The Tribune

With CHARLIE HARPER

You have to hand it to Donald Trump. Even as polls continue to show that a clear majority of Americans don’t want him back in the White House or perhaps even to remain out of prison, this man exerts an irresistible force on the media in the US. And he continues to crush any and all Republican opposition to his renomination for president next summer.

Trump was indicted for a second time on Tuesday, this time in federal court in Washington, on charges related to his incitement of the January 6, 2021 riots that saw the American capitol breached by an angry mob of Trump supporters.

Trump was charged on four counts: conspiracy to defraud the US; conspiracy to threaten the rights of others; and one count each of conspiracy and obstruction of an official proceeding before Congress. Convictions on the first two would carry a sentence of up to five years in prison each; the other charges carry up to 20 years each.

There was more bad news for Trump. The judge overseeing his case in Washington is much different than Florida district judge Aileen Cannon, who was appointed to her position by Trump three years ago, has ruled in his favor a couple of times already, and was randomly assigned to oversee his trial on charges related to his alleged illegal theft of highly sensitive documents from the White House after he lost the 2020 election.

The federal judge in Washington assigned to the election fraud has been quite tough so far on defendants who stormed the US Capitol in an attack incited by Trump’s claims of a stolen election. She has also ruled against Trump already.

Judge Tanya Chutkan has sentenced at least 38 people convicted of Capitol riot-related crimes. All 38 received prison terms, ranging from ten days to over five years, according to an Associated Press analysis of court records. Furthermore, Chutkan has matched or exceeded prosecutors’ recommendations in exactly half of her 38 sentences. In four of those cases, prosecutors weren’t even seeking any jail time at all.

This woman is tough.

Further dimming prospects of Trump evading the January 6 charges in court, Chutkan also ruled against Trump in a separate related case. In November 2021, she refused his request to block by asserting executive privilege the release of documents to the House of Representatives select investigative committee.

She rejected Trump’s arguments that he could retain some control over documents from his administration even after President Joe Biden had cleared the way for the National Archives to accept the papers. She wrote that Trump could not claim that such a presidential privilege “exists in perpetuity.”

In a line from her ruling, Chutkan wrote: “Presidents are not kings, and Plaintiff (Trump) is not President.”

Meantime, Trump is, counterintuitively, maintaining a really impressive hold on the GOP nomination for next year. A recent New York Times/Siena College poll showed that he is more than lapping the growing field of his potential rivals.

The poll, released Monday, showed Trump with 54 percent of GOP voter support. Florida governor Ron DeSantis trailed in second place with only 17 percent. No one else in the field polled at more than three percent. Though Trump is customarily guilty of preposterous bombast, particularly when talking about himself, he is right on this one when he claims to be obliterating his field of Republican opponents.

Furthermore, Trump holds decisive advantages across almost every demographic group and region and in every ideological wing of the party, the Times survey found, as Republican voters seemed to ignore or minimise concerns about his expanding legal jeopardy. Trump led in this poll by wide margins among men and women, younger and older voters, moderates and conservatives, those who went to college and those who didn’t, and in cities, suburbs and rural areas, the Times reported.

One voter from rural Virginia told a Times reporter that “DeSantis, I have high hopes. But as long as Trump’s there, Trump’s the man.”

Trump isn’t just dominating the news. On blogs and in whispered conversations, he dominates in similar fashion. Here are a couple of the rumors currently flying around in Washington backrooms, on patios (when the heat abates) and on numerous blogs:

Remember 30 months ago, soon after Donald Trump finally agreed to vacate the White House and fly back to Palm Beach? Remember when Saudi Arabian crown prince and prime minister Mohammed bin Salman reportedly overruled his advisers on the board of a Saudi sovereign wealth fund and allotted $2 billion to a new investment fund started by Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner? The same Kushner whose financial travails in real estate in New York City had him facing a huge default on a Manhattan office tower he had incautiously purchased? Guess what MBS got in return for his $2 billion? A trove of secret documents stolen from the White House by Trump!

Or how about this one? Trump, still in the process of bilking his innocent and misguided supporters out of millions of small-contribution dollars and using their financial support to pay his legal fees to the reported tune of $40 million so far, is secretly amassing his ill-got wealth in Palm Beach. After he is convicted in the middle of next year’s presidential campaign, he will appeal. That will push the legal process initiated by special prosecutor Jack Smith past the 2024 election in which Trump will inevitably lose. But by the time he does lose, he’ll have loaded his own jet with cash, and he’ll take off for a foreign land with no extradition treaty with the US.

Just a couple of nations in that latter category are Saudi Arabia and Russia. More attractive alternatives might include Brazil, whose own extradition treaty with the US dates from 1961 but whose practical implementation has sometimes proven to be problematical for American law enforcement.

TWO SUCCESSFUL GOP GOVERNORS DECLINE TO RUN FOR PRESIDENT

In the shadows of the Trump public relations phenomenon, Republican power brokers continue to wring their hands and hope for someone – anyone, almost – to emerge as a credible alternative candidate for president next year.

It won’t be Larry Hogan. And it won’t be Brian Kemp.

Hogan is a popular former two-term GOP governor in Maryland, one of the bluest states in the country. There was early speculation that he would run as a reasonable, centrist alternative to Trump in Republican primaries next year. But Hogan recently said he would not run as a Republican.

“I finished my eight years as governor with a 77 percent approval rating. Highest in the country. It was over 70 with Democrats, independents, and Republicans,” Hogan told Politico, the respected on-line political journal. “Of course, I’m not well known across the country. But you’ve got to run a race to see what it would look like.”

There has been much speculation about Hogan running on a third-party ticket. He is currently chair of No Labels, an aspirational crossover group of legislators that may run a national campaign next year aimed at the many voters who support neither of the likely big party nominees – Trump and Biden.

Right now, Hogan said, more voters are open to backing a third-party ticket than in previous years. A recent Quinnipiac poll found that 47 percent of voters would consider supporting a third-party candidate.

Kemp, who has managed to hold on to his job as Georgia governor as a reliable conservative who resisted Trump’s attempt to impugn and overturn the Peach State’s support for Biden three years ago, recently told reporters he wouldn’t seek a presidential nomination in 2024.

Kemp won reelection easily in 2022 even as Democrat Raphael Warnock won a full Senate term and Trump’s resentful opposition did not seriously damage Kemp’s campaign.

“He was mad at me. I was not mad at him. I told him exactly what I could and couldn’t do when it came to the election and I followed the law and the Constitution. And as I’ve said before, that’s a lot bigger than Donald Trump. It’s a lot bigger than me. It’s a lot bigger than the Republican Party,” Kemp said Monday.

Several Republicans remain in the 2024 nomination race as we approach an August 23 Republican presidential candidates’ debate. Others, like Virginia governor Glenn Youngkin, have preferred a stealthier approach and have remained outside the circle of declared candidates.