A meaningless sentence empowering him further
The historic New York criminal case against Donald Trump — the first of its kind against a former president — closed with a whimper Friday morning, with the president-elect facing no consequences for faking business documents to cover up a sexual affair from American voters in 2016.
“Never before has this court been presented with such a unique and remarkable set of circumstances,” Justice Juan Merchan said from the bench. “This has been a truly extraordinary case.”
However, the judge pointed out that the soft landing to such a weighty case was directly due to Trump’s impending return to office — and he reminded Trump that the legal protections sparing him what could have been a more serious sentence, which could have included years in jail, belonged not to a man but to the person who temporarily sits at the White House’s Resolute Desk.
“Ordinary citizens do not receive those legal protections,” Merchan said as he delivered his sentence.
“To be sure, it is the legal protections afforded to the office of the president of the United States that are extraordinary — not the occupant of the office,” he said.
Yeah, whatever.
Trump whined:
“It’s been a political witch hunt. It was done to damage my reputation so I would lose the election, and obviously, that didn’t work.”
Every day I am reminded that tens of millions of my fellow Americans endorsed not just Trump but the idea that a president should be immune from all accountability for everything he does. It’s nihilistic and shallow to just throw up your hands and say “nothing matters.” But damn, some days it’s really hard not to think that.
Update —
Why is it up to a former RNC chair to make this argument right now?