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| You Could Have Walked a Block Away and Had No Clue Trump Just Got Arrested | You Could Have Walked a Block Away and Had No Clue Trump Just Got Arrested |
| (about 11 hours later) | |
| I missed George Santos at the protest outside the courthouse where Donald Trump was later arraigned on Tuesday, and I couldn’t hear a thing Marjorie Taylor Greene said over the screams of counterdemonstrators and the incessant blowing of whistles. They were the two biggest names who turned out to show their support for Trump on a day that felt at once historic and very small. | I missed George Santos at the protest outside the courthouse where Donald Trump was later arraigned on Tuesday, and I couldn’t hear a thing Marjorie Taylor Greene said over the screams of counterdemonstrators and the incessant blowing of whistles. They were the two biggest names who turned out to show their support for Trump on a day that felt at once historic and very small. |
| The police put up metal barriers dividing a block-size park near the courthouse in two, with dozens of Trump opponents on one side, dozens of Trump acolytes on the other and cops everywhere. Altogether, there were hundreds of people, often screaming at each other across the divide, chants of “U.S.A.” competing with chants of “Lock him up!” Some characters were familiar from the Trump campaign road show, including Dion Cini, a peddler of Trump merchandise who flew a giant “Trump or death” flag, and Maurice Symonette, the founder of the groupuscule Blacks for Trump and onetime member of a violent Black supremacist cult. “He had sex with a prostitute,” Symonette said of Trump, apparently referring to the adult film star Stormy Daniels. “How is that against the law? Who hasn’t done that?” | The police put up metal barriers dividing a block-size park near the courthouse in two, with dozens of Trump opponents on one side, dozens of Trump acolytes on the other and cops everywhere. Altogether, there were hundreds of people, often screaming at each other across the divide, chants of “U.S.A.” competing with chants of “Lock him up!” Some characters were familiar from the Trump campaign road show, including Dion Cini, a peddler of Trump merchandise who flew a giant “Trump or death” flag, and Maurice Symonette, the founder of the groupuscule Blacks for Trump and onetime member of a violent Black supremacist cult. “He had sex with a prostitute,” Symonette said of Trump, apparently referring to the adult film star Stormy Daniels. “How is that against the law? Who hasn’t done that?” |
| Of course, Trump wasn’t indicted for his affairs but for the steps he allegedly took to cover them up. Before the indictment was unsealed, rumors flew across Twitter that it included a conspiracy count, but in the end, all 34 counts were for falsifying business records in connection with the payoff to silence Daniels, which the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, argued was connected to a broader scheme to squelch negative stories about Trump. | Of course, Trump wasn’t indicted for his affairs but for the steps he allegedly took to cover them up. Before the indictment was unsealed, rumors flew across Twitter that it included a conspiracy count, but in the end, all 34 counts were for falsifying business records in connection with the payoff to silence Daniels, which the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, argued was connected to a broader scheme to squelch negative stories about Trump. |
| According to the indictment, the business record falsifications were done “with intent to defraud and intent to commit another crime and aid and conceal the commission thereof.” Though no other crime is charged, the statement of facts accompanying the indictment accuses Trump of violating election laws. It’s the connection to another crime that turns falsifying business records from a misdemeanor into a felony. | |
| Observers from across the political spectrum have been skeptical of the legal theory that underlies Bragg’s case. As The New York Times reported in March, “Combining the criminal charge with a violation of state election law would be a novel legal theory for any criminal case, let alone one against the former president, raising the possibility that a judge or appellate court could throw it out or reduce the felony charge to a misdemeanor.” Trump, in other words, may still wriggle out of this predicament. |