Extract from ABC News
Donald Trump's legal woes will stretch deep into the 2024 election, but can anything sink his chances of a second term as president?
As America enters an election year unlike any other, you could be forgiven for thinking the legal noose is tightening for the United States' 45th president.
In 2023 Donald J Trump was indicted in four separate criminal trials, was found to have sexually assaulted writer E Jean Carroll in a department store dressing room, and faced the prospect of losing the right to do business in New York, the city he once called home and where he built his real estate empire.
As the year drew to a close there were more bombshell developments.
First Colorado, then Maine struck the former president from the ballot for the primary elections that will decide the Republican party's candidate for the White House, citing a provision of the 14th amendment to the US Constitution which disqualifies anyone who engaged in insurrection from holding public office.
All of it though contributes to a narrative that plays incredibly well with Trump's base.
With chilling cries of "election interference" and a dose of his trademark capital letters, the former president reached out in fundraising emails following the Maine decision.
"Their plan is to NULLIFY every 'Trump ballot' in the country and STEAL the 2024 election before patriots like YOU even have the chance to vote Biden out of office!" he wrote.
Trump has portrayed every legal move against him as evidence that he is a martyr, persecuted by his political foes, but determined to fight on — not to save his own hide, mind you, but to protect ordinary MAGA supporters.
"Remember, they're not really coming after me, friend, they're coming after YOU, I'm just standing in the way. And I ALWAYS will – stand in their way," he wrote.
So far, it appears this strategy is a runaway success.
Trump is so far ahead of his Republican rivals for the party's nomination that he's not bothered to show up for the traditional televised candidate debates, which have been reduced to a kind of Punch and Judy show in what appears to be the race for second place.
There was a moment back in late 2022 when it seemed the former president's power was waning.
Republicans had performed well below expectations in the midterms, with many of Trump's endorsed candidates failing to secure seats.
The prospect at the time of possible criminal indictments seemed to lull many who feared a second Trump presidency into a false sense of security.
It's possible the momentum the former president has since managed to build from the slew of cases brought against him will grind to a halt in 2024, but at every turn there is a possible get out of jail free card.
Colorado's highest court moved to strike Trump from the ballot, but the Supreme Courts in Michigan and Minnesota rejected similar attempts there to declare him ineligible.
While Maine's Secretary of State made the call to remove the former president, California's decided she didn't have the power to do so.
Decisions in a series of other states are pending and the patchwork already emerging suggests only the US Supreme Court can and should provide clarity on the issue, and soon.
If the Supreme Court justices do take on the case it's likely to be one of the most consequential decisions they'll make.
They'd have to decide whether the then-president engaged in insurrection, who should be allowed to determine that question, and interpret the intent of an obscure Civil War era clause in the 14th amendment and whether it applies to the office of the presidency.
A lower court in Colorado determined it didn't.
Rick Hasen, a professor at UCLA School of Law in Los Angeles, argued the bar for those challenging Trump's eligibility would be high because of the number of complex questions the court would have to decide.
"They'd have to win every argument … and Trump would only have to win one of these in order to knock out the disqualification of his candidacy," he told the ABC.
The politics of the case will also inevitably be a factor, though it may not be quite as simple as looking along party lines.
The Supreme Court leans heavily conservative.
Six of the nine justices were appointed by a Republican president, three of them by Donald Trump himself.
"Six Republican appointees [and] three Democratic appointees. And on a kind of knucklehead level you might think, 'well, that'll tell us what's going on'," Adam Liptak, who covers the Supreme Court for the New York Times, told The Daily podcast.
"But I think what will weigh on the justices more and on both sides of the ideological aisle is who should decide this question?
"Should the voters take account of Donald Trump's conduct in the aftermath of the 2020 election and make judgements for themselves about whether he is fit to be president again, or should courts … take that question out of the voters' hands?
"It will be part of the rich stew of calculations that go into their decision in this case."
Start date for January 6 court case in doubt
The ballot question is not the only Trump-related case that looks like it's heading the Supreme Court's way in 2024.
There are more potentially worrying signs for those seeking to hold the former president accountable for his actions following the 2020 election.
An attempt by Special Counsel Jack Smith to get the court to intervene and resolve an ongoing dispute over whether Trump is immune from prosecution because his alleged crimes took place while in the White House has failed.
Mr Smith petitioned the Supreme Court to circumvent the appeals court in order to speed up the process, arguing the case would inevitably end up at the highest court.
The Supreme Court declined, meaning the case is now going through the appeals process, putting the March start date of what's known as the January 6 case in doubt.
The longer Trump's lawyers can delay the start of proceedings the more difficult it will become to schedule it before the 2024 election.
Later in March, the arguably less politically significant case over hush money payments to former porn actor Stormy Daniels is set to begin in New York, while the Florida classified documents case is currently set to begin in May.
Court case | Date of next proceedings |
|---|---|
Jan 6 election interference case | Trial date set for March 4, 2024. Likely to be delayed. |
Classified documents case | Trial date set for May 20, 2024. Likely to be delayed. |
Georgia election interference case | Charges filed. Likely to be last case to go to trial. |
Manhattan hush money case | Trial date set for March 25, 2024. |
E Jean Carroll defamation case | Trial date set for January 16, 2024. |
New York fraud case | Trial underway, expected to conclude January 2024. |
The Supreme Court is also due to hear a case that has the potential to up-end the convictions of hundreds of January 6 rioters.
It centres around whether the charge they were convicted on, of obstructing an official proceeding, is applicable to the rioters' conduct.
Whatever is decided in that case would have ramifications for two of the four counts Trump is facing in the federal January 6 case.
At the very least, it could also threaten the trial's timeline.
In the worst-case scenario for federal prosecutors, Trump would be back in the White House and hold the power to dismiss the charges before the trial begins.
There is precedent for the Supreme Court to move quickly when the moment calls for it.
Remember the hanging chads debacle in the messy aftermath of the 2000 presidential election?
The court ruled in a matter of days to stop a recount in Florida, effectively confirming Republican George W Bush as the victor.
The day after the court's ruling, Al Gore gave a national address conceding defeat.
"Let there be no doubt: while I strongly disagree with the court's decision, I accept it," he said.
Who could possibly be confident that Donald Trump, were the Supreme Court to decide against him in any of these cases, would do the same?
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