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What once would have been unprecedented, the spectacle of a former US president appearing in a court on criminal charges, is now becoming almost routine.
By the end of next week Donald Trump is likely to have been arraigned in a court for the fourth time in almost as many months.
Trump is by far the favourite to be the Republican Party’s nominee to run for the White House next year.
But at a time when his campaign should be gearing up for the primary elections across the country, the former president may very well be preparing to stand trial in various locations next year – with each trial potentially running for weeks on end.
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He already faces charges in New York in relation to hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels before the 2016 election and over his handling of classified documents taken from the White House to his home and club in Florida.
Federal prosecutors a couple of weeks ago indicted the former president in Washington over alleged attempts to hold on to power after he lost the presidential election in November 2020 – similar ground to the charges made against him in Georgia on Monday night.
Trump’s legal diary for the end of August provides an example of how these difficulties are affecting his time.
[ Donald Trump charged over attempts to overturn 2020 election defeat in Georgia ]
In Georgia he has been ordered to present himself to authorities for arraignment by Friday week, August 25th. The day before, on August 24th, there will be a hearing about the classified documents in Florida, while the federal case regarding the 2020 election is scheduled to return to court in Washington on August 28th.
While the indictment in Georgia on Monday night covers similar terrain to the case brought against Trump by special counsel Jack Smith a fortnight ago, it is more wide-ranging in scope and its language more dramatic.
It charges Trump under racketeering laws initially designed by the US government under Richard Nixon to tackle the mafia but later mirrored in legislation introduced in various states to deal with issues not necessarily involving organised crime.
Such racketeering laws – known as Rico – allow prosecutors to charge multiple people who allegedly commit separate crimes while working toward a common goal.
The indictment released on Monday alleges the former president and the other defendants refused to accept that he lost the 2020 election and “knowingly and willfully joined a conspiracy to unlawfully change the outcome of the election in favour of Trump”.
The Georgia case also brings charges for the first time against key Trump allies including his lawyer and former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows as well as a number of outside legal advisers.
The indictment highlights about 160 acts allegedly undertaken by Trump and his allies – not only in Georgia but also in several other states – including false statements about election fraud and attempts to manipulate the US Electoral College system by appointing fake electors to back the former president.
The indictment also covers the alleged harassment of election worker Ruby Freeman who last year told a congressional committee about the impact on her life after being falsely accused of participating in election fraud in Georgia by senior figures on the Trump team.
At the forthcoming arraignment in Atlanta, Trump will undoubtedly plead not guilty, as he has in all other similar court hearings in recent months.
He has insisted all the prosecutions are politically motivated and aimed at interfering with his campaign for re-election to the White House.
The various court cases have unquestionably boosted his support among Republicans. He leads other candidates in the contest for the party’s nomination for the presidency by more than 30 points.
Each indictment has also allowed the former president to raise funds on the back of what he contends is a witch hunt against him and his supporters – although his legal bills are also burning through the campaign’s resources, costing about $40 million (€36 million) so far.
As Trump’s stock among his supporters increases following the criminal indictments made against him, his period in the doldrums after being blamed by some for the Republicans’ failure to win big as projected in the midterm elections last November is now rarely mentioned.
But while Trump’s core Republican base has been energised by his legal troubles, how the forthcoming trials will play out for key independent voters, who will be crucial in a general election, remains to be seen.
Nationwide, polls suggest a neck-and-neck race between Trump and Joe Biden in an 2024 rematch.
But that is now. Things may change as the criminal justice proceedings involving Trump continue while at the same time Republicans seek to make – as yet without substantial evidence – allegations of corruption about Biden and some of his family.