The punishment for Donald Trump, who has been convicted of 34 felony counts of falsifying business documents, will depend in part on what sort of show of contrition he makes.
Hahahahaha.
Judge Juan Merchan hahahahaha could sentence Trump to four years in prison, it is being said. The convictions — convictions! — are for a class E felony, on the edge of higher misdemeanour.
But what on earth do you sentence a former president of the United States to? “Picking up trash on the highway” one vox pop growled from the anti-Trump team gathered, against the pro-Trump team, outside the court in New York. That is the dream of harsh fate transmuted into the form America sees itself through: the ’70s, ’80s sitcom. You can see The Donald in a jump suit less orange than he is stabbing at litter as the theme song plays.
That’s the widespread fantasy. That this will now be over. There’s no reason it will be. Donald Trump is the first ex-president to be convicted of a felony, though not the first who has committed one. Nixon, Warren Harding, Andrew Johnson, JFK, and possibly Bill Clinton, and a few more besides, should all possibly have been in the dock at some point, and some on one or two far more serious charges in terms of threat and harm to actual people than The Donald has faced.
Trump’s crime is not insignificant — concealing hush money payments to former porn actress Stormy Daniels, something that Team Trump thought was necessary to avoiding electoral disaster in 2016 — but it’s still just adjusting a few figures on a spreadsheet. The conviction will be dismissed by some of his supporters as a conspiracy against him, and by the rest as unimportant, something that all candidates and businessmen do.
That it will further dissuade a certain type of voter — middle/professional class, who might have considered Trump in 2016 — does not seem in doubt. But they were mostly likely gone anyway, after the chaos and buyer’s remorse of his four years in office.
The people it won’t matter to are the people who will win the election for Trump, if he wins. They’re the working/middle class in the rust belt states who voted for him in ‘16, and most likely stayed away in ‘20 because Trump had not done enough for them, and they felt they had been taken for a ride. They had always seen him as “a pig”, and it’s not that they didn’t care. It just wasn’t a deal breaker.
Those who think that Trump is now finished should remember that he won the presidency after being caught on tape boasting of sexually assaulting women in order to come on to them, and still won the electoral college.
These voters will surely make up their mind as to Trump’s worthiness based on how things have been under Biden. Given what is felt to be the relentless squeeze on wages, prices and living standards, many may now be getting buyer’s remorse remorse about sacking Trump.
If Trump wins in 2024, it will be this way. He will lose the popular vote even more convincingly than he did in 2016, and win the electoral college. The felony conviction will be a matter of reminder, after half a dozen things have already happened: remember when Trump was convicted of a felony! I’d forgotten that! Etc.
The point about Trump being discredited as a fit and proper person to be president is that it has already happened. And then he became president. Within the American polity is a rich strain of anarchy and anti-systemic passion, of which Trump became the representative, the last Yippie. He’s either finished or on the road back to the White House, and no-one has a clue which it will be. Hahahahaha.
Does felony conviction mean the end of Trump, or will he survive yet another scandal? Let us know your thoughts by writing to letters@crikey.com.au. Please include your full name to be considered for publication. We reserve the right to edit for length and clarity.
