34 Indictments Effect

[Meclazine for Israel]

Given the election is now complete, looking back from a history point of view, what affect, if any, did the New York 34 Indictments Case have on the outcome of the 2024 election?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosecution_of_Donald_Trump_in_New_York

[ottermax]

Trump underperformed given the economic environment and unpopularity of the Biden admin.

[Pericles]

The status of being a convicted felon had a slight negative effect but it mostly wasn't an issue in the campaign.

[Arizona Iced Tea]

The lawfare did help him a little bit. I think the whole prosecutor vs felon dynamic ended up playing in his favor. It reminded me a little bit like Catch Me If You Can where most of the audience rooted for Abagnale and his escapes.

[Progressive Pessimist]

No effect.

Maybe if he was sentenced prior to the election it could have. Merchan f***ed up!

[Schumer can go f*** himself!]

Helped Harris

[qrdlelections]

Surprised by this poll.  As far as I recall, Trump's polling shot up hard every time he was indicted.

Honestly, I thought the democrats were doing it to keep Trump viable in perhaps the same way media gave him too much airtime in 2016.  

[Pericles]

Surprised by this poll.  As far as I recall, Trump's polling shot up hard every time he was indicted.

Honestly, I though the democrats were doing it to keep Trump viable. 

It helped him in the Republican primary, but him actually being convicted was a slight vote-loser in the general election (the President should not be a criminal so this is hardly a win).

[qrdlelections]

Not sure I agree with that.  I believe young black and latino men who have been perhaps unfairly targeted by the police (or at least have that perception) came to identify with Trump over this.

[Progressive Pessimist]

Not sure I agree with that.  I believe young black and latino men who have been perhaps unfairly targeted by the police (or at least have that perception) came to identify with Trump over this.

I still think this is beyond absurd. They voted for him for other reasons.

[Zenobiyl]

Not sure I agree with that.  I believe young black and latino men who have been perhaps unfairly targeted by the police (or at least have that perception) came to identify with Trump over this.

Agree. I laughed at this idea before the election, but it looks like it turned out to be true. One cook county precinct that covers a correctional facility even swung 98-2 Biden to 49-47 Trump!

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

My theory is that it was a slight positive.

My theory is that outside of any of the main specific issues, the main reason that Trump won is because he presented himself as an 'alpha male' who could fix these problems, especially in contrast to the 'wimp' Biden (and by extension Harris) who were defeated by these problems.

This is, indeed, no different than 1980 with Jimmy Carter as the defeated wimp and Ronald Reagan as the actor who played alpha males characters so much that people assumed he was an alpha male.

Americans (and really people the world over) may say they don't like convicts, have no respect for them whatever, but at some maybe more subconscious level I think many people including Americans have an admiration for the stereotypical convict for at least being an alpha male (and that's true for women convicts as well.)

I regard it as only a slight positive because I'm sure it cost him votes as well and there were many other things Trump did to promote himself as the alpha male.

The references to Trump as a threat to be a dictator were probably the biggest blunder from his opponents that promoted him as the alpha male. Not that it isn't a legitimate threat, but that doesn't take away from the electoral effects.

It reminds me of a scene from Yes, Prime Minister where Sir Humphrey Appleby gave an interview where he unintentionally suggested that Prime Minister Hacker was dictatorial. At the end of the episode where Appleby apologies to Hacker for this, Hacker is instead very pleased, slips a hand into his breast pocket which I believe was meant to be a visual reference to Mussolini and says "Dictatorial eh? Good, Voters like that. It means they think I'm decisive."

I admit that I didn't mention this during the election campaign because I didn't know what was going on. I was surprised after getting away from the Biden message of arguing Trump is a threat to democracy with the argument that Trump is 'weird' that the Democrats ended up with 'Trump is a threat to democracy' as their closing argument. But, I didn't know what to make of it, so I didn't make any comment.

Obviously Democrats would have had to have gone further with the 'weird' argument to tie into that how Trump would actually be a joke on solving the leading issues of cost of living/inflation, foreign policy weakness and crime, by for example correctly pointing out that Trump's real record as President was one of being an indecisive flip flopper due to his total ignorance on policy.

