What is President Biden’s best move after the jury brings in a verdict in President Trump’s trial in NYC? The editors of the Wall Street Journal advise maintaining a low profile:
Mr. Biden is better advised to say nothing. Even a platitude—a statement in the event of a conviction that the will of the jury should be respected—will sound like an expression of satisfaction by a President whose allies convicted a political opponent. Mr. Biden’s son Hunter is slated to go on trial on felony charges in early June. Will he comment on that proceeding, too?
The issue here is presidential decorum and political judgment. The President has already come close to taunting Mr. Trump for his legal predicament.
Sadly, maintaining a low profile does not play to the president’s strong suit. Any president’s. They continue:
Mr. Biden was elected in 2020 in large part as the anti-Trump who would restore calm and dignity to the Oval Office. But one irony of the Biden Presidency has been its habit of imitating Mr. Trump’s political style of over-the-top rhetoric and disdain for political norms.
That’s never been clearer than in the decision by multiple Democratic prosecutors to indict a presidential opponent for the first time in history. Democrats thought the Manhattan trial would hurt Mr. Trump, but so far he’s gained in the polls. Now they think a guilty verdict will take him down, and they want to gloat about it. But voters may conclude that stretching the law to turn a misdemeanor offense into a felony is more politically significant as an abuse of the justice system.
If Mr. Biden tries to exploit a conviction as a campaign theme, voters will have even more reason to believe Mr. Trump when he says the prosecution was political from the start.
So, what’s the president’s best course of action?
How many people haven’t already made up their minds? I think it best he just ignore it unless asked but probably doesnt matter much.
Steve
The WSJ is viewing it wrong.
What the President should do depends on the mental model about how politics and this election work.
WSJ and anyone saying “lay low” come from a completely different mental model then the one that the Biden and his team believe in.
The evidence of that is the arguments for laying low are the same ones for not charging him in the first place. But they went forth in indicting Trump, (remember, it was a choice to appoint Jack Smith as special counsel).
At this point; Biden’s team either chooses to ditch that mental model or they can choose to do what it would recommend (not laying low and highlight Trump’s “crimes”). One doesn’t lightly ditch the guiding principles that drove administration actions for 3.5 years.
Will be plenty of folks to do victory dances and other ungentlemanly behavior. Yet, the need to attract focus exists, so, maybe big show of awarding key state NGOs with big contracts, lead a high school tour of White House and or getting a license renewed at the Courthouse just like everyone else
Not a problem there’s no way even a NY jury would convict Trump.
(Typed a few minutes after the neighbors yelled the conviction announcement and started cheering loudly)
The judicial malfeasance inherent in Kangaroo courts is not very attractive in America. The Merchan court perfectly exemplified such a court. From all of Merchan’s family’s conflicts of interest and political merchandising of the trial by his daughter, to the bias in how narrow the testimony of the defendant’s witnesses was allowed in comparison to the plaintiff’s, finalized by the unprecedented menu of jury instructions given to the jury, this trial hurts the public perception of fairness in our judicial system more than it does the man put on trial for misdemeanors (twisted into felonies), charged after the Statute of Limitations had already expired.
New York elites can celebrate such a malignant victory, but the working classes will see it differently. Donor sites for the newly minted felon are already crashing. It remains to be seen how such an unseemly verdict will affect the election in November. However, I tend to believe the enormity of errors, and gross dereliction of unbiased oversight during the court proceedings, will not bode well for the democrats, after savoring only momentary glee over getting what they wanted – the conviction of their most competitive political opponent.
@jan
Good to “see” you. Hope all is well with you and your family.
I think we should wait for an ER Doctor’s analysis. They have special training in google searches, posting links, and statistical regressions.
Good to see you too, Tasty, and that you haven’t lost your wry sense of humor.