The Art of the Deal: Reflections on a Mysterious Former President, Donald Trump, in New York, and the Mueller’s Case
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In 1971, an Ivy League graduate in his mid-20s rented a studio apartment on Third Avenue and 75th Street in New York City. The window looked out onto the water tank in the other building.
I tried to split it up so that it would look bigger. No matter what I did, the apartment was still a dark, dingy place. Even so, I loved it,” wrote former President Donald Trump in his 1987 book, “The Art of the Deal,” co-authored with Tony Schwartz. I was a kid from Queens and working in Brooklyn when I found an apartment on the Upper East Side. … I was a city guy, not a kid from the boroughs.
Trump was not the last person to fall under the spell of Manhattan, with its fast pace, its soaring towers and its glamorous celebrities. There, he would build his career, endure divorces and business bankruptcies, become a mythical figure through his starring role on “The Apprentice” and mount an unlikely campaign for president.
As with almost everything about the former president, there’s no real precedent for the latest chapter of his story — and no way to tell how it will end.
A person who spoke directly with Trump said that he was surprised by the decision of the jury to indict him. While he was previously bracing for an indictment, he began to believe reports that a potential charge was weeks – or more – away.
Trump has denied wrongdoing in all of the cases. But once more, America’s political and legal systems, under a near-constant stress test since he came down the escalator in Trump Tower to launch his campaign in 2015, will be put under enormous pressure that is likely to only deepen the country’s internal estrangement.
If Trump is elected, he will argue the case against him must be dismissed because the Justice Department’s guidance that a president cannot be indicted doesn’t apply to him. While working in office.
Bragg, the judge and the Biden Justice Department might be effective in a political context, but they are not guaranteed to work in court. Bragg does have an exacting task in that he must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump committed crimes. The former president is now in a position where he has to follow the rules of evidence and the court schedule if he is to get a fair trial.
In Manhattan, where Trump won only 12% of the vote in the 2020 presidential election, it could be challenging to find jurors who don’t already have a negative opinion of him, said Matthew Galluzzo, a former prosecutor in the New York County District Attorney’s Office.
In the political arena, “there is a distinct possibility that Trump not only survives but also thrives,” wrote Julian Zelizer. “Trump has an uncanny instinct for using moments of peril to his advantage and his political career is built on punching back against the people and institutions he claims are unfairly attacking him. He’s fallen back on the old idea of presenting himself as a victim of the corrupt establishment in order to get his supporters behind him.
In the Washington Post, Henry Olsen wrote, “Anyone who cares about fairness in our criminal justice system should be queasy that Donald Trump will be prosecuted in one of the country’s most liberal jurisdictions. By all accounts, this case should be a federal one.
It is believed that the case will show that Trump is being called to account for his rule-crushing behavior, which many Americans dislike, as well as that all former presidents are equal under the law. Trump is saying that the prosecution is a case of political persecution by the District Attorney in hopes of preventing a presidential comeback. The Trump campaign said that he was getting a political boost from the attention.
The Murder of a 4-Year-Old School Student in Tennessee Revisited: When the Parents of an Infant Shoot and a Student die, What Happened
There were many feelings of sadness, anger and frustration after a school shooting in Tennessee on Monday, in which three children and three adults were killed.
“James and Jennifer Crumbley, who have pleaded not guilty, allegedly neglected cries for help from their son for months and dismissed serious concerns from the school the day before and the morning of the shooting. Yet even as they apparently ignored warning signs, the Crumbleys bought their son a gun and took him to target practice. The son of a couple who were 15 at the time of the massacre pleaded guilty to terrorism and murder charges in October.
The question of how to prevent shootings is raised. They say that there is a move to hold parents accountable in certain cases.
“The parents of a teenager who shot and killed four students at Oxford High School in Michigan in November 2021 are set to stand trial for involuntary manslaughter after an appellate court last week rejected their contention that the charges have no legal justification,” Peterson and Densely observed.
