If you’ve been watching the hush money trial news develop daily, the defendant is showing obvious signs of panic. Friday wrapped up another week of trial and he couldn’t even make it to the end of the day without a 14-post rant on Truth Social. The aide known as “the human printer” follows him around and brings him “mood elevating” articles, which he then reads from aloud while standing in the street, complaining how unfair the trial is. The main thing that gets him is that he’s got no MAGAs outside to support him. He was truly counting on massive pro-Trump demonstrations in New York City. His game plan was to do performative theater every day and proclaim, in the wake of protests, heck, maybe even a riot, that “the American people will not stand for this.” Where are the American people, Donnie? Are they there in the room with you now?
People love Trump https://t.co/KUhSE6NxFF
— Bella (@stockbella) April 23, 2024
Karoline Leavitt is Trump’s national press secretary and she posted the bottom clip. One small question here: Where are the MAGA hats and signs? There’s a group of people in the streets of New York (or some city) yes: but there’s nothing that identifies the people as being MAGA. These could be extras on a movie set, for aught that we know.
Now, of course it gets worse. Not only are MAGAs not coming out in droves, none of Trump’s children have shown up to court, except Eric. And where’s Melania? I’m sure that Trump insiders know the futility of that query better than anybody. So that fact has necessitated Trump allies showing up in court — and Salon is reporting that Trump was plenty miffed at them for not showing up sooner.
It’s doubtful that Trump wanted his family to be there to hear all these sordid details in person anyway. But he reportedly was quite upset that his political allies weren’t in attendance during the first two weeks of the trial. According to NBC News, he whined “no one is defending me” and pouted over the fact that there wasn’t a big crowd of protesters outside. He lied about that, of course, and said on camera that there were hundreds of people blocked from protesting.
He actually called for his followers to come to the trial on his Truth Social platform — “GO OUT AND PEACEFULLY PROTEST. RALLY BEHIND MAGA. SAVE OUR COUNTRY!” — but other than a dozen or so kooks, they haven’t shown up. From the very beginning of his legal travails he’s issued threats that his people “won’t stand for it” saying as far back as 2022, “If these radical, vicious racist prosecutors do anything wrong, I hope we are going to have in this country the biggest protest we have ever had … in Washington, D.C, in New York, in Atlanta and elsewhere because our country and our elections are corrupt.”
Why MAGA hasn’t turned up to support him in his moment of need when there always seems to be a few thousand who like to go to his rallies is a mystery but it clearly has him feeling down in the dumps. So now he’s got some of his employees, political cronies and right-wing media personalities attending the trial to give him a little boost. […]
The lawyer who has lost several cases for Trump but who defends him vociferously on TV, Alina Habba, has appeared in the courtroom. And on Thursday former judge and current Fox News member of “The Five,” Jeanine Pirro was in attendance. The big name of the day, however, was Florida Senator Rick Scott who went the extra mile and held a press conference where he compared Trump to himself:
Scott: I'm fed up. I watched what happened to me and my company. I've talked to business people over the years and what's happened to them when you have political persecution. pic.twitter.com/hMJ04gp13L
— Acyn (@Acyn) May 9, 2024
Scott was CEO of a company that was accused of rampant Medicare fraud and it took a fine of $1.7 billion to achieve a settlement. Scott at the time said, “I take responsibility for what happened on my watch as CEO.” Now he says he’s a victim of the deep state.
The corruption is thick. This is the supporting cast as the star goes crazier and crazier and those hordes of adoring extras which are supposed to show up just can’t seem to be found anywhere. You can’t do an epic without hordes of extras. What is Donald to do?
He appears to have the support he deserves.
Very little, and what there is consists of crazy idiots.
Will this support carry on through to the election?
as I recall, at the time. Scott took the fifth on every question he was asked in his deposition including when asked if he was ceo of the company. and if Medicare fraud wasn’t enough, as governor he got the legislature to pass a law requiring all florida recipients of unemployment, food assistance etc to undergo drug tests. these were paid for by tax dollars unless the test was failed, which was rare. the no bid contract for testing went to hi former company. I say former because when he became governor he signed his controlling shares over to his wife. you know, so there wouldn’t be any appearance of impropriety. he also briefly instituted a program whereby citizens could report waste, fraud and abuse in government. it was discontinued when it received thousands of complaints reporting, you guessed it, Rick Scott. contribute to Debbie mucarsel-powell if you can
FL, like every other red state, is rife with corruption. I would have thought things would change after scott’s fraud but apparently the heat par boiled Floridian’s brains.
“You can’t do an epic without hordes of extras. What is Donald to do?”
… fail epically, of course.
I don’t know why Death has such a bad rap…it’s the only true democracy. Anyone expecting or seeking justice in Life either hasn’t been paying attention or is thick as a brick. This asshole’s clock is also ticking.
We know what he did. He enlisted PIRRO!
And she did hour long screed against Stormy and Cohen.
Really do wonder what MERCHAN will do about that. Though commenters think she doesn’t have much MAGA clout.