Donald Trump’s involvement in American politics can be measured in “firsts” and “most”. Trump last week became the first former US president to be prosecuted by the Justice Department for alleged violations of federal law.
On Tuesday, he became the first former president to be formally charged in a federal court and subjected to criminal court practices.
Trump’s supporters, of which there are millions in America, remember him for the excellent appointments he made in the courts of law across the USA, but especially in the federal Supreme Court. They remember him for his comprehensive economic reforms and especially the cutting of regulations that gave the American economy a real boost before the pandemic.
They also remember him for his unconventional but successful foreign policy that initially prevented Putin and his military from invading Ukraine, that halted North Korea’s nuclear program, at least during the Trump presidency, and that European leaders belatedly realized that the time had come to show greater responsibility for their own defence.
Trump’s opponents and the millions of Americans who have a strong dislike for him remember that he is the first US president to be impeached twice by the US Congress. They remember his long list of scandals, tirades, the total disorder in his administration and that he is the president with the most cabinet resignations and dismissals in history.
In terms of good and bad, since his entry into politics in 2016, Trump has been a president first and foremost. He was elected president in 2016 with a small majority in the American Electoral College, while he is the president who suffered the biggest defeat in total votes (Hillary Clinton won almost three million more votes than Trump), while he is still won in the electoral college.
Earlier this year, Trump was charged in a court in Manhattan in the state of New York with several alleged violations. Investigations in Georgia and Washington DC, respectively, into his alleged attempt to influence the election outcome in Georgia in 2020 and his alleged involvement in the uprising in Washington DC on January 6, 2021, may lead to more court cases against Trump later this year.
While Trump was surprisingly elected president in 2016 and despite the three million votes that Clinton got more than him, the Republicans under his leadership, or at least because of his leadership role in the party, suffered repeated electoral defeats in 2018. 2020 and 2022 suffered which meant that the Democrats currently control the White House and the Senate, control more governorships than before Trump’s election in 2016 and that the Democrats also control more state legislatures than before Trump’s entry into politics.
Despite all the court cases against Trump, all his controversy and his inability to convert his popularity among a substantial part of the Republican electorate into wider success for the party’s candidates at the ballot box, Trump is still the Republican party’s most popular leader in at least two decades. According to a poll conducted by CBS News in collaboration with YouGov, 76% of Republicans believe that the federal case against Trump is politically motivated. Only 12% of Republicans believe that Trump’s handling of classified documents poses a national security risk for the USA.
It is important here to understand the case against Trump, which was announced by the US Department of Justice on Friday. There are 37 charges against Trump, 31 of which are directly related to the Espionage Act of 1917, which was passed by the US Congress during the First World War and which specifically applies to the handling of US secret information and military strategy and which determines how the mishandling of this could harm America could threaten its national security.
Trump has not been indicted under the Presidential Records Act of 1978. This law determines how a president must handle confidential, secret and classified documents after his retirement and how the National Archives and Records Administration must cooperate in order to handle them correctly.
Claims that a president may not take classified documents with him after retirement are factually incorrect. Previous presidents did this as well, but did cooperate thoroughly with the archival services to ensure their correct preservation and eventual transfer.
This is where the most substantial complaint against Trump comes in. It is clear that Trump and his employees took boxes full of classified and top secret documents to his private residence in Florida. Trouble ensued, however, when it came to light that the documents had not been preserved correctly; that Trump may have shown it to people without security clearances; and that he did not cooperate with the archival service and later the FBI for months last year. It is also alleged that he was dishonest about it, tried to hide documents and tried to interfere with the FBI’s investigation.
Trump’s case will appear in a federal court in the southern district of Florida and the judge, who Trump appointed during his presidency, is a competent and fair judge. Furthermore, a jury, which will probably be made up of Republicans, Democrats and independent American citizens precisely because of the demographic composition of the district, will have to finally decide whether Trump is guilty or not. There is little or no reason to believe that Trump will not get a fair trial.