President Joe Biden touted efforts to oppose autocratic governments at last week’s White House democracy summit, co-hosted by Costa Rica, the Netherlands, South Korea and Zambia.
“This makes the premise of the democracy summit ring somewhat hollow because while the Biden administration does an excellent job of trumpeting its commitments to democracy and women’s rights, only a year and a half ago, it cavalierly abandoned 40 million Afghans to the Taliban’s misogynistic theocracy.”
House Republicans are investigating the tumultuous US withdrawal from Afghanistan and there’s a congressionally mandated bipartisan commission examining the entire 20-year war in Afghanistan. “Of course, any examination of the US record in Afghanistan is something of a double-edged sword for Republicans,” Bergen noted, “since it was the Trump administration that signed the agreement with the Taliban in 2020 that set the stage for the total US withdrawal from Afghanistan.”
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/02/opinions/trumps-manhattan-story-opinion-column-galant/index.html
Love Better: How Protest Can Save a Child from Self-Injury and Other Misfortunes in the Israeli House of Representatives
This week’s drama in Israel offered an indicator of how protest can make a difference. Netanyahu, who returned to the office after a two-year break, has been pressing for the judiciary to be placed under the control of the Knesset. “For Netanyahu, the plan was convenient,” wrote Frida Ghitis. “It created the possibility of escaping his own legal woes, since one of the controversial bills recently passed would make it more difficult for a prime minister to be declared unfit for office…
Under pressure, Netanyahu decided on Monday to put off the overhauled until the next legislative term. The crisis, however, is not over.”
Break ups don’t work. New Zealand has a campaign designed to help people cope with the loss of a relationship. “Our behavior doesn’t have to” follow suit, wrote Holly Thomas.
“The nation’s Love Better campaign … aims to help young people recover from breakups and build resilience. The campaign includes a dedicated phone, text or email helpline run by Youthline, an organization dedicated to supporting people ages 12 to 24.”
A survey of 1,200 16 to 24 year olds shows that 68% of them experience at least one instance of self-injury, substance abuse, or physical violence because of rejection. Given the breadth of the potential damage, it’s wild that campaigns like these aren’t ubiquitous in other countries as well … At the minimum, it would improve our mental health. It might save lives.
“It’s about time,” wrote Alaimo. The law gives parents the tools and safeguards to keep their kids safe on social networks, but it isn’t enough. Congress should follow Utah’s lead and enact a similar law to protect every child in this country.”
“Parents will also be able to access their kids’ accounts, apps won’t be allowed to show children ads, and accounts for kids won’t be able to be used between 10:30 p.m. and 6:30 a.m. without parental permission.”
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/02/opinions/trumps-manhattan-story-opinion-column-galant/index.html
The Case of Jack Kirby: The Ex-President Vladimir Putin and the Higgs Sector of the Kremlov Synagogue
Last weekend, Russian President Vladimir Putin expanded on his plans to station nuclear weapons in Belarus, which borders both Russia and Ukraine. Keir Giles wrote that there was little new in the announcement and it set off some alarms that the analyst thinks are exaggerated.
A year before the US entered World War II, a gutsy artist and his writing colleague introduced a new superhero, with the debut cover of the new comic showing him punching the Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler.
Captain America was born, more than 82 years ago. Roy Schwartz wrote for CNN Opinion and talked about his back story, which included the artist who changed his name to Jack Kirby. Both children of Jewish immigrants were a writer and artist.
As Schwartz noted, “After the war, superheroes fell out of favor and Kirby wrote and drew other genres of comics. When Stan Lee, by then the editor and head writer at what would soon be named Marvel, asked him to try superheroes again in 1961, the two created together the Fantastic Four, the Hulk, Thor, Ant-Man, Iron Man, the Avengers, the X-Men, Black Panther and countless others. Kirby earned the title of ‘King of Comics’ due to his artistic innovation. He was one of the most influential artists of the 20th century.
