“THE CLIMATE CHANGE agenda is a hoax!”
So bellowed Vivek Ramaswamy on the stage at the first Republican presidential debate in Milwaukee last week.
It was surprising that his rivals focused much of their attention on and directed their ire toward the 38-year-old billionaire entrepreneur, rather than targeting Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who surveys show is closest to the clear frontrunner, Donald Trump, albeit still a huge distance behind.
Ramaswamy, who posted a video online of himself playing tennis earlier in the day and claimed that was how he prepared for verbal combat with seven vastly more experienced contestants, has a flair for the outrageous. His irrational assertion about the climate – which flies in the face of science and, at the end of an extraordinary summer of calamitous weather incidents, defies common sense – is par for the course.
Those who are dismissive of the son of Indian immigrants to the United States are correct in that his chances of being the GOP standard-bearer are minimal, yet they would be wise to remember that in 2016 a wholly untested, long-shot aspirant, Trump, took a similarly irregular approach to candidate forums. His alternatively bombastic and nasty rhetoric met the mood of millions of Americans sick of politics as usual and propelled him all the way to the White House.
The story of this debate was arguably Trump’s absence. He and his advisers calculated that, with an enormous lead, he could only be damaged by participating. Accordingly, he skipped it and has said that he won’t be at the next clash either.
This strategy will not hurt his standing with hard-core adherents. One wonders whether opting out could irk other grassroots conservatives who have drifted to his corner because they deem pending criminal matters against Trump to be driven by leftist prosecutors, but expect presidential contenders to respect the traditions of the selection process.
At any rate, legal developments since have rendered what transpired in Wisconsin’s biggest city yesterday’s news. The arrests of Trump and 18 others in Atlanta instantly dominated the headlines. In particular, the mugshot of a heavily made-up, scowling ex-commander-in-chief featured in the papers, as well as on television, computer and smartphone screens, throughout the US and globally.
Speaking bluntly, it was the stuff of nightmares for right-thinking people. We Americans are taught from childhood to revere our democratic institutions, the presidency perhaps foremost among them. To see former President Trump in this light, regardless of one’s opinion of him, was profoundly saddening. To see how brazen he was afterward was positively revolting.
Naturally, he viewed this as an opportunity to raise money. Trump disciples are snapping up “mugshot merch” and helping the billionaire to pay his high-priced litigators in so doing. He has just pleaded not guilty there and will fight the charges vigorously.
There was another, potentially very significant court hearing this week. In Washington, DC, Tanya Chutkan, the federal judge presiding over the case against Trump relating to his and unnamed allies’ efforts to overturn the result of the 2020 election, ruled that the trial will begin on 4 March 2024.
She rejected the prosecution’s request to get going in January but delivered a stinging rebuke to Trump’s counsel, John Lauro, who had sought to push things out until 2026.
At this moment, the legal and political processes appear irretrievably destined to collide. To say that the US is in uncharted waters is an understatement. Again, observers from afar should take any firm predictions made by political pundits or expert attorneys on cable news networks as to how this will unfold with a large grain of salt. The fact is that none of us knows.
The 4 March date set by Judge Chutkan immediately precedes “Super Tuesday,” when women and men in more than a dozen states will decide who they want to represent the GOP at the top of the ticket. Fully one-third of the delegates required to be declared the winner at July’s Republican National Convention, also in Milwaukee, will be up for grabs.
Trump’s lawyers may deploy an array of delay tactics, however. They will file a plethora of pre-trial motions and, if unsuccessful, will mount appeals. Even if expedited, these manoeuvres could stall proceedings in Washington, DC, in New York, in Florida, and in Georgia.
What is a near certainty is that at some critical juncture(s) in 2024, Donald Trump will be a defendant in a weighty criminal case with a prison sentence looming if he is found guilty. If the parties are kept to the ambitious timeframes established by the respective judges, it could be that the Republican nominee for president is a convicted felon.
Now that we have a legal timeline, in addition to the election schedule, what has long been the subject of conjecture is concretising. That simultaneous happenings in the realms of law and politics are impending only gives rise to further speculation. Two intertwined hypothetical questions, posed previously in this space, have become very real.
Will these trials thwart Trump from campaigning effectively? It probably won’t make a major difference in the primary, yet going into and out of courthouses in the autumn, with salacious details featuring in daily reportage, would be unlikely to convince the small cohort of floating voters who determine the outcome of tight presidential elections in the US that they should back Trump.
In the meantime, will there be a tipping point, when enough of the 45th president’s supporters accept that there is just too much trouble swirling and that their adored champion cannot prevail in November?
In this scenario, which DeSantis, Ramaswamy, Pence, Haley, Scott, et al base their hopes on and pray for incessantly, Trump’s followers gravitate before it’s too late toward the person they consider second best and ready to beat Joe Biden. They may have to choose which is stronger: their love of Trump or loathing of Biden?
Regrettably, the polling suggests the former will triumph. There are no signs of a tipping point on the horizon. As such, we citizens of the US will soon get sick and tired of hearing the word unprecedented to describe ongoing events. In our parlance, we had better buckle up and hold on for a wild ride.
For we – and people around the world who are stakeholders in the workings of American democracy, though they might wish they were not – are staring down the barrel of a year that seems bound to be… unprecedented.
Larry Donnelly is a Boston lawyer, a Law Lecturer at the University of Galway and a political columnist with TheJournal.ie.
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