All posts tagged: former President Donald Trump

Opening statements expected Monday at Trump’s New York criminal trial

Opening statements expected Monday at Trump’s New York criminal trial

Opening arguments are set to start Monday at the New York trial of Donald Trump, the first criminal case ever brought against a former U.S. president. Prosecutors are expected to allege that Trump schemed in 2016, just before winning election, to hide hush money payments to two women to cover up their claims of alleged extramarital affairs with him. Trump’s lawyers are likely to deny the affairs occurred, and to tell the jury that payments made to Michael Cohen were reimbursements for legal work, not hush money Cohen claims he paid porn actress Stormy Daniels. Cohen, a convicted perjurer, was Trump’s one-time political fixer and personal lawyer, and is expected to be a key witness for the prosecution. “I was paying a lawyer and marked it down as a legal expense.” Trump told reporters last week. “That’s exactly what it was.” Trump has pleaded not guilty to all 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. If convicted, he could be imprisoned for up to four years. Trump was president from 2017 to 2021 and is …

D.C.’s Crime Problem Is a Democracy Problem

D.C.’s Crime Problem Is a Democracy Problem

Matthew Graves is not shy about promoting his success in prosecuting those who stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. By his count, Graves, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, has charged more than 1,358 individuals, spread across nearly all 50 states and Washington, D.C., for assaulting police, destroying federal property, and other crimes. He issues a press release for most cases, and he held a rare news conference this past January to tout his achievements. But Graves’s record of bringing violent criminals to justice on the streets of D.C. has put him on the defensive. Alone among U.S. attorneys nationwide, Graves, appointed by the president and accountable to the U.S. attorney general, is responsible for overseeing both federal and local crime in his city. In 2022, prosecutors under Graves pressed charges on a record-low 33 percent of arrests in the District. Although the rate increased to 44 percent last fiscal year and continues to increase, other cities have achieved much higher rates: Philadelphia had a 96 percent prosecution rate in 2022, …

The Supreme Court’s Supreme Betrayal

The Supreme Court’s Supreme Betrayal

The Supreme Court of the United States did a grave disservice to both the Constitution and the nation in Trump v. Anderson. In a stunning disfigurement of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Court impressed upon it an ahistorical misinterpretation that defies both its plain text and its original meaning. Despite disagreement within the Court that led to a 5–4 split among the justices over momentous but tangential issues that it had no need to reach in order to resolve the controversy before it, the Court was disappointingly unanimous in permitting oath-breaking insurrectionists, including former President Donald Trump, to return to power. In doing so, all nine justices denied “We the People” the very power that those who wrote and ratified the Fourteenth Amendment presciently secured to us to save the republic from future insurrectionists—reflecting a lesson hard-learned from the devastation wrought by the Civil War. Quinta Jurecic: The Supreme Court is not up to the challenge For a century and a half before the Court’s decision, Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment was the Constitution’s safety …

Donald Trump Mocks Joe Biden’s Stutter

Donald Trump Mocks Joe Biden’s Stutter

Former President Donald Trump, perhaps threatened by President Joe Biden’s well-received State of the Union address, mocked his opponent’s lifelong stutter at a rally in Georgia yesterday. “Wasn’t it—didn’t it bring us together?” Trump asked sarcastically. He kept the bit going, slipping into a Biden caricature. “‘I’m gonna bring the country tuh-tuh-tuh-together,’” Trump said, straining and narrowing his mouth for comedic effect. Trump has made a new habit of this. “‘He’s a threat to d-d-democracy,’” Trump said in his vaudeville Biden character at a January rally in Iowa. That jibe was also a response to a big Biden speech—one tied to the anniversary of the January 6 insurrection. (Guess who the he was in that sentence.) More than Trump’s ugly taunt, one thing stands out to me about these moments: the sound of Trump’s supporters laughing right along with him. This is a building block of Trumpism. The man at the top gives his followers permission to be the worst version of themselves. I was on my way to meet friends last night when someone …

Joe Biden’s Most Urgent State of the Union Priority

Joe Biden’s Most Urgent State of the Union Priority

As President Joe Biden prepares to deliver his State of the Union address tonight, his pathways to reelection are narrowing. His best remaining option, despite all of the concerns about his age, may be to persuade voters to look forward, not back. In his now-certain rematch against former President Donald Trump, Biden has three broad possibilities for framing the contest to voters. One is to present the race as a referendum on Biden’s performance during his four years in office. The second is to structure it as a comparison between his four years and Trump’s four years as president. The third is to offer it as a choice between what he and Trump would do over the next four years in the White House. The referendum route already looks like a dead end for Biden. The comparison path remains difficult terrain for him, given that voters now express more satisfaction with Trump’s performance as president than they ever did while he was in office. The third option probably offers Biden the best chance to recover …

How Do You Run an Election as a Trump Target?

