The notorious US lawyer Roy Cohn, one-time mentor to Donald Trump, taught the property mogul in his early years in business to fight all charges, to countersue when sued and to never concede defeat. Any observer interpreting the unprecedented US criminal prosecution being taken this week against the 45th US president as politically damaging should pay heed to Cohn’s advice in any consideration about what the case might mean for Trump’s 2024 run for the White House.
Trump’s rise to political power during the 2016 US presidential election was rooted in his capacity to present himself as an outsider to a divided and frustrated electorate. He sold himself to voters as an anti-establishment figure looking to upset the status quo in Washington politics and as a fighter in the midst of political combat, who can surprise opponents with incendiary comments and outrageous actions that would have ended the presidential campaigns of most candidates.
The infamous Access Hollywood tape, in which Trump bragged about being able to sexually assault women because he was famous, did little damage to his support when it emerged in the final stages of the 2016 campaign. Now, it is unlikely that a prosecution case taken over the payment of hush money to buy the silence of a woman with whom he had an affair will cause Trump any lasting damage among the right-wing electoral base that he so easily stokes.
Remarkably, there is nothing to stop Trump continuing with his second-time run for the presidency in 2024 while indicted or even if convicted of the charges he will face this week. The US constitution requires only that a candidate is a natural-born citizen, at least 35 years old and a resident of the US for at least 14 years.
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Expect Trump the showman to use the spectacle of his “surrender” to prosecutors in a New York court on Tuesday to fan his base and to point to a “political” prosecution by an ambitious Manhattan district attorney that Trump will no doubt claim is squarely aimed at disrupting his “Make America Great Again” agenda. Trump understands the American news cycle better than anyone in US politics and he will likely, as a master salesman, peddle the line to supporters that a politically motivated criminal case is aimed at disrupting his plans to “take the country back”.
The real test for the future of the US political system is how moderate Republicans will react to the prosecution. Few will want a candidate under indictment to be anywhere near a presidential campaign.
The case should be a step too far, even for Republicans captured by the Trump agenda. But many in the party have been slow to take him on. This case should force some to grow more backbone. With Trump’s expected counter-punching, that may prove difficult.