Presidents of other countries have been tried— Louis XVI (France), Charles I (Great Britain), Lula in Brazil, Nicolas Sarkozy in France, Hissène Habré (Chad), Zulfikar Ali Bhutto (Pakistan), Alberto Fujimori in Peru, Park Geun-hye (South Korea), Slobodan Milošević (Serbia), Carlos Menem (Argentina), Charles Taylor (Liberia), mar al-Bashir (Sudan), Pervez Musharraf (Pakistan)— and others were disposed of extrajudicially, like Salvador Allende (Chile), Muammar Gaddafi (Libya), Saddam Hussein (Iraq), Patrice Lumumba (Congo), Tsar Nicolas II (Russia), Nicolae Ceaușescu (Romania), Indira Gandhi (India), Benito Mussolini (Italy)… the list is endless.
And now Trump’s series of trials. Before it got started, Trump sent out an e-mail asking his supporters to send money. There was wall to wall coverage on TV. The first order of business was Merchan telling Trump he would not be recusing himself and dismissing Trump’s spurious claims of bias. Trump’s campaign then sent out another hackneyed fundraising e-mail (“They’re just a DEEP STATE plot from RADICAL Democrats to come after you— and I’m the only thing standing in their way!”). They didn’t pick any jurors on day one; over half of the 96 perspective jurors from the pool said they couldn’t be impartial and were dismissed.
It didn’t take long— less than an hour— before Trump fell asleep. He had been all hopped up on drugs in Schnecksville— listen to this Trump version of the Gettysburg Address— and yesterday he paid the price with low, low energy and a nappy during the argument over using National Enquirer evidence.
The prosecutor Joshua Steinglass, asked the judge to hold Trump in contempt for violating the gag order that forbids him from denigrating witnesses to the public (which Trump has been doing). Steinglass wants Trump fined $1,000 for each violation. Merchan says he’ll rule on that next week. Merchan ruled in Trump’s favor several times, exactly as Trump hoped he would, trying to disprove Trump’s baseless accusations that he was biased— a Roy Cohn strategy. Trump fell asleep again. Maggie Haberman wrote: “Trump appears to be sleeping. His head keeps dropping down and his mouth goes slack.” She neglected to mention he was drooling.
Before the court was adjourned the Trumpanzee campaign sent out another fundraising e-mail falsely claiming Pig-Man had stormed out of court. Maybe he had dreamed that in one of his naps.
The NY Times had 5 takeaways from yesterday’s show:
Justice Merchan is no-nonsense. That hasn’t favored the defense.
The trial is about much more than business records.
Trump says he’s happy. His demeanor suggests otherwise.
The trial may take a while.
We are on our way to picking a jury. Slowly.
The Washington Post had takeaways too, different ones:
Prosecutors want to include salacious details of Trump’s history with women
Judge warns Trump to behave in court
Trump will be present during sidebar questioning of jurors
Picking a jury could take a while