You can tell that Donald Trump’s criminal trial is not going well for him by the simple fact that it is actually happening. His alleged co-conspirator, former fixer Michael Cohen, has already served a year in prison for his role in paying off an adult film star to influence the 2016 election – and now he will be testifying that the former president told him to do it.
Trump’s best hope is perhaps that a single juror sympathizes with him and prevents a unanimous verdict. That could happen even with the most stringent vetting. But what if a juror voted to acquit based not on their honest judgment of the facts, or even their own previously concealed bias, but because they feared the consequences, for them personally, of a guilty verdict?
