America’s 45th president has racked up yet another first in the chaos he has unleashed since launching his first campaign in 2015. At a courthouse in Miami on Tuesday, Donald Trump was arrested and booked after becoming the first ex-president to be arraigned on federal charges — over classified documents he kept at his resort. He has pleaded not guilty.
Of course, it wasn’t Trump’s first indictment for a criminal offense. He’s awaiting trial in March next year — slap bang in the middle of presidential primary season — on charges of falsifying business records related to a hush money payment paid to an adult film star. He has also pleaded not guilty in this case.
You might think that the possibility of criminal conviction would snuff out Trump’s hopes of a return to the Oval Office. But he’s actually making his legal issues the core of his campaign for another White House term, firing up supporters with claims that he’s being persecuted by the Biden administration. The argument ignores the facts, but might work politically.
The prospect of a felon as US president sounds alarming, but there’s nothing that says the ex-president can’t run. The Constitution only requires presidential candidates to be natural born citizens, at least 35 years old and a US resident for at least 14 years.
Could voters stomach a convicted president? Trump’s Republican devotees, especially in the House of Representatives, have enthusiastically accused Biden of weaponizing justice. But Trump is facing grave charges; photos in the indictment show classified material — including details about nuclear weapons — strewn in his bathroom, shower and ballroom, raising huge questions about his fitness to return to office.
Some Republicans have gently begun to test this argument. Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, who's running in single digits in GOP primary polls, said that if the indictment is true, Trump has been “incredibly reckless.” (Although she also said Tuesday she'd be "inclined" to pardon him if he's convicted.) Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, who served for years on the Senate Judiciary Committee and who had initially condemned the indictment, conceded that the charges against Trump have “got to concern you.”
And Trump’s former Attorney General William Barr thinks the ex-president is in deep trouble.
"If even half of it is true, then he's toast,” Barr said.
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