By no means in my maturity have I witnessed a extra dire prognosis for a presidential election.
I’m watching with abject horror as former president and sentient pumpkin-colored boat shoe Donald Trump clears the trail to coast again into the White Home — and it doesn’t really feel like there’s a factor we are able to do about it.
Mirroring his unlikely victory in 2016, Trump is toppling his subject of rivals one after the other. Tim Scott bounced in November and channeled his inside Stephen from “Django Unchained” to endorse him a pair weeks in the past and Vivek Ramaswamy acquired out of his approach in the course of final month. However when Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis dropped out of the Republican presidential primaries final week, that’s after I knew issues had gotten actual.
Actual, actual.
Thoughts you, I didn’t need DeSantis anyplace close to the White Home. However I figured he would’ve been Trump’s greatest menace had he not run a veritable shitshow of a marketing campaign.
Now, the one different candidate standing in the best way of Trump’s nomination is Nikki Haley, who just lately made headlines for refusing to acknowledge *how racist the U.S. is and whose marketing campaign is presently being held collectively by chewed bubble gum and paper clips. Though Trump beat her within the New Hampshire primaries final month, Haley has vowed to proceed duking it out.
Trump will very possible seal the nomination, and with each passing day I lose extra optimism that President Joe Biden can repeat his 2020 win. Nobody I do know is happy about Biden (or Kamala Harris, for that matter) and the polls reflect that. A similar lack of enthusiasm allowed Trump to steamroll over Hillary Clinton in 2016.
After all, the largest distinction between 2016 and 2024 is that Trump goes into the election with legal circumstances hanging over his head longer than his comb-over. Embodying the apex of white male privilege, Trump is dealing with 4 legal indictments in three jurisdictions and just below 100 felony prices, 34 of that are in reference to hush cash paid to clear heels fanatic Stormy Daniels. And but, he nonetheless roams the streets as a free man.
I feel the one likelihood we’ve to maintain Trump away from the White Home subsequent January is to lastly lock his ass up. Nevertheless, which may not be legally sufficient.
Three of the indictments will not be a lot of a menace to him proper now, particularly in Georgia, the place Fulton County District Lawyer Fani Willis allegedly blocked her personal blessings by the use of poor judgment. The Division of Justice case, which focuses on Trump’s position within the Jan. 6, 2021, riot, seems to be the best chance to have him thrown in the pokey.
The issue is that Trump can still run for president if convicted. Felons can’t even vote in sure states (and Trump may not even get to vote for himself) however there are not any federal limitations for the presidency that acknowledge criminality. (As if the founders of the Structure didn’t assume to fret about such issues.)
Particular person states will try and hold him off the poll, simply as Colorado did when it tried to leverage a 14th Modification clause that states that anybody who took an oath to uphold the U.S. Structure however then “engaged in riot or insurrection” is unable to carry state or federal workplace. However this looks like a attain. Plus, the extremely conservative, Trump-leaning U.S. Supreme Court will be deciding on this, which means it’ll possible fall flat.
(I’d prefer to pause this piece and ask you to shut your eyes and replicate for a second on how mind-boggling and absurd it could be for Trump, a person dealing with a number of legal indictments as a result of he illegally tried to stay in workplace, to get voted again within the White Home. Accomplished? OK, again to it.)
If Trump will get again into workplace earlier than he’s imprisoned, he’ll have the facility of the presidency on his again, which he’ll wield in its entirety to maintain from behind bars. His federal circumstances may very well be booted by an lawyer normal he appoints — and it could be fully authorized.
There’s even a chance, nevertheless slight, that he may very well be elected whereas in jail. If that occurs, I’ll convert again to Christianity simply so I may be first in line for the rapture.
Thoughts you, a lot of that is with out precedent that the powers that be gained’t know the way to cope with it till it occurs. I’d like to imagine that we wouldn’t develop into the laughingstock of the aliens – or the remainder of the civilized world ― by electing a jailbird.
However we nonetheless have of us just like the Republican voters on the Iowa caucus, the vast majority of whom imagine that Biden wasn’t elected legitimately and that Trump could be match to be president even if he were convicted. Which tells you every little thing it is advisable to learn about Republicans or Iowans.
Additionally, eight years in the past at this second, I didn’t assume there was a pig’s likelihood in Kansas Metropolis, Kansas, that Trump would really get elected. Now, something can occur — and nothing would shock me.