The former president will challenge every potential issue in his indictment once it becomes public, an attorney said Sunday.
The arraignment would be showmanship and nothing more since we have not seen the indictment yet. The team will look at all the potential issues that we can challenge and we will also take the indictment, he told Dana Bash on CNN.
Tacopina also telegraphed an effort to target the credibility of Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, who made a $130,000 payment to Daniels and went to prison on charges including lying to Congress, but who may be a central witness in any trial of Trump.
At times, the lawyers have vowed to ask for the charges to be dismissed. But the full slate of charges still aren’t known. The judge will eventually determine if the laws are sound enough for the case to proceed to trial.
Former Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance said in an interview with NBC News on Sunday, “We can speculate on what evidence we think they may or may not have, but even with the indictment published, we really will not know what the district attorney’s evidence is and what they would present at trial.”
The Manhattan district attorney’s office is investigating the case of Stormy Daniels, the adult film star who says she had a sexual relationship with Trump before he was president. Trump and his allies have already attacked Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg – and an advertised Tuesday night speech back at Mar-a-Lago will likely given Trump more opportunity to claim he’s being political persecuted.
The case against a misdemeanor in the State of the Art, is not a New York City felony, or is it a new legal theory?
They are not false entries. They had to cobble them together in order to get a felony, if they were Misdemeanors way beyond the statute of limitations.
Trump’s legal team isn’t currently considering asking to move the case to a different New York City borough, Tacopina said. “There’s been no discussion of that whatsoever,” he told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos in another interview Sunday. It is premature to worry about venue changes until we know what is happening and how the legal issues will affect us.
On CNN at 10 a.m and 1 p.m., Fareed Zakaria hosts his show, Fareed ZakariaGPS. The views are of his own. Read more opinion at CNN.
On the one hand, Trump is a walking advertisement for rich privilege. For decades he has been breaking rules and standards as he climbed up the ladder, even though he didn’t fit the usual standards. He was found guilty of tax fraud, his business was taken to court more than once, and he stole money from his charities.
Those who watched Jon Stewart on “GPS” last week saw the crux of his argument. Jon was certainly right that the law should not care about the popularity of a person or the political effect of an indictment — and no one can really be sure what that effect will be in the long run anyway.
The misdemeanor will be charged with a felony because it is a violation of federal election laws. But that violation is one that the Justice Department under both Trump and President Joe Biden looked at and decided against prosecution. That is, as many experts have pointed out, a novel legal theory. I should note that Trump denies any wrongdoing.
The Case for a Serious Charge of a Former State Senator: Donald Trump, the Wall Street Journal, and a New Generation of Law-Violating States
This case has the feel of a prosecution focused on finding a violation of the law. If a person commits a crime, you should look for the criminal first, rather than looking to see if the person committed a crime, as was believed in Anglo-Saxon law.
Many Republicans think the moment will be a big deal as state prosecutors are going to indict national politicians they don’t like. They seem to forget that they have been involved in helping develop the weaponization of the legal system. The Wall Street Journal was happy to say that any prosecution of a former President should involve a serious offense.
Really? The Wall Street Journal filled six volumes with editorials that endorsed the investigation of a sitting president. Bill and Hillary Clinton lost money in a failed land deal and as a result, a special prosecutor found no evidence of criminal wrongdoing, but they did learn that Bill Clinton had had an affair with a White. Is it a serious crime?
The Journal’s standard is the right one, however, and the truth is, Trump is likely to face just such charges soon. In Georgia, he could be prosecuted if he threatened the Secretary of State to find a large amount of votes to win the 2020 election. And then there is the January 6, 2021, uprising in which he could easily be charged by federal prosecutors with an effort to overturn an election.
The rule of law is pursued not simply to punish people but to create a system of self-government that is widely viewed as legitimate. The country will be interested in the case. Rumors about the charges facing Trump are likely to be true. Will it help our judicial system or our democratic system? This is a case of trying the right guy for the wrong crime, that is the worry that I have.
