LOS ANGELES.–All the fake news analysis about former President Donald Trump’s impending conviction is just wishful thinking heading into closing arguments and jury deliberation. Former President Bill Clinton’s Democrat hack Atty. Lanny Davis says the “facts speak for themselves,” hoping like all Democrats and the fake news for a conviction. But the more you look at the poor jury, the more it looks like it’s hung or leaning toward acquittal. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg made a lot of wild allegations about the case, including upgrading all the bookkeeping charges to Class 3 felonies from misdemeanors. Bragg predecessor Cryus Vance Jr. said he didn’t have enough evidence to convict Trump and refused to prosecute. Bragg promised voters he would bring charges against the former president in an election year, hoping to derail his 2024 presidential campaign.
In a momentary lapse for a CNN journalist, Sarah Murray speculated what would happen if the jury gets hung or in an acquittal. “Donald Trump gets to go out there and say, ‘Joe Biden’s prosecutors” which, again, not true, ‘came after me, his Department of Justice came after me, and they still didn’t convict me. I’m still innocent,” Most of the CNN and MSNBC analysts think Trump will be convicted but only because that’s what they want politically. Any hung jury or acquittal would, as Murray says, raise questions of all the cases against Trump, no matter how legitimate they seem. Bragg’s case was always the most dicey using convicted felon, disbarred, disgraced former Atty. Michael Cohen as a star witness. Jurors have to weigh his testimony over what seems as Bragg’s best evidence, diverting jurors away from the actual case, charging Trump with felonies as opposed to misdemeanors.
Bragg’s prosecutors have made no effort to explain why he charged ordinary bookkeeping issues as Class 3 felonies, the lowest felony level. To prove his case beyond a reasonable doubt, all 12 jurors must vote to convict Trump based on testimony from a star witness Michael Cohen that admitted to stealing untold sums of money from the Trump Organization. “I also think you could end up somewhere in this sort of muddy middle where you end up with a hung jury, a jury that cannot reach a verdict. And then this truly does just get kicked to the voters to decide,” Murray said. So, Murray raises the issue of the 2024 election, asking why would any politically motivated prosecution be considered legitimate at all, no matter how much Democrats and press despise Trump. Most CNN and MSNBC analysts don’t want to consider the likely outcome: A hung jury.
Trump has called all the various prosecutions politically driven because they all have something in common: They’re all driven by Democrat prosecutors. Even the most partisan Trump critics, like 60-year-old George Conway, concedes reluctantly that the jury could be hung by one or more jurors. “I don’t think they can get an acquittal. I don’t think they’re going to get 12 jurors to acquit him,” Conway told MSNBC’s Katie Phang. “I think their best shot, and that’s what they’re going to do, is hope that there’s just some person on the jury who refuses to convict,” something not said by most analysts on MSNBC. Conway was previously married to Kellyanne Conway, Trump’s 57-year-old former Senior White House Adviser. Conway’s hedging his bets as the trial comes to an end, realizing that the jury has been presented with too much contradictory evidence.
Jurors must decide more than whether or not Trump ordered his former Atty. Michael Cohen to pay off porn star Stormy Daniels. But that’s not what jurors must decide in this case. They must determine whether Trump let Cohen handle Daniel’s nuisance claim as part of his legal duties. If the jury decides that Cohen worked to rid Trump of his legal problems with Stormy Daniels, then it was part of his legal duties, not, as Bragg claims, a scheme to defraud the government. Jurors don’t know why Bragg brought 34 felonies against Trump, as opposed to misdemeanor bookkeeping errors. “I suspect that it’s going to be successful,” said former U.S. Acting Solicitor Gen. Neal Kaytal, calling Bragg’s case “common sense.” Jurors know that the case against Trump is anything but common sense. Cohen worked in his capacity as Trump’s “fixer” to end the nuisance matter.
When you add up all the contradictory evidence, including the cross examination of Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen, jurors know that case is more than about paying Stormy off for her silence. Jurors know she extorted $130,000 from Trump of stop her leaking a false rumor about an alleged affair with Trump in 2006. Jurors will also be thinking what in the world is an alleged affair in 2006 having any impact on a trial today. Jurors know all about Bragg’s star witness, admitting to stealing cash from the Trump Organization. Jurors also know that that Michael Cohen is a convicted felon, disbarred for his own crimes, having nothing to do with Trump, including income tax evasion. Bragg only hopes as Kaytal that jurors focus only on extraneous documents, not use their “common sense” to know there’s something deeply flawed about Bragg’s case.
About the Author
John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news. He’s editor of OnlineColumnist.com and author of Dodging The Bullet and Operation Charisma.
