The first day of Donald Trump’s criminal trial is going poorly for him already

| 2:45 pm EDT April 15, 2024
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Donald Trump’s first criminal trial started today, which means that by definition things are going poorly for him. But as it turns out, things are going particularly poorly for him in court today, for a few different reasons.

Trump predictably started off by losing his motion for recusal. Then his lawyers lost their request for additional time to process late arriving evidence. Trump’s lawyers also looked particularly inept when the judge told them to email something to the court, only for the lawyers to claim that they weren’t allowed to email the court, only for the judge to then correct them. How do they not know this stuff?

But then came the real trouble for Trump, when multiple reporters stated that he appeared to doze off and fall asleep during the trial. Trump is on criminal trial, and he’s so far gone that he can’t even stay awake for it? This is just embarrassing for him.

Then came the part where Judge Merchan explicitly told Donald Trump that he’ll be thrown in the clink if he fails to show up for the rest of trial, or misbehaves in the courtroom. No special treatment indeed.

But the biggest problem for Donald Trump today was that his legal team’s feeble attempts at delaying things failed on every level. This was predictable, yet also crucial. Trump has no strategy or hope of winning here. His only tactic was to delay the inevitable for as long as possible. And with the start of his trial, that’s now failed.