Former President Donald Trump has been indicted for a third time, now on the charge that he attempted to subvert the 2020 presidential election. The indictment, filed by special counsel Jack Smith on August 1, 2023, accuses Trump of conspiring to obstruct the counting of electoral votes on January 6, 2021, by spreading lies about election fraud and inciting a violent mob to storm the U.S. Capitol.
The indictment also details how Trump pressured Vice President Mike Pence to reject slates of electors from states that Trump had lost narrowly, and how he tried to leverage the Capitol riot to persuade lawmakers to overturn the election results.
Until recently, no American president had ever been charged with a crime. Now, it’s happened three times to Trump over a few months. It’s unprecedented and it does not bode well for American democracy, with potentially long-lasting consequences for our political and legal systems.
The charges mark an extraordinary moment in United States history: a former president, in the midst of a campaign to return to the White House, being charged over attempts to use government power to subvert democracy and remain in office against the will of voters. It boggles the imagination to think that the most powerful leader in the world claimed that he alone had the authority to decide which votes counted and which could be discarded, or that he could make decisions that might redefine the powers of the executive branch of the American government.
Recent history has shown that despite the two previous indictments, one related to the hush money payments made to Stormy Daniels, and the other related to the unlawful retention of classified documents, support for Trump from his loyal base has not wavered. If anything, it has solidified as they rally around him and send in money to his fund-raising appeals meant to fund the GOP 2024 campaign.
Money that he then arbitrarily reassigns to pay for his personal legal defense. His political action committee, Save America, disclosed on Monday that it spent more than $40 million on legal fees during just the first half of 2023 for costs related to defending him, his aides and other allies.
Minutes before the indictment was announced, Trump called it “fake” on his Truth Social media platform, pitching the monetizing machine into high gear.
A Trump campaign statement later said: “President Trump has always followed the law and the Constitution, with advice from many highly accomplished attorneys.” The statement likened his indictments this year to “Nazi Germany in the 1930s.”
How likely is it that even a third indictment may spell doom for the embattled former president?
According to Reuters, this latest indictment will likely propel him to the Republican Party’s 2024 presidential nomination.
“This will rally his supporters to his talking points – about how the establishment and the ‘deep state’ are against him and against them,” Stu Rothenberg, a non-partisan political analyst, said before the indictment was handed down.
Yet Politico offers a different view, one that is not so favorable to Trump and the outlook for his GOP nomination. “… this indictment is on more serious charges — an attack on American democracy,” they write. “That may be harder for at least some voters to dismiss than an episode involving hush money to a porn star or holding on to some government documents,” predicting a downturn in his popularity.
The reaction from Republican presidential candidates was mixed, ranging from criticism, support, and calls for him to drop out of the race.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, said he had not read the indictment but criticized the “politicization of the rule of law” and vowed to “end the weaponization of government” if elected president. Ironic that DeSantis who has turned his war against “wokeness” into a veritable crusade, using every lever of government to destroy the Disney company, attack the LGBTQ+ community and dictate school curriculums, should claim to want to end the weaponization of government.
Former vice president Mike Pence declared, “Today’s indictment serves as an important reminder: anyone who puts himself over the Constitution should never be President of the United States.”
Former Gov. Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas, who called for Trump to end his campaign before and after the indictments were announced, said that Trump should “step away from the campaign for the good of the country” and that he was “morally responsible” for the attack on democracy.
Republican Will Hurd of Texas, expressing a view held by many non-MAGA adherents, tweeted that Trump’s campaign was “driven by an attempt to stay out of prison and scam his supporters into footing his legal bills” and that he was “unfit for office”.
It is highly likely that Trump will be nominated. If he does, it will be the loyal base and the rest of the electorate that will have the final word on his fate.
We have had ample opportunity to observe that Trump’s principal skills are self-promotion and the ability to monetize every misfortune that befalls him. Trump’s campaign committee, Donald J. Trump for President Inc., receives millions of dollars in donations from small-time supporters who cling to the illusion that he is the victim of the famous witch hunt that he invokes every time that he is caught with his hand in the cookie jar.
It remains to be seen whether there are enough of them to propel him to the White House for a second term, because there are not many who can realistically believe that a megalomaniacal politician like him would willingly step out of the way for the good of the country.