The real problem is the political implications of the court case. While the case in Manhattan, about hush money he allegedly paid to a porn star, clearly has the color of a political witch hunt and is really unnecessary, the federal case in Miami is substantial. Yet the risks in such a case are so multifaceted that serious questions must be asked as to why the case could not have been prevented.
In this regard, both Trump and the Department of Justice are guilty. Even before the court case began, Trump’s handling of the classified documents was irresponsible, judging only by the evidence that is already public. His unwillingness to cooperate with the authorities was unnecessary and created real risks to national security. Trump was here, as in countless other cases, his own worst enemy.
The Department of Justice, and specifically the minister, Merrick Garland, who of course has been at odds with Trump and the Republicans since the beginning of 2017 because they did not want to carry out his nomination by Barack Obama as a judge on the Federal Supreme Court, had to made more effort to settle the matter between them and Trump without it having to turn into a court case. The credibility of the US justice system, especially at the federal level, is undoubtedly damaged by the case.
The risk of further division and eventually even violence is also substantial. A core group of Trump supporters, probably quite a few million, are so convinced that if the case against Trump amounts to political prosecution they will go to unprecedented measures to protect him.
Trump as symptom of bigger problem in USA
However, it is important to understand that this is about more than the person Donald Trump. Trump is a symptom of a much bigger problem in America. Trump represents the combined alienation, frustration and loss that as many as 40% of Americans are currently experiencing. It is this group of Americans who believe that the “deep state”, a set-up of decades-long cooperation between federal government institutions, the US intelligence services, the FBI and also non-governmental institutions such as large media houses and various pressure groups, is out to put an end to the America which became the most powerful country in the world in the 19th and 20th century.
Trump Americans live in the countryside and in the smaller cities and towns. They are mostly white, but sometimes are also third or fourth generation conservative Latin Americans or Asian Americans who believe that conservative America is being destroyed while the principles that used to make America the home of the American Dream, namely hard work, respectability, faith , property rights, freedom and a deep-seated national pride are wiped out.
If as much as a third or perhaps even 40% of the US feels alienated from their federal government and from important government institutions, a clear division arises in the population between the rural, conservative Americans who want to put America’s interests first versus the urban, liberal and multicultural Americans who increasingly see America as part of a new global order. These two groups inevitably collide and a court case in which the leader with the most support from one group is prosecuted by the government in control of the other group carries a serious risk.
The chance still exists that one of Trump’s Republican challengers can emerge victorious to be nominated as the party’s presidential candidate, precisely because of all the controversy in which Trump is shrouded and the damning testimony that may be given against Trump. There is a whole list of highly qualified, extremely conservative and capable candidates such as Ron DeSantis, Tim Scott, Mike Pence and Nikky Haley who could be really good presidential candidates.
While Joe Biden is still unpopular, and perceptions are deepening about his physical abilities to serve another term as president, it is clear that there is a great opportunity for the Republicans to take the White House, and even the senate, next November. to conquer. Democrats hope that Trump will be the candidate. Only 39.5% of American voters (the average percentage as shown by a series of recent polls) have a positive image of Trump. The Democrats are playing with fire by making a martyr out of Trump.
Should the case against Trump be settled before next year’s election, it could have a decisive effect on the election. Should he be found innocent, it could give his campaign a huge boost. Should he be found guilty, it would mean the end of his political career. Trump’s chances of being re-elected president of the USA next year are limited. Too many Americans are already calculating the risk he poses to America.
However, the chances that the current court cases against Trump could send the USA into the dangerous waters of hyperpolarization, physical mobilization and even violence is a fact. Precisely because of this, the tragic absence of leadership from both the totally inept Biden and the leaders of both political parties is indicative of an America that is weakening.
The past decades of illegal mass immigration, the continuous breakdown of the values and principles that made the USA a world power and the centralization of political power in a clique in Washington DC put a question mark on the future of the USA but can also mix of crises that will force necessary reforms.
Long after Trump has disappeared from the scene, America will still be busy with a realignment. The current power imbalance between left and right America is unsustainable. The only unanswered question is how it will be resolved.