How Do You Run an Election as a Trump Target?

At about 10 a.m. on Monday, the eve of Super Tuesday, the Supreme Court released its unanimous decision that former President Donald Trump was eligible to appear on the 2024 Colorado election ballot. Shortly after this news broke, Jena Griswold, Colorado’s secretary of state, posted on social media that she was “disappointed” in the Court’s ruling, and that, in her view, the justices were stripping states of their authority to enforce the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution. Sitting in her downtown-Denver office yesterday afternoon, Griswold showed me some of the DMs she’d received over the previous 24 hours. “Well, one of the things—you probably don’t want to print this—is I’m being called a cunt every two minutes,” she said. Griswold read a selection of the messages out loud—a mixture of angst, anger, sadness, and resolve in her voice. “Karma will be a bitch … Build gas chambers … We are on to you … Reap what you sow … Hope you choke and die … Fuck you, ogre bitch … I’m coming … Resign now …

The Leader of Today’s Republican Party

The Leader of Today’s Republican Party

“McConnell was the final backstop against the complete Trumpification of the Senate.” Courtesy of Washington Week With The Atlantic March 2, 2024, 10:36 AM ET Editor’s Note: Washington Week With The Atlantic is a partnership between NewsHour Productions, WETA, and The Atlantic airing every Friday on PBS stations nationwide. Check your local listings or watch full episodes here.   The race to become the Senate’s top Republican is already under way. Mitch McConnell made the surprise announcement this week that he will step down from his role as Senate minority leader in November—ending his tenure as the longest-serving Senate leader in U.S. history and solidifying former President Donald Trump as the leader of today’s Republican Party. Meanwhile, both President Joe Biden and Trump won their respective primaries on Tuesday, but the results underscored vulnerabilities in their 2024 bids for the White House. Joining the editor in chief of The Atlantic and moderator, Jeffrey Goldberg, this week to discuss this and more are Adam Harris, a staff writer for The Atlantic; Leigh Ann Caldwell, a co-author of …

Why an Improving Economy Hasn’t Helped Biden

Why an Improving Economy Hasn’t Helped Biden

Just since last November, the most closely watched measure of consumer confidence about the economy has soared by about 25 percent. That’s among the most rapid improvements recorded in years for the University of Michigan’s Index of Consumer Sentiment, even after a slight decline in the latest figures released yesterday. And yet, even as consumer confidence has rebounded since last fall, President Joe Biden’s approval rating has remained virtually unchanged—and negative. Now, as then, a solid 55 percent majority of Americans say they disapprove of his performance as president in the index maintained by FiveThirtyEight, while only about 40 percent approve. That divergence between improving attitudes about the economy and stubbornly negative assessments of the president’s performance is compounding the unease of Democratic strategists as they contemplate the impending rematch between Biden and former President Donald Trump. Most Democratic strategists I spoke with believe that brightening views about the economy could still benefit Biden. But many also acknowledge that each month that passes without improvement for Biden raises more questions about whether even growing economic …

A few theories on why Dean Phillips is still in the race

A few theories on why Dean Phillips is still in the race

This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here. At what point does a “long-shot candidacy” tip into a pure vanity spectacle? Representative Dean Phillips of Minnesota refuses to suspend his Democratic-primary campaign against President Joe Biden. Does Phillips know something we don’t—or does he have a different 2024 plan in mind? First, here are three new stories from The Atlantic. Vanity Campaign or VP Campaign? Seemingly nobody wants a 2020 rematch, yet both Biden and former President Donald Trump continue to cruise toward their respective party nominations. Last night in Michigan, Trump defeated his Republican-primary challenger, former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, by 42 points. In the Democratic contest, Biden won with more than 80 percent of the vote, while second place went to “uncommitted”—partially due to protests over Biden’s support for Israel in its war with Hamas in Gaza. Marianne Williamson, who had previously suspended her campaign …

What Is No Labels’ Grand Plan?

What Is No Labels’ Grand Plan?

“We are in this to win it,” No Labels’ chief strategist, Ryan Clancy, told me one morning earlier this month. Clancy and 16 other representatives of the beleaguered centrist group were staring at me through their respective Zoom boxes during a private briefing, electoral maps and polling data at the ready, all in defense of their quest to alter the course of the 2024 presidential campaign. He continued: “And that’s a function not only of having a ticket eventually that can accumulate electoral votes—” That’s when Nancy Jacobson, the group’s CEO and founder, interjected. “But I just want to clarify, this organization is not in it to win it,” Jacobson said, a truly unusual statement for a political operative. “This organization is in it to give people a choice.” In the coming weeks, No Labels seems poised to intervene in the presidential race with a “unity ticket”—ideally one Republican and one Democrat—meant to appeal to the large number of Americans dissatisfied with the likely major-party nominees, President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump. Unlike …