Donald Trump will take America through yet another grave and unprecedented national drama this week when he becomes the first ex-president to appear in court charged with a crime.
Donald Trump is planning to turn himself in to New York City authorities after being indicted by a Manhattan grand jury.
It’s likely that a judge will find that Trump doesn’t pose a flight risk. Trump will be free to leave after the hearing. He plans to immediately return to Florida, where that night he will give a speech, his campaign announced Sunday.
The criminal indictment takes Trump into political territory. The case turns out he was involved in a double impeachment, false claims of a stolen election and mob attack on the US Congress during an unruly four-year presidency that pushed the nation to the point of exhaustion.
Some legal experts have questioned if a campaign finance violation is enough to warrant indicting a president who’s already running again, without having seen the indictment.
He would not have been indicted if he hadn’t been running for office right now, since his numbers have gone up significantly, by the way. Bragg has made no public comment on the case since the indictment came down last Thursday.
Michael Cohen is a liar. He’s lied to banks, the IRS, Congress,” Tacopina said. But Cohen’s lawyer, Lanny Davis, hit back, warning on “State of the Union” that a Trump defense shredding his client’s reputation would not work. “My old friend Joe Tacopina … (has) a wrong strategy if he thinks he’s building his whole strategy on personal attacks on Michael Cohen,” Davis said.
There is extensive security in New York after Trump warned about the danger of being charged, especially given his past anti-Semitic statements and calls for a Capitol insurrection. Many of his supporters have not shown up for the protests that Trump has called for.
The indictment has already had an impact in the GOP presidential race, with leading potential challengers to Trump, like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, joining the ex-president’s allies in Congress to blast the Bragg investigation as motivated by partisanship. Given Trump’s popularity with grassroots Republicans, his potential rivals may have no other move, but it would be premature to conclude that Trump’s legal problems will prove to be a long-term rallying point for GOP voters.
DeSantis, who has yet to declare a run, is running a shadow campaign rooted in the premise that he could offer Trump-style policies without the chaos or distractions of the ex-president. A GOP nominee indicted in the general election could be considered a liability in the race. Another Republican, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, who has called on Trump to step aside because of the indictment, announced his own run for president on Sunday.
In a statement on Thursday, Trump showed that he will respond to this brush with political fate in the same way he has lashed out at previous threats in his business and political career – with fury and by seeking to use his political power to stir up huge disruption and partisan anger.
He believes that the witch-hunt will backfire on Joe Biden. The American people are aware of what the Radical Left Democrats are doing. Everyone can see it. It will be the strength and unity of our Party that will defeat Joe Biden and win the election so that we will once again make America great.
His approach means that this Tuesday is likely to be just the start of a new, dramatic and divisive chapter in Trump’s political career and another extreme test for America.
The expected voluntary surrender of a former president and 2024 White House candidate will be a unique affair in more ways than one – both for the Manhattan district attorney’s office and the New York courthouse where he’ll be arraigned and for a nation watching to see how it’ll shake up the GOP presidential primary.
CNN reported that despite the shock of the indictment, Trump remained focused and calm in the days leading up to his court appearance.
The Secret Service, New York Police Department and court officers will coordinate the security for Trump’s appearance. The Secret Service is scheduled to accompany Trump in the early afternoon to the district attorney’s office, which is in the same building as the courthouse.
“This is the first time that it really seems likely that the former president of the United States will be having a mugshot, being fingerprinted,” presidential historian Douglas Brinkley told NPR’s Morning Edition. Brinkley said that “we’re in for a very rocky spring with Trump and some other criminal cases to contend with.”
Typically, after defendants are arrested, they are booked and held in cells near the courtroom before they are arraigned. That will not happen with Trump. Once the former president is finished being processed, he’ll be taken through a back set of hallways and elevators to the floor where the courtroom is located. He will go to a public hallway to get to the courtroom.
