Trump Trials Coming – Let’s Look At the Timeline

We’ll all have to wait a bit longer to see exactly what the charges are (and against what defendants) in Fulton County Georgia.  Hopefully before I hit the sack tonight.  I live in the eastern time zone)  But it’s official.  Thrice indicted Donald Trump is now FOUR TIME indicted Donald Trump.  Gotten himself a pair of federal indictments, and a pair of state ones.  That’s a lot of trials, and in four different places up and down the eastern seaboard Trump is going to be in court for.  And at least some of it will be while he’s campaigning for another term in the White House.

Whew!

So how will all this play out in practice, and how will succeeding trials be affected by the one(s) before?  Now THERE’S a question to ponder.  And to speculate on.  So here’s my take.  From what I’m hearing from pundits, the GA case will be devastating for Trump in more ways than one, but some of GA law will make us happy and some won’t.  First the good news.  Georgia is one of three states where the Gov. can’t pardon/commute a sentence.  True they get to appoint the members of the Board that does but having it be a process handled by in independent board makes it less likely a convicted Donald Trump would be let off the hook.  The bad news is that given the number of people that will be charged AND that it’s almost certain to be a RICO case it’s going to take a long time to get to trial.  A looooong time, and not just because it’s Trump.  That’s just how things work there.  So I’m assuming the Fulton County trial will be last.

As for the others, it seems pretty clear that whatever chance Trump might have had to push his DC trial for his role in January 6 back is going to go first.  The prosecution wants jury selection in December and a trial starting in the first week of the new year.  Since Trump has (is anyone surprised) again proved incapable of keeping his fat mouth shut he’s given the judge ample legal grounds to accede in large measure to the prosecution’s proposed timeline.  In fact, she’s given pretty strong indications she might push things up to even sooner.  Practically speaking she can’t do so by much but I keep saying if they can get a jury picked by mid Dec. we’ll see maybe a week of actual trial.  Opening arguments and even some witnesses before everyone gets a week off for Christmas.

Next, we have Alvin Bragg up there in NYC.  He’d already indicated that if the feds needed his time slot (this was when we were talking about when judge Cannon would schedule the FL trial) he’d be okay with pushing his own trial down the road.  Well, Cannon set a May 24 trial date, not that anyone doesn’t believe she’s planning on dragging it out well past that and into the window where DOJ would shut down until after the election.  That suddenly opened up March for Trump’s DC trial.

However, as I’ve said the odds are Trump will be tried (and almost certainly convicted on at least some counts) in DC well before March.  No reason during any “verdict watch” he can’t be prepping with his lawyers to square off with Alvin Bragg.  So let’s put down March for trial (and hopefully conviction) #2.

We now move to the would be sunny state of Florida which isn’t so sunny with the orange cloud covering the place thanks to it being Trump’s home of record.  Judge Cannon, who actually DOES have the most straightforward set of charges could easily have been the first up.  But trial, even in a place where he’s got an actual shot at jury nullification (only takes one juror to hold out after all) is the last thing Trump wants.  So she did him a solid and talked like this FL business will make for the most complicated trial that has ever been seen or will be seen again and while not completely doing what Trump wanted (dismissing the case, or at least setting a date AFTER the election) pushed it as late as she thought she could get away with.  Knowing she could find excuses to keep pushing it into the fall and election season – effectively giving Trump what he wanted.  A chance to regain the WH and shut the whole thing down.

But Cannon may have already tripped herself up, and though Jack Smith hasn’t yet asked the appellate court to step in that might still happen.  Given her bungling of a recent case pressure might also mount of the Chief Judge to replace her.  Her tiny little one judge shop is out of the spotlight but only for the moment.  But it will be there again.  AND, if Trump is a convicted felon (maybe at both the federal and state level) she’s going to be hard pressed next spring to grant the delays Trump wants (expects actually) and have it hold up if Smith finally asks the appellate court to weigh in.  Given all that, while I wouldn’t call it great odds I think they are now better than even we’ll see a FL trial come next May.  And hopefully conviction #3.  All long before Georgia gets its crack at Trump.

So here’s what the lineup card Lady Justice will hand to to the legal system:

In the leadoff spot we have is Dec 23/Jan 24 for federal trial in DC.

Batting second will be state charges in NYC in March, a case which a recent judicial ruling makes it more likely Trump will in fact be convicted of a felony instead of only a misdemeanor.

Batting third will be a National Security trial (I keep saying it’s way the hell more than a “classified documents case”) in FL in May.

And after all THAT, in the “cleanup” spot we have Fulton County at a yet to be determined date in the cleanup slot.  Almost certainly with runners on base (felony convictions in as many as three states, or in baseball terms the bases filled) and what we know will be a rock solid case in Georgia.  With Trump by then already having been sentenced in at least one and maybe more cases!

Convicted felons, no matter how despicable their actions over the years get treated, at least with a first conviction as having a :clean record” which usually gets them some slack from a judge come sentencing.  However, Trump’s looking at a string of different cases in different jurisdictions and with each new conviction the weight of each will impact his sentencing with each new conviction!

Plenty to think about isn’t it?