Campaign chaos for Trump in competing court rulings
Within the span of an hour, one court rescued Donald Trump from potential financial ruin, while another set a trial to start in the height of the campaign season.
The presumptive Republican presidential nominee rolled with the rapid twists yesterday with his usual defiance and bluster - in split seconds attacking one set of judges and praising another, ignoring reporters then suddenly pivoting to address them, brushing off heckles and welcoming cheers from onlookers along the streets.
The surreal string of turnabouts capped another chaotic day of Trump’s 2024 campaign, with almost no resemblance to the conventional activities of campaigning.
Trump last held a rally on March 16 as his campaign juggled an overhaul of the Republican National Committee and has not announced where or when the next one will happen. He spent the weekend golfing in South Florida, then dropped into New York for a contentious court hearing and broad-sweeping news conference that most major networks carried live.
The unusual schedule highlighted Trump’s gambit to maximise the publicity surrounding his four separate criminal proceedings, using them to cast himself as a victim of a political persecution of a kind with his supporters who rioted at the formal certification of his last electoral defeat. That strategy helped Trump consolidate support in the Republican primary, but its effectiveness is less clear in the general-election rematch with President Joe Biden now under way. And as much as Trump’s team is choosing to take this approach, it is also coping with the uncharted realities of overlapping, evolving court calendars, serious criminal charges and a daunting cash crunch.
Yesterday Trump headed back to the New York criminal court for a hearing in the criminal case accusing him of falsifying business records to hide hush money payments to an adult-film actress leading up to the 2016 election.
As tempers rose, the judge called a recess, and it was not hard for anyone watching to predict that when proceedings resumed, he would be ruling against Trump. The former president stormed out.
Almost immediately after his exit, news broke that he had won a reprieve in the other case: The appeals court granted his request to reduce his bond to US$175 million, with 10 days to pay.
As the recess elapsed, Trump reappeared, now eager to engage the press. “I greatly respect the decision,” he said, promising to post the $175 million “very quickly,” while also criticising the trial judge, Arthur Engoron. Soon his motorcade was rolling downtown to Wall Street, where tourists flocked from Trinity Church, Federal Hall and the Charging Bull statue to see the next big attraction. Someone cursed Trump as he emerged from his limo. “Criminal!” someone else shouted.
“Keep fighting for us!” a man called out from behind the police line. Trump poked his head out above the open door of his black SUV. “I will,” he said.
Biden’s campaign pounced on the chaos. “America deserves better than a feeble, confused, and tired Donald Trump,” Biden campaign spokesman James Singer said in a statement about the presumptive Republican nominee’s day.