Legal expert Jonathan Turley is pointing out why Donald Trump’s hush money trial may ultimately help him politically.
On Monday, trial arguments began in Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s case against the former president. Trump is accused of falsifying business records related to payments made to Stormy Daniels. The trial is expected to take weeks, which means Trump’s ability to campaign is severely hampered. President Joe Biden, meanwhile, is ramping up his campaigning.
That juxtaposition — Trump in a courtroom versus Biden on the campaign trail — could help Trump, Turley predicted.
“This is becoming the split-screen election,” the law professor said on Fox News. “Earlier it was pretty damaging to see the split screen between Trump in different courtrooms. This is even more effective when the other side of the screen shows Biden campaigning in key states like Pennsylvania while [Trump’s] held in this courtroom.
“It really brings home something that bothers a lot of Americans, including people who don’t particularly like Trump: That this is the weaponization of the criminal legal system,” he explained.
A CNN panel also brought attention to Trump’s situation, noting that it was “pretty remarkable” that Judge Juan Merchan, who is overseeing the trial, ended court early on Monday to allow an alternate juror to attend their dentist appointment while potentially forcing Trump to miss events important to him.
Earlier in his interview on Fox News, Turley explained why Bragg’s prosecution of Trump is “an embarrassment” and leaves him in “utter disbelief.”
“The arguments today did, in fact, capture all the problems here: You had this misdemeanor under state law that had run out — this is going back related to the 2016 election — that they zapped it back into life by alleging that there was a campaign finance violation under the federal laws that doesn’t exist. The Department of Justice doesn’t view it this way,” he explained.
“On top of that, you got these tough factual issues that were laid out well by the Trump team, saying someone else designated this as a legal expense,” Turley continued.
“Keep in mind: this is what Hillary Clinton’s people did,” he pointed out. “Remember, when they funded the Steele dossier — which they denied to reporters — they put it as a legal expense. And then they fought the eventual fine they received from the federal government saying, ‘But it was a legal expense.’ Now you’ve got some of the same Democrats supporting this bizarre theory.”
Turley, moreover, agreed there is credence to the narrative that Bragg’s case is “coordinated” with the Justice Department, owing to the fact that Michael Colangelo, who once worked in the Biden DOJ, helped present opening arguments on Monday.
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