My main thought on this verdict, globally, is that I don’t know what it means in a political and electoral context.
It’s a good thing that Trump faced accountability, for once in his life, for his own conduct. It is ironic on many levels that this case, by far the poor relation of the family of Trump prosecutions, is the one that actually went to trial and actually secured a conviction. It’s a disgrace that the others are unlikely to go to trial before the election. But that’s where we are.
NEW YORK — After years of scandal, allegations of criminal schemes, two impeachments, and four indictments, Donald Trump has been found guilty by a Manhattan jury.
I got a note this morning from TPM Reader CH who asked me a question I get with some frequency. He basically asks, why does the end-state need to be two states? Why won’t it be ethnic cleansing or genocide or bantustans? These are good questions. And it makes me realize that I may need to state more explicitly what is maybe too implicit.
I am certainly not arguing that there is some natural or inevitable progression to two states. On the available evidence there’s a much better argument that there is a natural and irremediable inertia holding the status quo of the last half century in place.
I wanted to share a few thoughts about the Sam Alito problem. I don’t want to preach to the choir on this, but there are two points which should be highlighted. The first is that even on its own terms, Alito’s rationale for not recusing himself doesn’t hold up. His argument is essentially this: My wife is her own person with her own views and ways of expressing herself. I asked her to stop but she refused to do so and I couldn’t compel her to do anything. He notes that they co-own the properties in question, so even in the narrow sense of control over a piece of property, he couldn’t dictate anything. It was his wife, not him. He did what he could, but couldn’t do more. End of story.
This is not how federal ethics guidelines work. They make very clear that the appearance of a conflict of interest or impropriety, for these purposes, counts as much as actual ones. They also make clear that the actions of a spouse count toward creating such appearances even though, certainly in the early 21st century, a judge can’t dictate a spouse’s actions. The ethics guidelines specifically deal with the spouse issue. And they say “it’s my spouse, not me” isn’t a defense.
Congratulations, For Not Recusing Yourself From My Cases!
In his singular way, Donald Trump managed to undermine Sam Alito at the very moment the flag-whipped Supreme Court justice was trying to extricate himself from his ethics morass.
In his usual grandiose style, Alito not only refused to recuse, but in a letter to Democratic senators engaged in a paucity of real legal analysis and suggested there was no possible good faith argument for recusal, which is of course silly, reductive, and self-serving.
Nonetheless, Alito baldly asserted there was no basis for recusal, used the Supreme Court’s weak self-enforcing code of conduct as an imperative to do the wrong thing as opposed to rigorous standard to meet, and thumbed his nose at his naysayers with typical relish.
To which the man whose cases Alito is compromised on rose up in his defense, even as a jury in Manhattan deliberated on criminal charges against him:
It was a marvelous distillation of the corrupt conservative-supermajority Supreme Court that Trump helped to create and which he sees as his ultimate salvation against the four – count ’em, FOUR – ongoing criminal prosecutions he faces.
Nevertheless, She Persisted?
Justice Alito’s letter contained one of the most remarkable lines in recent political history: “My wife is fond of flags. I am not.”
That bit of misdirection and minimizing came as he recounted in evolving fashion the upside-down American flag incident at his Virginia home.
His latest version is that he didn’t know about it until he did and then he asked her to take it down (he doesn’t say why but implicit in the request is that it was inappropriate to have the insurrectionist symbol flying in front of his home) and … she REFUSED!
Alito proceeds to offer a pre-law-caliber legal defense of Martha Alito’s joint ownership interest in their Virginia home and her right to exercise her constitutional freedoms independent of him, an irony so excruciating coming from the justice who authored the Dobbs decision that it’s hard not to view it as a deliberate troll of his critics, even though his account in its entirety casts him as small, powerless, and clueless.
A Benign 18th-Century Foam Finger
Dahlia Lithwick, bringing the withering scorn even before Alito’s comical letter surrendering the flagpoles at his homes to his wife:
When the New York Times reported last week that Samuel Alito, an associate justice of the Supreme Court, had been flying an “Appeal to Heaven” flag at his vacation home on the New Jersey shore last summer, the legal world was confronted with yet another classic case of how to deal with the current warring textual methodologies for interpreting the law. One could either “read” this obscure-to-some pine-tree flag in the way the New York Times and its experts did—as a signifier of insurgent Christian nationalism. Or you could read it as a kind of benign 18th-century foam finger: “Gooooo George Washington!”
Jury Digs In On Its Trump Deliberations
A lot of speculation, attempted tea leaf reading, and bloviating about how to interpret the first two notes from the Trump jury yesterday. Journalists abhor a vacuum and so they will fill it, but there was in fact very little to go on from what transpired. Just chill. Juries are notoriously hard to predict.
TPM’s Josh Kovensky is at it again today, with a liveblog going. You can check in periodically to see if anything has happened.
We expect the judge to respond to both jury requests this morning: re-reading his instructions to them and reading some key trial testimony from the court transcript. This will happen in open court and take a while to complete. I doubt we’ll see a verdict this morning, but by afternoon we should be back on verdict watch.
