What you need to know about the prosecution of Donald Trump

The famous management expert Tom Peters wrote, “If you’re not confused, you’re not paying attention.” That was in 1987, but it applies perfectly to America’s 2024 presidential election.

The race has started ugly, and it’s sure to get much uglier as justice closes in on former President Donald Trump. He leads the contest for the Republican nomination with the heavy baggage of multiple felony charges under multiple indictments in multiple jurisdictions.

The system’s integrity as well as Trump will be on trial. His strategy is to delay his several trials until he or another Republican wins the presidency and pardons him. Justice delayed would literally be justice denied.  

Meantime, the American people face the possibility, however remote, of the most corrupt candidate in the nation’s history assuming the most powerful position in the land and, arguably, the world.

The complexities, possibilities and probabilities are mind-boggling. However, they become more apparent if we compare Trump to Joe the Plumber, which we can do because the law applies equally to us all.

Consider the “I can’t be bothered” strategy, where his lawyers argue Trump doesn’t have time for trial because he’s too busy running for president. That’s like Joe the Plumber arguing he can’t go to trial for bank robbery because he’s too busy fixing sinks.

There are two simple solutions. First, Trump could try to clear a few things from his schedule, like posting on social media, hosting three Saudi Arabian golf tournaments and “cruising around Mar-a-Lago” in his golf cart.

Or, he could solve the scheduling problem instantly by dropping out of the election.

An honorable person would do this anyway. No one who respects elections or the electorate would subject them to a candidate with multiple unresolved felonies on such highly pertinent issues as inciting an insurrection, conspiring to steal an election, and attempting to prevent the peaceful transfer of power. Only candidates with clean — or at least fully resolved — records should stand for elections.

Here are some suggestions for putting a few other questions and issues to rest:

Who is defending Trump? It isn’t easy to track Trump’s legal team because of its constant turnover. But he has an additional formidable, completely free defense team known as the U.S. House of Representatives. Under GOP control, the House appears to be setting aside its actual responsibilities to fortify Trump’s specious claim that he’s a law-abiding citizen persecuted by a Democrat plot.

Has President Biden weaponized the Justice Department against Trump? Hardly. In fact, Attorney General Merrick Garland is roundly and justifiably criticized for being too worried about avoiding the appearance of political influence. Federal prosecutors have done a great job prosecuting ground troops in the Jan. 6 insurrection, but they only now are considering charges against the insurrection’s senior leaders. The delay has worked in Trump’s favor by giving him hope he can delay his trials long enough to win the presidency and pardon himself.

Can Trump get a fair trial? Yes. In fact, Special Prosecutor Jack Smith has given Trump a considerable advantage in the documents case by assigning it to a Trump-appointed judge in a state Trump carried in his two previous presidential races. His case could end up before a conservative Supreme Court whose justices include three Trump appointees. It’s hard to get fairer than that. In his other felony cases, Trump can escape conviction if only one juror in each trial votes in his favor.

What does Hunter Biden’s case have to do with this? Absolutely nothing. Congressional Republicans are keeping Hunter’s plea bargain in the spotlight to embarrass President Biden, create the suspicion that the president was involved in his son’s doings, allege the younger Biden received special treatment from Justice and allow Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) to show off the nude picture she keeps of Hunter. This says a lot more about Greene than the younger Biden.

Is Trump the victim here? Of course not. No one forced him to break any law, let alone so serious and so many. Because Trump has rarely been held accountable for high crimes and misdemeanors, he probably assumes he’s too big to jail.

What’s so important about all this? Nothing less than the survival of democracy. Trump is clear about what he would do if he returns to the White House. He would reshape the government to give himself total control. He’d use it for retribution against everyone who’s criticized him. It’s what he’s always done, but never with such big weapons. According to reporters covering Congress, the fear of Trump’s retribution is why many Republicans criticize him in private but won’t in public.

To avoid all these complexities, should Republican voters just follow their leaders? Voters should follow their consciences. They can’t trust leaders to be honest about Trump. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and presidential candidate Nikki Haley have flip-flopped from criticizing Trump’s involvement in the insurrection and documents cases. They act like mafia soldiers afraid of “sleeping with the fishes” if they break ranks with the capo di tutti capi.

Why is this heating up? Several people are throwing gasoline on the fire. Haley says Democrats are guilty of “vendetta politics.” Psychologists call that transference because the vendetta is Trump’s. A recent Washington Post analysis found his speeches are getting more extreme, brazenly defiant, menacing and confrontational while becoming “less tethered to reality.”

For example, he characterizes Democrats as “lunatics” trying to destroy America forever, another case of transference. With the law closing in, Trump is online predicting violence again, his signal to militants to “stand back and stand by.” PBS reports that violent rhetoric is escalating.

What should we make of all this? The modern Republican Party, traditionally the champion of limited government and maximum freedom, now openly stands for a totalitarian government that abolishes our freedoms — a pattern we see most vividly with Ron DeSantis’s insertion into what teachers teach, what readers read and what rights women’s have over their bodies.

Trump appears more interested in taking complete control of federal agencies and employees to exact retribution for “those who have been wronged and betrayed,” which of course means him. A coalition of conservative groups led by the Heritage Foundation is working on a plan to accomplish this by reconfiguring the federal government along conservative lines in the first 180 days after the 2025 inauguration.

So, here we are. Trump’s allies see prosecution as persecution. We who witness this from the cheap seats and stress out at every day’s developments don’t control the outcome. Juries and judges are responsible for that. We should take the advice of prayer that says, “Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”

Our courage will be necessary if Trump remains on the ballot 15 months from now. We know from eight years of experience that if he were to win, he would preside without morals, empathy, honesty, decency, justice or respect for the office and the law.

Whatever the outcome of the election, we can anticipate that neither Trump nor his MAGA army will disappear from American politics. He and his hard-core base would fade into history only when convinced they have no place or power in America.

When that day comes, we could offer conciliatory terms: We’d let MAGA members keep their cool baseball caps, but only if they accept an entirely different definition of “great.”

William S. Becker is co-editor and a contributor to “Democracy Unchained: How to Rebuild Government for the People,” a collection of more than 30 essays by American thought leaders on topics such as the Supreme Court’s perceived legitimacy. Becker has served in several state and federal government roles, including executive assistant to the attorney general of Wisconsin. He is currently executive director of the Presidential Climate Action Project (PCAP), a nonpartisan climate policy think tank unaffiliated with the White House.