Minutes to midnight
Ever since Donald Trump was booted from office, I’ve been saying that he was only relevant in terms of bankruptcy and prison, and not in terms of political viability. It’s taken some time, as all legal processes tend to do, but sure enough Trump is now facing a remarkable day today in which his life is indeed all about bankruptcy and prison.
By the end of today Trump will have to either come up with a massive bond in his New York civil fraud trial, or he’ll have to tacitly admit that he’s broke and sit helplessly as his assets are seized. There’s always the small chance that Trump will get lucky and someone will hand him the money. But nothing he’s done up to this point suggests that he has any clue how to come up with the funds or any hope of pulling it off.
Also by the end of today, Trump will be assigned an official start date for his New York criminal trial. That date will likely be April 15th (like Alvin Bragg wants) or something close to it. And it’ll be the kind of firm date that doesn’t change no matter how many last minute nonsense motions Trump might file.
So unless Trump gets lucky, by the end of the day his financial dismantling will be upon us, and he’ll be locked into a criminal trial that will leave him a convicted felon on his way to prison before the Republican Party can even get to its national convention.
The Republican Party seems intent on nominating Trump for President anyway, even with his convictions, his senility, and his toxic unpopularity. But that doesn’t mean he has a political future. We’re already seeing some Republican Senators saying they won’t vote for him, even as Republicans keep quitting the House because they’re sick of what he’s turned the party into.
Today is the day of reckoning we’ve been waiting for. Donald Trump is either going to lose his financial house of cards today, or even if he gets lucky he’ll have to wreck himself financially in order to post bond. And today is the day that everyone finally sees Trump never had a magic wand for keeping his criminal trials from happening.
For most of us it’s Monday morning right now. But for Donald Trump it’s minutes to midnight.
