PNN – The ruling of the New York court in the United States against the former President of the United States, Donald Trump, has had various responses among American partisans and independent individuals and personalities in this country, and has caused this country to become more polarized than before on the eve of the 2024 presidential election.
On May 30, Donald Trump, as the first former president of the United States, was found guilty of 34 charges in a court in New York; The ruling, which many American analysts consider to be history-making, and they say that this issue fueled the doubts about Trump’s participation in the 2024 presidential election and its consequences more than before in the public opinion in the United States and globally.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg last year charged Trump with 34 counts of falsifying business records and said Trump’s ex-lawyer Michael Cohen paid porn actress Stormy Daniels $130,000 to end Trump’s illicit relationship with her.
District prosecutors also said the payment was made in the closing days of the 2016 presidential election campaign in exchange for the actress’s silence about her secret relationship with Trump a decade ago. This action was carried out in the form of a massive plan to suppress negative news against Trump before the 2016 election, the results of which led to the defeat of Hillary Clinton.
The fact that one of the two most likely presidents in the United States next year is now a criminal has raised many questions about America’s future. Including “to what extent will the criminal president have the necessary legal authority in the White House and if he is accepted in the American society and obtains the necessary votes in the 2024 presidential election, to what extent will he be able to bring the two branches of the judiciary and the legislature together with the policies, will be your goals and plans?
There are other questions in this context:
1- Will the sentence against Trump hinder his election campaign?
2- Can Trump still run for president?
3- Can he vote for himself?
4- If Trump becomes president, what will be the consequences of the unprecedented event of electing a criminal as president in the future of America?
A number of party and political figures, university professors and American historians answered some of these questions from their point of view or political position:
The intensification of the conflict between the judiciary and the executive branch
TIMOTHY JAMES NAFTALI, a historian analyst and senior researcher at Columbia University’s School of International Affairs and Public Affairs, wrote in a report in Politico in this regard: It seems that if Trump becomes president, the position of the rule of law will come under the sharpest political attacks in American history.
According to this analyst, it is too early to assess the long-term consequences for the rule of law of the former US president’s first conviction. These consequences will be determined by a different ruling; The verdict that the American people will pass collectively at the polls in November. Americans are not going to agree on this verdict and maybe they never will.
Americans regret the election of Trump
Curt Mills, executive director of The American Conservative, told Politico in this regard that based on Trump’s proven crimes, the most troubling aspect of this case is that everything he did as a former president, or even the last 10 years, or anything he will do in his future presidency, is likely to be in some way overshadowed and there is strong political and judicial suspicious.
He emphasized that if Trump becomes president in this year’s elections, “Americans of every political faction will regret one day that they let this genie out of the bottle.”
A ruling affecting the reduction of Trump’s votes
MIKE MADRID, a Republican Party strategist, believes in this regard: There is no doubt that this ruling is politically bad for Trump. It’s just a question of how bad. 20% of GOP voters consistently voted against him in primaries, and this ruling is likely to encourage them to oppose Trump; But losing Republican voter approval by more than 10 percent would be unprecedented and devastating.
Republicans: Trump’s sentence was political
Mark Baerlein, a retired professor of English at Emory University and the senior editor of First Things, said that Democrats are extremely happy to condemn Trump, but the answer to this issue will be determined on election day. Whatever we think of Trump, when half the country distrusts the justice system, when prosecutors and judges are so biased that the ideals of impartiality no longer exist, civil faith crumbles.
Democrats: Trump should not have immunity
Catherine J. Ross is a law professor emeritus at the George Washington University School of Law and the author of “The Right to Lie? Presidents, Other Liars and the First Amendment” believes: The rule of law appears to be alive and well in New York. Even before the trial began, Trump and his allies attacked the system itself and the charges against him. During the trial, they brutally harassed the judge’s family, witnesses and even the brave and hardworking jury.
Moments after the results were announced, Trump reappeared outside the courtroom, calling the entire trial a “fraud” and a “disgrace.” I fear that the attacks on the New York court ruling are just the prelude to more concerted efforts to destroy the rule of law and the institutions on which democracy rests.
The disgrace of the first criminal president
David Greenberg, Politico analyst and professor of history and journalism at Rutgers University, considered the New York verdict against Trump to be a historic and unprecedented verdict in America, which has a special meaning in society.
An unprecedented verdict in the past 235 years of America
Allan Lichtman, a distinguished professor of history at the American University, also believes that the verdict issued by the jury of the New York court in Trump’s guilt is of great historical and political importance. In the 235 years of US history, no president or potential or actual presidential candidate of a major party has ever been charged with a crime.
Now Trump has been convicted by the court not only for one count, but for 34 crimes. He was not found guilty by his political enemies, but was quickly and unanimously convicted by a jury of 12 ordinary Americans. Contrary to Trump’s lies, there was no mock trial. The judge was very fair in his rulings; He gave Trump plenty of time to defend himself.
Democrats: Trump is using his warrant for another rebellion
According to LEAH WRIGHT RIGUEUR, associate professor of history at Johns Hopkins University and author of “The Loneliness of the Black Republican,” Trump’s conviction highlights at least two important things for the American people. First, American democracy is fragile and in crisis. The Trump administration’s penchant for rejecting democratic processes to get what it wants and using trials to foment violence is troubling.
Republicans: America is teetering on the brink of a tyrannical left-wing dictatorship
NEWT GINGRICH, the former speaker of the US House of Representatives and one of Trump’s main supporters and party mates, said that Trump’s supporters are so angry that I don’t think I’ve ever seen them before. The $38 million that Trump raised overnight despite the website being down is an example of how deep this anger runs.
Conclusion:
Trump’s opponents and supporters emphasized in the last two days that Trump may have been found guilty of all charges, but the ruling will not stop the former president from continuing his campaign to retake the White House. Trump was found guilty in a New York criminal court on 34 counts of falsifying business records in connection with “hush money” payments to a porn star, but the ruling will not stop him from campaigning for the presidency.
In response to the question of whether Trump will be imprisoned? Analysts say it is unlikely that people with no criminal record will be required to serve jail time simply for falsifying business records, even if convicted. In these cases, penalties such as fines or probation are more common.
But there are other questions in this context that some American media have raised and answered:
Can Trump become president despite the conviction?
If Trump becomes president, can he pardon himself?
To what extent can Trump’s conviction affect the results of the 2024 US presidential election?
Trump’s opponents say that the sentence against him does not change the fact that the American people are facing a simple reality. There’s still only one way to keep Donald Trump out of the Oval Office; Attending the polls.
First, Trump is the main threat to the survival of America itself, rather than the rest of the world; Therefore, Americans now see Trump as the biggest threat to the survival of this country. For months, Trump has been preparing voters for the possibility of his conviction in what US prosecutors say was an attempt to mislead voters in 2016. He has claimed that his four criminal indictments are a conspiracy by Biden to destroy him, but his opponents say that even if Trump’s lawyers appeal, a criminal should not be allowed to be nominated as the president of the United States.