Donald Trump will make history in a New York courtroom on Monday as the first former US president to stand trial in criminal proceedings.
It also raises novel issues for the potential Republican presidential candidate in November, even as he builds a political brand that has so far seemed immune to accusations of misconduct.
Trump is accused of falsifying business records to conceal payments he made during his first term in the White House in 2016 to adult film star Stormy Daniels in exchange for his silence about the alleged affair.
It’s a fairly complicated document-based case in which prosecutors must convince jurors that accounting errors were made to illegally influence the election, said Jessica A. Levinson, director of the Public Service Institute at Loyola Marymount University School of Law. interview.
And while some experts believe it is an election interference case, it is neither the most earnest charge Trump faces nor the easiest for prosecutors to prove, Levinson said.
“This case is going to carry more weight than it should or could,” Levinson said. “They were asked to be a leader, to be a referendum on Trump. And this is a state criminal case. It’s neither more nor less, but the amount of attention it attracts is obviously exaggerated.
“People who believe Trump should be held accountable now have all eyes on this one business records case,” she added. “When you think about the things that have been most damaging to our democracy, this is probably not the issue that should have been addressed in the first place.”
The outcome of the trial could influence how voters view other impeachments, Levinson said.
Here’s the thing one of four against Trump with criminal charges, two in state courts and two in federal courts. State prosecutor’s office in Georgia accuses him of conspiring to overturn the state’s election results.
The two cases before federal courts include federal charges related to Trump’s efforts to make up for his loss in the 2020 presidential election, which culminated in the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, and another federal case accusing Trump of improperly keeping secret documents after leaving office.
Election interference?
Norm Eisen, a legal analyst who served as co-counsel to the U.S. House Judiciary Committee Democrats during Trump’s first impeachment on charges that he encouraged Ukraine to interfere in the 2016 election, said the New York state case should also be considered a state interference case. elections.
Levinson, an expert in political process law, including campaign finance law, agreed, although she said the allegations were not on the same level as those related to attempts to overturn the 2020 election results.
In her opinion, the payments to Daniels were intended to disrupt the 2016 election by concealing key information from voters. They began shortly after a video surfaced showing Trump bragging about grabbing women by the genitals.
Prosecutors say allegations of the porn actor’s infidelity would further erode Trump’s support among voters, and the payments were intended to prevent that.
Levinson noted that the allegations in the case allege violations of election and campaign finance laws.
“It’s not the same as ‘I don’t want you to count the Electoral College votes,’” she said, referring to allegations made in other election interference cases. But “in my opinion, this is an attempt to hide history from voters right after they hear the ‘Access Hollywood’ tape and right before they go to the ballot box.”
Trump has consistently characterized this case, as with all of the criminal charges against him, as a political witch hunt by Democrats to weaken a political rival.
In a fundraiser appeal On Friday, Trump repeated that message.
“HELL LECKS OUT ON MONDAY!” wrote in the email. “BIDEN AND HIS ALLIES WANT TO LOCK ME IN JAIL! Angry Democrats are ready to raise millions while I’m stuck defending myself in court!”
This criticism ignores the high level of evidence needed to bring criminal charges and does not disprove the allegations, but these types of capitalized accusations have proven effective in retaining support for Trump among many Republican voters.
Trump campaign spokespeople did not return messages seeking comment for this story.
In the courtroom
The trial will begin Monday with jury selection, which could take several days or longer.
When actual arguments begin, the case will depend on whether Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg can show jurors that irregularities in Trump’s business records may have contributed to another crime.
Levinson said paying hush money is not in itself illegal, which is why violating campaign finance laws is central to this case.
Bragg and his team should try to simplify the matter and “emphasize over and over again” that the payments were intended to influence the outcome of the election, she said.
Trump’s defense will likely focus on Michael Cohen, a former vice president of the Trump Organization and former Trump personal adviser, who allegedly provided payments to Daniels.
Cohen, who served time in federal prison for tax fraud and perjury, has publicly described Trump’s role in the alleged scheme. However, his credibility after his convictions and the public reversal of his testimony is a earnest issue.
The impact of a conviction on the election is unclear
For more than eight years, Trump has successfully diverted attention and even exploited to his advantage scandals that were previously considered disastrous for political candidates, so regularly debunking predictions of imminent political decline that has become a cliché.
So far, he has dealt with all the significant damages from criminal prosecutions, including the New York case, and even made some political gains from them.
He said the charges are a politically motivated attempt by Democrats to weaken their main political opponent. At least Republican voters seem to largely accept this argument, allowing Trump to do so for nomination earlier this year.
The criminal charges have not yet critically damaged Trump’s reputation among general election voters. He is polling close to President Joe Biden in several swing states and nationally, though voters have told pollsters their opinions could change if Trump is convicted.
But there are reasons to doubt whether a conviction will have any impact on Trump’s standing with voters, Seth Masket, director of the Center for American Politics at the University of Denver, told States Newsroom.
Masket said that throughout 2023, political observers had been wondering how the four indictments against Trump would affect the former president in the 2024 primary election.
The accusations, especially the New York ones that were the first to come to delicate, seemed to actually aid the nomination race. His rivals in this contest largely defended Trump.
Masket said that even if he is convicted, Republican voters in a polarized country are more likely to side with Trump than with a judicial system he daily calls corrupt.
“Everything we’ve seen so far suggests that every bad thing that happens to him causes Republicans to rally behind him and reinforce his view that the system is coming after him,” he said. “I think a conviction would be seen broadly enough by all parties as completely justified and open, I think it is quite unlikely.”
Eisen, who has said he expects Trump to be convicted in the New York case, disagrees, saying the spectacle of a conviction will break Trump’s influence over voters.
“When a jury of Trump’s peers — and their peers, ordinary Americans — sits in court and reaches a verdict, and if that happens, it’s a different order of magnitude,” Eisen said. “And when you combine that with a criminal sentence following a sentence like that, you really are in a completely different situation.”
Beyond the first trial
But if Trump is not convicted or if the charges are reduced to misdemeanors, it could isolate him in voters’ minds from other ongoing cases, Levinson said.
Because Trump has for years characterized legal actions taken against him as political, winning the first case to go to court could reinforce that message, she said.
“If he’s even remotely at risk of being convicted of a crime, that would be a huge victory for him because he’ll see it as saying, ‘Look, any legal action against me is baseless,’” Levinson said. “I don’t think it has anything to do with the law with the other cases. However, it will be a politically huge victory for the former president.”
It’s unclear how much historical significance the former president’s first trial will have, Masket said. But the idea that Trump remains a viable presidential candidate — and therefore somewhat immune from criminal prosecution — is a troubling signal for American democracy.
“We often get the message that no one is above the law, except maybe this one guy,” Masket said. “And that’s the problem. It simply undermines many people’s faith in the democratic system.”
