Trouble for Trump in Georgia: A TV trial and all those co-defendants - USA Trending Blog
Trouble for Trump in Georgia: A TV trial and all those co-defendants - USA Trending Blog
Another day, another indictment?
Not exactly.
The fourth time Donald Trump has faced criminal charges since leaving the White House a statement that manages to simultaneously sound unimaginable and mundane is not like all the others. The charges by a Fulton County grand jury in Atlanta that the former president tried to overturn the 2020 election are familiar, outlined already in a congressional impeachment trial and a federal special counsel's indictment.
But there are ways in which this trial will not be like all the others. The law and the politics in this case pose distinctive perils that could make it the most serious challenge of all to Trump's future and whether that entails a term in prison or in the White House.
Here's how:
There's a tape of that phone call
"So what are we going to do here folks?" Trump can be heard saying toward the end of an hourlong phone call on Jan. 2, 2021, with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in which he pleaded, beseeched and threatened him to "find" the votes Trump needed to carry Georgia. "I only need 11,000 votes. Fellas, I need 11,000 votes. Give me a break."
In Trump's own voice, in his own words, he can be heard trying to overturn an election outcome that Raffensperger, a fellow Republican, repeatedly told him had been accurately counted and confirmed as a victory for Democrat Joe Biden. Trump was undeterred in exchanges that are easy to understand and hard to explain away.
By the way, it was another taped phone conversation, one in which he tried to coerce the new president of Ukraine to help him politically, that prompted Trump's first impeachment.
The trial will be on TV
The other pending trials will feature what might seem like an archaic form of journalism, the courtroom drawing, plus the descriptive powers of reporters to convey in words the dramatic exchanges between witnesses and prosecutors, between witnesses and defense lawyers.
Cameras aren't typically allowed in federal or New York courtrooms, but they are required in Georgia courtrooms, with a judge's approval. That would give Americans the opportunity to see every moment and make their own decisions about who and what to believe.
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