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We are now six days into the Trump trial. A complicated case became clearer after both sides made their opening statements on Monday.
Now we know a lot more about how the attorney general in Manhattan will present the case against Trump.
I wrote at the weekend that the matter is politically harmful for Donald Trump because it takes the focus away from an unpopular president, and reminds people of the Trump drama they never liked. And that a conviction would be poorly received by independent voters.
Also read: Should scare any presidential candidate
But after the opening remarks, a new scenario applies:
How big a political victory would an acquittal be for the former president?
A messy affair
Trump has been indicted 34 times for violating the accounting law in New York. The high number of charges sounds worse than it is, given that each charge represents only one cheque, invoice or book entry.
His running boy Michael Cohen paid porn actress Stormy Daniels to keep quiet about an alleged sexual encounter with Trump in 2006, so that it did not appear in the media just before the 2016 election.
Private non-disclosure agreements are legal, but Trump is said to have paid back Cohen in a way that violated state accounting laws. Trump claims these were normal and legal legal fees.
This is no more than a minor offense that only carries a fine. So why then appoint a public prosecutor Alvin Bragg in so strongly against Trump?
Also read: The bribery case: – In theory, Trump can rule the country from prison
Career-boosting to beat Trump
After the opening statements, it is difficult to see any better explanation than that Bragg, an elected Democrat, wants to make a career out of winning a case against Trump.
Bragg has a curious theory.
He claims that the offense was committed to cover up other offences. This increases the potential penalty, even if Trump has not been charged with these other offences.
The accounting error illegally influenced the 2016 election because it violated federal campaign finance law, Bragg claims. These expenses should therefore have been booked as part of the election campaign, he believes.
And this is where the prosecution will have to struggle to persuade the jury. To be convicted, Trump must have committed the violation of the accounting law with the knowledge and will to violate the campaign finance law.
Henrik Heldahl
Henrik Heldahl is a trained political scientist and political journalist at Nettavisen. Heldahl regularly comments on American politics in Norwegian media and writes and contributes for the website AmerikanskPolitikk.no and the podcast Amerikansk Politikk.
Several experts are scratching their heads.
Law professor Jed Shugerman at Boston University questions whether Trump’s violation of a New York law can even be linked to a federal law in this way, since a state attorney general has no authority over federal laws.
Read also: The trial against Trump: – This was a disaster for the defenders
Trump has a good case here
Trump denies the accusation of adultery. He paid Stormy Daniels to hide the allegation from his wife and children, his defense will claim.
Trump has a good case here. The prosecutor must persuade all 12 jurors that Trump’s perfectly reasonable explanation is incorrect. It is, to say the least, a demanding task.
Even if Trump is convicted, the case is less serious than the other three in which he is charged. There is talk that his election campaign failed to account for one of thousands of expenses in line with the electoral law.
Law professor Richard Hanson at the University of California has rightly pointed out that to call this “illegal electoral influence” is to dilute the term.
Especially at a time when democracy in the USA feels threatened, and after Trump has really tried to influence the election illegally in other ways, such as when he tried to pressure a party member in Georgia to find 11,780 votes, in order to reverse the result in the state.
After the opening statements, the so-called hush money case appears as a file case.
Also read: The jury is out: These are the citizens of Manhattan who can judge Trump
I think Trump will win a possible appeal case
It’s no wonder that Attorney General Bragg has been willing to delay the case, saying that one of the other Trump trials should go first.
The case that was supposed to go now, but has been postponed, is the federal January 6th case.
There, the prosecution believes they can prove an extensive conspiracy to change the election results, coordinated by several of Trump’s closest advisers at this time. His inner circle.
This trial would have given the voters absolutely necessary information ahead of this autumn’s election.
The hush money case, on the other hand, is unlikely to end with Trump going to prison. The penalty is up to four years, but it takes a lot to jail a 77-year-old with a clean record for accounting errors.
And even if Trump is convicted, he has a good chance of winning an appeal, writes the law professor and writer Randall Eliasonwho is skeptical of the legal basis in the case.
Also mentioned Shugerman at Boston University believes that Trump has a good chance in a possible appeal case, because it is far from certain that an appeals court will accept that a violation of a New York law is linked to a violation of a federal law, as the judge in this case has accepted.
But if Trump is acquitted, or the jurors fail to agree, it will be a huge political victory for the former president.
Also read: Man has set himself on fire outside the courtroom where the Trump case is ongoing
Trump’s lap of honor
This autumn’s election campaign will be a round of honor where Trump will repeat that he is exposed to a political witch hunt.
Possibly with a contagion effect, where some will believe that if this trial was questionable, perhaps the others are too.
It could be the consequence that the clearly least serious trial was allowed to go first.
