to try for days.

People have mentioned the Manafort case. Manafort was convicted on 8 out of 18 charges but the other 10 were hanged and the jury took days struggling with the last 10 before giving up.

[The Mikado]

MAGA Tears!

https://twitter.com/specialpuppy1/status/1796295622678732858?s=46

Fully support Teresa Trump on a new life. Very brave to make that sort of transition so late in life. Still not voting for you, Teresa.

[The Mikado]

Someday when I'm getting prosecuted for an in-kind campaign finance contribution in the form of hush money to cover up a questionably consensual stint with a porn star I'll remember this and bemoan how foolish I was. If it can happen to Trump it can happen to anyone.

[The Mikado]

Also extremely sick of people acting as if Trump revving up his "base" is enough to win.

If Trump gets 47%+ of the vote, he probably wins. If Trump gets 45%- of the vote, he loses. Between those numbers is a close race.

In the 47% of the vote scenario and the 45% of the vote scenario, the overwhelming number of the same people are supporting him. Trump wins or loses by a small group on the margin.

[The Mikado]

Love Blago.

Does a corrupt Illinois Democrat really play well with the Fox crowd? If so, they’re even dumber than I thought.

Classic Fox news democrat syndrome. Their viewers adore the parade of so-called Democrats they put on camera to decry and pearl clutch over how much the Democratic party has betrayed them blah blah blah blah blah

What scandal-ridden and disgraced R washup would be the equivalent of this? If Mark Sanford were a CNN or MSNBC commentator, maybe? Say what you will about the MSNBC Republican as a species, it's almost never the "disgraced and chased out of office in scandal" types who went that route.

EDIT: Forget Sanford, the answer would be if Bob McDonnell were a cable news frequent flier. He's a pretty good match for Blago.