Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of a former president of the United States being found guilty on 34 felony counts in a court of law is that it is so unremarkable.
After all, who didn’t think national and state justice systems wouldn’t work together to ensure that at least one of four court cases against Donald Trump would happen before the November election? And who didn’t think a New York jury, buffeted by an unrelenting national media that detests Trump, would find him guilty?
Indeed, he has survived two impeachment charges, a two-plus year investigation of collusion with Russia, a pandemic in which the national media attempted to make him the culprit and an incursion at the U.S. Capitol that many say his words encouraged — only to be leading in the polls for another term as president. So why should 34 guilty verdicts be remarkable?
On top of that, though, is the sense — even before Thursday’s proceedings — that a guilty verdict wouldn’t immediately change anything. National pundits on both sides of the political spectrum on these editorial pages have said that very thing. And polls have said there is likely to be very little slippage in support of the former president in case of such a verdict.
Plus, Trump’s backers have been certain in their claims that the charges against him wouldn’t have been brought for the same alleged crimes had he been someone else, that current President Joe Biden has used the mechanics of his administration to ensure that Trump be tied up in litigation during a tight election and that the national media has kept the spotlight on Trump to paper over the remarkably poor job that Biden has done.