Humiliated in public – but he still leads

 

Michael Cohen
 

Troublesome testimony against Trump - yet he leads in crucial states

Wolfgang Hansson

This is a commenting text. Analysis and positions are the writer's.

Updated 16.01 | Published 14.13

 

Donald Trump outside the court. Photo: Curtis Means/AP

I don't know if it matters to the election if Donald Trump is convicted or not.

But after Michael Cohen's testimony, it feels even more clear that it was to hide the connection with the porn star from the voters that Trump paid for her silence.

The question is whether voters care.
 

Quick version

• Despite Donald Trump being accused of hiding his relationship with a porn actress before the 2016 election, a poll shows him leading in six of the seven swing states ahead of November's presidential election.
• The star witness in the trial, Michael Cohen, claims that it was Trump who ordered him to pay Stormy Daniels and to hide the payment with fake invoices.
• Other trials against Trump, over top secret documents and election fraud, are on hold and are unlikely to be concluded before the election.  
  

Trump has no high morals. Rather, he resembles a mafia boss where he sits on the dock. Therefore, no one expects him to follow normal rules of the game.

Normally, it would have been enough for a presidential candidate to be indicted to automatically be out of the race.

For Trump, other laws of nature apply.

 

After a number of weeks of being flayed in a Manhattan courtroom, having his persona dragged into the dirt and generally being humiliated in public, a new poll from the New York Times/Siena came out the other day showing that Trump is leading in six of the seven swing states that will determine who wins the presidential election in November. In four of them by seven percentage points or more.
 

In other words, voters seem completely unconcerned about whether Trump paid a porn actress to not tell about their sexual escapades before the 2016 presidential election.

Regardless of the verdict, I think most people realize that Trump wanted to bring voters behind the scenes to improve his chances of victory.

Those who are outraged by this would never consider voting for Trump anyway. Those who might consider giving Trump another chance at the White House don't care if they were duped or not.

Michael Cohen was Trump's fixer and legal torpedo for many years. Now he is the prosecution's star witness in the only trial likely to be completed against Trump before the presidential election.

 

Fixer Michael Cohen testifies against his former boss. Photo: Seth Wenig/AP

Trump's defenders tried to question Michael Cohen's credibility. He has admitted that he lied before, "to protect Trump".

But Cohen's story agrees well with what other witnesses have told. Cohen claimed that it was Trump who ordered him to pay Stormy Daniels and hide the payment through fake invoices.

Which is exactly what the prosecutor claims.

Both Cohen's and Stormy Daniel's testimony were troubling to Trump in a number of ways. That could be enough for a conviction. But it is far from impossible that the jury acquits him. It only takes one of the twelve jurors to find Trump innocent for him to go free.

The outcome may play a role in the outcome of the presidential election. About 20 percent of Republican voters say in opinion polls that they cannot imagine voting for a presidential candidate who has been convicted of a crime.

For Trump, it was positive that the trial was not televised. He certainly didn't get the same attention as he would have otherwise, but he didn't have to wash his dirty laundry in public. There is a difference between written summaries in the media of testimony and Trump's reactions than following everything in real time.

• For those who hope that the other trials will be more damaging to Trump, more bad news awaits. The judge in the indictment of the top-secret documents Trump took with him from the White House when he left the presidency has postponed the case indefinitely. A trial could still begin before the presidential election, but that appears increasingly unlikely.För den som hoppas att
  
• The indictment in the state of Georgia that Trump conspired with 18 other people to falsify the election results is on hold. The judge in the case is in the middle of a re-election campaign. It is still unclear whether or not District Attorney Fanni Willis will be removed from the case. Although her ex-boyfriend who was also the prosecutor in the case has recused himself from the case after their affair was exposed, a commission of inquiry is underway that could fire Willis. In that case, everything must be redone from the beginning. The prosecution may even be dropped. It does not seem likely that the trial would start before November.
• The US Supreme Court is to give a ruling before the summer vacation on the question of whether Trump is immune from prosecution or not. If the answer, as expected, is no, it opens the door to the indictment that deals with Trump's involvement in the storming of Congress on January 6, 2021.

          

        Stormy Daniels. Photo: Markus Schreiber/AP

 

But Trump is an är expert at letting his lawyers object and appeal everything. That a trial can be completed before the presidential election is very doubtful.

Therefore, all eyes remain on the case of Trump, the fixer and the porn star.

But not even a conviction can stop Trump from running for president.

He might even win.