However, I think it's likely that Trump's acting job of himself as the alpha male was so convincing to Americans who are extremely shallow in general, that Democrats just couldn't convince voters of this reality versus the fantasy.

Finally, unless anybody think I'm contradicting myself, there is no reason an indecisive flip flopper can not also want to be a dictator and take the necessary steps to become a dictator. The two really are not connected. Being a dictator is related to ego, grift and/or lust for power. Actual knowledge of issues has nothing to do with any of that.

[Redban]

I feel the NY indictment and conviction became a forgotten big event, like the assassination attempt. People just forgot that he was convicted; the same happened after the Judge Engoron and E Jean Carroll verdicts too. The ordinary person didn't dwell on these events for long

When the NY trial was ongoing, this site had an active thread in the General Politics section, where people posted and analyzed the minute details. But from my experience, the average person didn't follow the trial day-to-day that way. People knew the trial was happening, and they knew Trump got found guilty; then they moved on.

I don't think this indictment had a major effect

[Duke of York]

if he was sentenced before the election it might have had an impact.

[qrdlelections]

My theory is that it was a slight positive.

My theory is that outside of any of the main specific issues, the main reason that Trump won is because he presented himself as an 'alpha male' who could fix these problems, especially in contrast to the 'wimp' Biden (and by extension Harris) who were defeated by these problems.

I don't think people equate convicts with alpha male.  I believe it was more anti-establishment.  People are largely upset with the status quo across the world - fueled by both the economy and increased immigration.  

Being targeted by the DOJ  and NY democratic lawyers and judges increased Trump's anti-establishment profile.  Young minorities certainly were attracted to this quality, as I mentioned above, but also more generically speaking - many others who are unhappy with current direction and want things to change.

It should be no surprise that Trump leaned into the indictments heavily for political purposes.  He understood the political value of this.  Notice also how Kamala laid back on these issues during the debate.   She did not, for example, call him a convicted felon as Biden did, but rather very technically that he was 'arraigned'.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

My theory is that it was a slight positive.

My theory is that outside of any of the main specific issues, the main reason that Trump won is because he presented himself as an 'alpha male' who could fix these problems, especially in contrast to the 'wimp' Biden (and by extension Harris) who were defeated by these problems.

I don't think people equate convicts with alpha male.  I believe it was more anti-establishment.  People are largely upset with the status quo across the world - fueled by both the economy and increased immigration.  

Being targeted by the DOJ  and NY democratic lawyers and judges increased Trump's anti-establishment profile.  Young minorities certainly were attracted to this quality, as I mentioned above, but also more generically speaking - many others who are unhappy with current direction and want things to change.

It should be no surprise that Trump leaned into the indictments heavily for political purposes.  He understood the political value of this.  Notice also how Kamala laid back on these issues during the debate.   She did not, for example, call him a convicted felon as Biden did, but rather very technically that he was 'arraigned'.

You might be right but it doesn't have to be one or the other.

However, and I realize the Mafia is just a subset of convicts, but I don't think people are like "I admire the Mafia because they're anti establishment, I think it's I admire the Mafia because they're alpha males." Here, again, you may not find people willing to say they admire the Mafia, but that doesn't really mean anything.

Obviousy most convicts aren't in the Mafia, but as I'm sure you'd agree these perceptions and how they subtly effect thinking are often not rational.

[LBJer]

Trump underperformed given the economic environment and unpopularity of the Biden admin.

Yes.  Democrats down on Harris should remember that she was running as the vice-president of a president whose performance a substantial majority of Americans disapproved of--the polls hovered around 40 percent approved/55 percent disapproved--and at a time when the VAST majority of Americans, more than 70 percent, were dissatisfied with the overall state of the nation.  Yet she still came close to winning.  This suggests that there were countercurrents blowing in her favor--namely, that many Americans found Trump's behavior unacceptable. 

Unfortunately, not enough did to prevent him from winning.

[qrdlelections]

You might be right but it doesn't have to be one or the other.

The machismo dimension is definitely a huge effort by the Trump Campaign.  I'll agree that aspects of the indictments helped with that.

Maybe it's just my personal bias.  I really despair at the idea that anyone would equate convict with alpha male, mafia or otherwise.