Former US president and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks to reporters during the closing stages of his criminal trial at Manhattan Criminal Court in New York City, May 21, 2024. Donald Trump became the first former US president to be convicted of a felony after a New York jury found him guilty on all 34 charges, Thursday, May 30, 2024. (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Pool/AFP)
WASHINGTON, United States — Donald Trump once boasted that “when you’re a star, they let you do anything. You can do anything.” That maxim, which he believed in for decades, finally crumbled on Thursday when a New York jury told him “no.”
One of the most powerful and influential people in the world has finally been tripped up by a porn star, convicted of lying about paying hush money to her about what she describes as a frivolous affair.
The details are sordid, but the moment is great.
Love him or hate him, there’s one thing most Americans agree on: There has never been a president quite like Trump in the two and a half centuries since the founding of their republic.
And Thursday’s sentence added an unprecedented new chapter to his history, making him the first former president to be convicted of a crime. He could become the first felon in U.S. history to be president this November.
Who knows how much of an impact this latest scandal will have on his fans.
Read: Guilty: Trump becomes first former US president to be convicted of a felony
The New York indictment is just one of four criminal cases against the presumptive Republican nominee.
And he denounced all of this as political persecution at the behest of a corrupt White House led by President Joe Biden.
Undaunted by shame or even embarrassment, Trump has turned his run-ins with the law into a badge of honor that he says is evidence of his conspiracy theories that the deep state is targeting him and what he calls the “forgotten men and women” of the American working class.
His narrow lead over Biden in the polls suggests his brand is working so far.
Donald Trump: Wrecking Ball
To millions of his supporters, the 77-year-old is a conventional wisdom who defeated Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton in 2016 to win the White House in a shocking victory.
But to most of the country, he just destroyed America.
The Republican president’s first term began in 2017 with a somber inaugural address that evoked an “American carnage.”
Read: Trump may still vote for himself after New York conviction
The situation descended into chaos when Trump refused to acknowledge his loss to Biden and incited his supporters to storm the Capitol on January 6, 2021.
Since taking office, President Trump has upended every tradition, from the small (plants in the Rose Garden) to the fundamental (our relationship with NATO).
Journalists became the “enemy of the people.” The intelligence agencies and the FBI were demonized. Congressional opponents were variously labeled “crazy” and “traitors.”
The same thing happened on the world stage: Trump turned US alliances into transactions.
Friendly countries such as South Korea and Germany were accused of “trying to deceive us.”
In contrast, Trump has repeatedly expressed admiration for figures like Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, saying “we fell in love.”
Throughout, his disruptive political presence became increasingly dominant within the Republican Party.
When Democrats launched a second impeachment proceeding, Republicans backed him with all their might to win his acquittal.
And as a former president, his influence remains undiminished.
Never mind that voters punished pro-Trump candidates in the 2022 midterm elections, or that they have repeatedly rejected conservative efforts to curtail long-cherished freedoms like the right to abortion.
The party was still in control, as evidenced by the sight of its followers gathering at a dingy Manhattan courthouse over the past few weeks to prove their loyalty.
The drift of authoritarianism
Before Trump descended the gold escalator in Trump Tower and announced his 2016 presidential run, he was popular but few took him seriously.
He was best known for the ruthless character he played on the reality TV show “The Apprentice,” but he was also known for developing luxury buildings and golf resorts, as well as for his wife, Melania, a former fashion model.
But scholars point out similarities between his evolution as a politician and that of autocrats in countries where democratic institutions are merely a pretense, allowing populist showmen to seize power.
During his presidency, he relished the daily controversies, joking and winking that he would amend the U.S. Constitution to stay in power indefinitely. “They’ll go nuts over that,” he said.
Despite four years of tweet-fueled mayhem and outrage, Trump has accomplished some things: Republicans boast that the economy was better back then, and Trump has at least begun construction on the border wall he promised to build.
But as the COVID-19 tragedy of 2021 worsened, Trump looked inept, and Biden’s old-fashioned approach and calm, centrist message helped him easily win a majority.
When it became clear he had lost, President Trump did the unthinkable again by refusing to concede, and ultimately unleashed a mob on the U.S. Capitol and threatened to hang former Vice President Mike Pence.