Trump Trial Misinformation On Overdrive
A new round of furious spinning from the right commenced as soon as the jury got the case. You can safely ignore the substance (or lack thereof) of it, but between Fox News and at least one sitting Republican U.S. senator, there was a brain-eating level of dumb misinformation flying around.
This Didn’t Make It Into Evidence At Trial
The Daily Beast: “Donald Trump boasted about having sex with adult film star Stormy Daniels at the 2006 golf tournament where the two met, a celebrity athlete who played the tournament has said.”
The Price Of Resisting Trump
The mother of former police officer Michael Fanone, who was nearly killed defending the Capitol on Jan. 6, was swatted at her Virginia home on Tuesday, just hours after her son made a campaign appearance for Joe Biden outside the courthouse where Donald Trump’s trial is being held, NBC News reports.
Quote Of The Day
What would’ve happened if Black Americans had stormed the Capitol? I don’t think he’d be talking about pardons. This is the same guy who wanted to tear gas you as you peacefully protested George Floyd’s murder. It’s the same guy who still calls the ‘Central Park Five’ guilty, even though they were exonerated. He’s that landlord who denies housing applications because of the color of your skin. He’s that guy who won’t say Black lives matter and invokes neo-Nazi, Third Reich terms.
President Joe Biden, in a campaign speech to Black voters in Philadelphia
Oligarchs Of The World, Unite!
WSJ: “Donald Trump and Elon Musk have discussed a possible advisory role for the Tesla leader should the presumptive Republican nominee reclaim the White House, the latest sign that the once-frosty relationship between the two men has thawed.”
New Eruption In Iceland
REYKJANES, ICELAND – MAY 29: Another volcanic eruption is seen from a helicopter flight Landhelgisgasla Islands for the fifth time since December on the Reykjanes peninsula in southwestern Iceland on May 29, 2024. Shortly after authorities evacuated the nearby town of Grindavik. Icelandic Meteorological Office (IMO) reported that an eruption has started near Sundhnuksgigar, north of Grindavik. Following an earthquake in the area, a state of emergency had been declared leading to the evacuation of the famous geothermal Blue Lagoon spa and the small fishing town of Grindavik, according to Icelandic Public Broadcaster RUV. (Photo by Almannavarnadeild/Anadolu via Getty Images)
The ongoing series of eruptions on Iceland’s Peninsula resumed Wednesday morning with the most intense lava flow yet:
Although there was a more abundant level of magma, the eruption followed the pattern of previous ones, with an initial surge of magma followed by a gradual slowing of the rate of flow. The new lava mostly stayed with in the confines of previous flows in recent months:
Hér má sjá hvert hraunið er búið að renna. Hægst hefur verulega á rennslinu en hraunið er farið yfir Grindavíkurveg norðan Grindavíkur og yfir Nesveg vestan Grindavíkur. Varnargarðarnir stóðu af sér áhlaup gossins. pic.twitter.com/jgZYNu2CKK
The basis for Justice Samuel Alito’s rejection of congressional Democrats’ request that he recuse himself from Supreme Court cases tied to Jan. 6 was literally a meme.
The first-ever criminal trial of a former president is drawing to a close. On Wednesday morning, Judge Juan Merchan read out his jury instructions, explaining how the panel is to apply the law. He then handed the case over to the jury.
The jury submitted notes Wednesday afternoon requesting a read out of certain parts of trial testimony from witnesses David Pecker and Michael Cohen, and also requesting to rehear the judge’s instructions before they were dismissed for the day.
Yesterday Ireland, Spain and Norway formally recognized a Palestinian state. The U.S. and most other European governments continue to support a “two-state” solution but refuse to recognize a Palestinian state because they say such recognition and such a settlement must emerge from negotiations between the two parties. Meanwhile, numerous other countries throughout the world have already made a declaration similar to Ireland, Spain and Norway’s. Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says such recognition amounts to “a reward for terrorism.” Some offer a middle ground. British Foreign Secretary Cameron says the UK won’t recognize a Palestinian state as long as Hamas controls Gaza, etc. etc.
In practice such declarations have no real practical impact. The Palestinians most definitely do not have a state: that is their central grievance. Recognitions don’t change that. But is this actually a bad thing from the perspective of the United States? Or supporters of Israel? Or, really, anyone else?
It is not. It’s not a bad thing. In fact, it’s a good thing. Much more important than that, it is a necessary thing.
Before we get a verdict, it’s important to recognize that this is justice, regardless of whatever the verdict is. It is a billowing outrage that the three other cases against Donald Trump have been stymied to date by judicial corruption (certainly that’s the case in the two federal prosecutions; the Georgia case is more complicated). But those are different cases. This trial is in a different jurisdiction and about totally different facts and crimes. Both sides were allowed to make their case before a judge who did a good job of controlling the process. Now it’s in the hands of a jury.
I am certainly hoping for a conviction, mostly because the evidence is overwhelming and irrefutable. I’ve always thought this was essentially a jury nullification case. Trump’s only hope for an acquittal is for the jury to essentially say: we’ve heard what you say the law is and we’ve heard the evidence but we just don’t think this is a crime. More realistically, I think Trump’s real hope is a hung jury. Regardless, this is our system. Donald Trump deserves to have his fate in the hands of a jury. And now he does.
