What the Manhattan DA is really trying to do to Donald Trump
I suspect the Manhattan DA’s criminal indictment of Donald Trump will be neat and tidy, a simple enough case to not be overly prone to legal challenges, consisting only of charges that are easy to convict on. DA Alvin Bragg seems to want a quick and easy win that’ll put Trump behind bars – which works for me.
Bragg previously hesitated to bring a different indictment against Trump that was more ambitious but also riskier in terms of getting a conviction. Now that he is indicting Trump, he’s focusing on campaign finance fraud, which is straightforward (in spite of the ratings-driven doomsday hysteria you’re hearing on television right now), with numerous corroborating witnesses to help ensure a conviction.
That strongly points to Bragg just wanting to cleanly and efficiently nail Trump on one easily convictable crime that takes Trump down, rather than try to litigate every inch of Trump’s lengthy life of crime. Which under the circumstances feels like the responsible move.
This will lead to inevitable outrage from folks on social media who will insist the “rule of law is dead” because Trump isn’t being indicted for every single thing he’s ever done. But these people have no connection to reality, and just want to feel defeatist outrage.
It remains to be seen just how broad Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is being with her Trump indictment; for all we know she could charge him with something as ambitious as RICO or something as safe and straightforward as election fraud. The same goes for DOJ Special Counsel Jack Smith, whose multiple Trump criminal probes appear to be targeting him for everything from sedition to fraud to espionage.
But if I’m reading Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s moves right, he just wants a safe and comparatively swift conviction on an easily provable felony charge. Realistically speaking, given Trump’s current situation, any felony conviction and any length of prison sentence will finish him off for good. So if that is indeed Bragg’s goal with this indictment, then we should all be just fine with it.
