LOS ANGELES.–Today’s Reuters/Ipsos poll indicated, at least in a snapshot, up to 10% of GOP votes would have second thoughts about voting for Trump now that he’s a convicted felon. Trump was convicted of falsifying business records related to a payoff of porn star Stormy Daniels claiming she had a one-night stand with Trump in 2006, something Trump denied. Before voters jump the gun on deciding anything about the 2024 presidential election, they should consider the nature of the charges and the court in which they were prosecuted. Trump was in unfriendly territory with a so-called jury of his peers, including a Judge Juan Merchan and Manhattan District Atty. Alvin Bragg, in Democrat territory. How can anyone take the convictions seriously when it was a star chamber or kangaroo court of the highest order, setting Trump up for a fall no matter what his attorney did in his defense?
Biden prematurely celebrated Trump’s convictions, hoping it will give him an advantage heading into November. But most voters, Republicans and Democrats, know that Biden is unfit for office, suffering from obvious age-related cognitive decline, possibly diagnosable dementia. So when voters go to the polls in November, they need to look at the big picture, especially whether or not Biden is fit as commander-in-chief. Looking at Biden’s foreign policy, especially proxy war in Ukraine against the Kremlin, he’s pushed the U.S. dangerously close to WW III, possibly nuclear war. So, when reading the tea leaves about the impact of Trump’s conviction on the polls, there’s many ways to look at this. At least 35% of respondents to the Reuters/Ipsos poll indicated they would be more likely to vote for Trump, largely because of the perception of playing politics.
Pollsters want to compare 2020 with 2024, the two election years are like night and day. Voters in 2020 were scared out-of-their-minds about the growing deaths from Covid. Democrats, with the help of Dr. Anthony Fauci and Washington Post journalist Bob Woodward, blamed Trump for the escalating crisis. President Joe Biden and VP Kamala Harris often dismissed any development of life-saving vaccines, knowing the Trump White House under Operation Warp Speed, worked 24/7 on developing a safe-and-effective vaccines with a number of drug companies. Biden and Harris told voters during the campaign to not hold their breath because Trump would most likely not deliver any vaccines. Only one week after the Nov. 3, 2020 election, Pfizer announced the release of the first MRNA vaccine. Democrats had thoroughly discredited 77-year-old President Donald Trump.
Voters in 2024 are willing to tolerate a lot including the recent conviction of Trump, knowing it was a politically-motivated trial. Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg ran on a platform of going after Trump, when his predecessor Cyrus Vance Jr. decided against it due to a lack of evidence. Bragg upgraded all of Trump misdemeanor bookkeeping charges to Class 3 felonies, making the trial fake from the get-go. Voters know Trump was convicted really of misdemeanors, not felonies, for recording the $130,000 payoff to Stormy Daniels as a legal expense. What other way could Trump look at the event? A woman accused him of a one-night stand in 2006, ready to undermine his 2016 presidential campaign. Trump told his former Atty. Michael Cohen to deal with Daniels’ extortion plot. What would anyone call the $130,000 payoff other than a miscellaneous legal expense?
Yet a jury of Trump’s peers convicted him on upgraded misdemeanors to felonies all for political purposes, to undermine his 2024 campaign. Trump’s lead defense Atty. Todd Blanche miscalculated the best legal strategy, trying to sell jurors that Michael Cohen went rogue in paying off Stormy Daniels. No one on the jury believed that Trump had nothing to do with paying off Stormy Daniels. Blanche tried to sell the jury on the idea that Cohen went rogue in paying off Stormy Daniels. Blanche only needed to tell jurors that Trump viewed the situation as a legal expense, which it was. Convicted on all 34 felonies, it’s clear that the jury didn’t buy Blanche’s argument that Trump knew nothing about the payoff. Blanche’s defense didn’t make any sense to jurors, promptly rejecting the idea that Michel Cohen went rogue to paid Stormy on his own, without Trump’s approval.
When you look at how the Manhattan DA set Trump up, it was a disgraceful exercise in toxic partisanship, most likely coordinated with the Democratic National Committee [DNC], White House or other Democrat political operatives. Voters must keep in mind that no one other than Trump would have been charged with felonies for otherwise misdemeanor bookkeeping errors. Voters need to keep in perspective the extreme corruption and partisanship in the criminal justice system. Trump was investigated for years for Hillary’s fake allegations about his ties to Russia. Yet no one in the fake news at CNN, MSNBC, New York Times or Washington Post, ever retracted one story after he was cleared by Special Counsel Robert Mueller in 2019. So , when voters evaluate whether to vote for Trump or not, they should not use Bragg’s convictions as anything more than partisan politics.
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.
