By James Oliphant
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – If the judge charged with overseeing Donald TrumpIf the secret money trial is to be taken at its word, America could be headed for an unprecedented moment: a former U.S. president behind bars.
Justice Juan Merchan On Monday, Trump threatened Trump with prison time for repeatedly violating a silence order in the ongoing Manhattan criminal case, although Merchan said it was a step he was reluctant to take .
Jailing Trump would almost certainly inflame his base of already loyal supporters and, in their minds, reinforce Trump’s narrative that he is politically persecuted, an argument that helped him win the Republican nomination in 2024.
But being jailed — even for a brief time — would remind other voters of the chaos that has routinely followed Trump, including the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, several political analysts said.
This could be particularly damaging for Trump, with voters remaining undecided between him and the Democrats. President Joe Biden and are just preparing to jump into the race six months before the November election, analysts said.
Some of those voters may be turned off by the sordid details of Trump’s alleged tryst with a porn star and his attempts to cover up the affair, said Chris Stirewalt, an election analyst at the conservative American Enterprise Institute.
Being imprisoned for contempt of court could further alienate them, as could any right-wing violence or increased threats that might result from his imprisonment.
“It’s not good for convincing voters,” Stirewalt said. “It just seems like a problem.”
Merchan on Monday fined Trump $1,000 and held him in contempt of court for the tenth time for violating an order that bars him from speaking publicly about jurors and witnesses, warning that further violations could take him to prison.
Merchan called Trump’s past statements a “direct attack on the rule of law” that he could not allow to continue, even as he said jailing the former president would be “a last resort “.
Trump’s campaign quickly responded with a statement calling the threat a “third world authoritarian tactic.”
The Republican candidate’s die-hard supporters on social media were furious. US Senator Marsha Blackburn said Trump was being punished for defending himself and that the trial was a “sham”. Rogan O’Handley, a popular conservative commentator on social media, wrote: “If Trump is imprisoned, this country will be torn apart.” »
EXPLOIT THE CASE
While Trump has often complained about the trial and criticized the judge and prosecutors, the court proceedings have given him a regular platform to air his grievances during his appearances before the assembled media. His campaign exploited the affair, regularly asking for donations based on silence and the threat of prison time.
A photo of Trump in jail would likely elicit a similar response from the campaign that followed the release of his mugshot by Georgia prosecutors in a separate case last year.
Trump’s campaign worked to turn the image into a political and commercial opportunity, with the photo ending up on T-shirts and beer coolers as a symbol of his defiance.
Trump faces new federal and state lawsuits for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election and for alleged mishandling of classified documents. A Reuters/Ipsos poll showed the race with Biden remains neck and neck, a sign that Trump has lost little support nationally despite his legal woes.
In a poll taken just before the secret trial began in April, about half of independent voters believed the allegations that Trump paid money to silence his indiscretions, but about the same proportion believed the cases against him were excessive and politically motivated.
At the same time, 60% of independents and 24% of Republicans said they would not vote for Trump in November if he was convicted of a crime. Another 24% of Republicans said they weren’t sure.
“Independents are the key here, and their reaction will depend on whether the decision seems fair,” said John Geer, a public opinion expert at Vanderbilt University. “Given the number of violations of the hush order and the judge’s efforts to extend more chances to follow the rules, this could pose some problems for Trump.”
The question that remains is whether some of Trump’s die-hard supporters would respond to his imprisonment with public threats or outright violence. Elizabeth Neumann, a former head of the US Department of Homeland Security under Trump, said this was unlikely if Trump was imprisoned for a brief period.
“The reaction would probably be related to the severity of the judge’s punishment,” Neumann said. “A jail sentence of a day or two does not give organizers enough time to mobilize a large group to demonstrate in front of the courthouse.”
In the long term, Neumann said, Trump supporters realize that their goal is to get Trump elected and that “political violence would disrupt those efforts.”
(Reporting by James Oliphant. Additional reporting by Luc Cohen, Helen Coster and Ted Hesson; editing by Colleen Jenkins and Rosalba O’Brien)
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