Several media outlets, including CNN, have asked a New York judge to unseal the indictment and for permission to broadcast Trump’s expected appearance in the courtroom on Tuesday.
The news organizations are requesting a limited number of photographers, videographers, and radio journalists to be present at the court, in order to ensure that the court’s operations aren’t disrupted.
Merchan, an acting New York Supreme Court justice, has sentenced Trump’s close confidant Allen Weisselberg to prison, presided over the Trump Organization tax fraud trial and overseen former adviser Steve Bannon’s criminal fraud case.
According to attorneys who have appeared before him, he does not stand for disruptions or delays and he is known to retain control of his courtroom even when his cases draw attention.
Donald Trump’s lawyer said during an interview that he was not easy on himself when he tried a case, but that he will likely be fair.
“I’ve tried a case in front of him before. He could be tough. I don’t think it’s necessarily going to be something that’s going to change his ability to evaluate the facts and the law in this case,” Parlatore said.
The former president will plead not guilty according to tacopina. His team “will look at every potential issue that we will be able to challenge, and we will challenge,” Tacopina said.
Donald Trump’s campaign against the Trump indictment is political hoax and witch hunt: An NBC News interview with Hutchinson
According to sources close to Trump, his advisers were discussing how to best campaign against the indictment that they portrayed as a political hoax and witch hunt.
During the last week, his team has presented the former president with polls which show him with a growing lead over the governor of Florida. And his team says it has raised more than $5 million dollars since he was indicted Thursday.
The office is more valuable than any individual person. In an interview with ABC News, Hutchinson said that he thought that was too much of a sideshow and distraction for the presidency. “He needs to be able to concentrate on his due process.”
Trump is expected to deny any wrongdoing and plead not guilty. “On Tuesday morning I will be going to, believe it or not, the Courthouse,” he wrote on Truth Social. “America was not supposed to be this way!”
Traveling with the New York Array: A Challenge for Vance and Other Former U.S. District Attorneys Against Donald Trump’s Indictment
The first court appearance is for a criminal who has been indicted. For a normal defendant, that’s usually when one would appear for photographs, fingerprints and arrest paperwork, a process that typically takes several hours behind closed doors.
Then, defendants go before a judge to hear the charges against them. At this point in the criminal process, defendants can enter a not guilty plea.
Even so, his status as a former president is expected to pose some unusual logistical challenges. He has a big team and a Secret Service detail. Protests are expected. There will be media attention. And all of that will happen alongside the everyday operations of a busy state court office.
“There’s a lot of external factors that just don’t happen for 99.99% of the cases we have,” said former Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance in an NPR interview on Sunday. “It will be a real challenge for the [police department], the court officers, investigators in our office to ensure that things function safely and smoothly.”
But he’s still entitled to the same due process as everyone else, says Kim Wehle, a former assistant U.S. attorney and now a law professor at the University of Baltimore.
She said that there weren’t many hurdles to go through because of the charges against him and penalties they would carry.
“There are a lot of procedural, evidentiary and constitutional protections in place to make sure that that far-off question is fairly adjudicated,” Wehle adds.
The strength of the evidence presented will be key to a trial, legal experts said. According to Michael Gerhardt, a law professor at the University of North Carolina, other factors will include the jury.
“If I had to pick which side to be on, and I had to win to save my life, I would probably choose to be on the prosecution’s side simply because the jury pool in Manhattan is so incredibly against Donald Trump,” he said in an interview with NPR.
Most similar cases would probably take a year to get to trial, Galluzzo says. He expects that Trump’s strategy will be to delay that process as much as possible.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2023/04/03/1167756756/trump-traveling-new-york-arraignment-whats-next-trial
“Nobody wants to talk to him about what he can do,” Polone tells C.F.D. Anderson in a New York Times teleprogram
“They’re not going to make him an offer that he would accept,” he adds. “And I think more than anything he probably wants that public stage to play the victim, to have an audience.”