The long haul
Earlier this week Michael Cohen announced that out of respect for the sanctity of Donald Trump’s ongoing criminal trial, he won’t mention Trump in any tweets or podcasts until after he finishes testifying against Trump. This is an important development, given the ongoing gag order developments against Trump. But there’s additional news buried in Cohen’s announcement.
Cohen said that his testimony could be a month or more away. Even if Cohen is the final witness for the prosecution, this would mean that the prosecution’s case alone is going to last until late May or even early June. Then Trump’s defense presentation could take a couple weeks. Then the closing arguments and jury deliberations and so on.
So we’re looking at a long haul here. This trial could conceivably run until late May or even June. While no one wants to have to wait that long for Trump to be convicted, this is a good thing. The longer Trump is on criminal trial, the more days we’ll have where the headlines are about Trump being on criminal trial. That’s the kind of thing that motivates undecided Republican voters to stay home instead of voting for Trump, and motivates undecided moderate voters to turn out for Biden instead of staying home.
On a personal note, this also means that Palmer Report is going to be covering Trump’s first criminal trial four days a week for the rest of April, all of May, and into June. Bring it on. This is a lot of work, but I’m more than excited to be doing it. I’m the guy who said all along that Trump would end up on criminal trial well before the election, and so of course I’m thrilled to be covering it.
But this is going to be a grind. Then again, the 2024 election was always going to be a grind, no matter how it plays out, whether Trump ends up surviving it or not. After all, this is the battle for our democracy.
It’s also worth pointing out that Trump’s Fulton County criminal trial is still tentatively on track to happen this summer. So if the New York Trump criminal trial wraps in June, he could conceivably have to turn around and be right back on trial again.
Given that yesterday’s Supreme Court hearing didn’t seem to go particularly well for Trump, it’s also possible that he could soon be cleared for federal criminal trial in Washington DC with Judge Chutkan. When would that take place? That’s anyone’s guess.
But the upshot is that Trump could end up being on criminal trial in one jurisdiction more or less nonstop through election day. And that’s his own fault. He’s the one who tried to drag these trials out for as long as possible, instead of moving for a speedy trial and trying to get them out of the way sooner. So if he can’t function as a candidate because he’s on trial for the entire election cycle, that’s too damn bad. Trump is so far gone cognitively, he can’t seem to function anyway.
