Former President and current investigation subject Donald Trump went off on his sad little live journal (aka TruthSocial) about Manhattan D.A. Alvin Bragg’s decision to present evidence to a special grand jury about the $130,000 Trump paid adult film star Stephanie Clifford (aka Stormy Daniels) one month before the 2016 presidential election, allegedly to keep her quiet about their affair. The crux of the case is whether the payment was in violation of campaign finance laws. Testimony began Monday, Jan. 30.
Here, Trump seems to be letting us know that he’s started the new year on a strict diet of word salad, fake news, and a belief that the D.A.’s out to get him, even though he, Donald J. Trump, is innocent, of course:
“The ‘Stormy’ Fake Witch Hunt has been stop and go, on again, off again, for years, to the point where the whole thing has become Prosecutorial Misconduct. Missed Statute Big. The Fake News has been pushing the D.A., and all D.A.’s and Prosecutors, at a level that they have NEVER been pushed before. Just study D.A. Bragg’s CNN interview from 2 months ago – Disgraceful! There’s NO GUILT, just Trump Derangement Syndrome. GET this man, even if he’s innocent. It’s all WEAPONIZED POLITICS. So Sad!”
Trump’s posts are a compendium of his greatest hits: Randomly Capitalized Words, ALL CAPS, and the bigliest hyperbole the world has ever seen. He also tosses in his signature “So Sad!” for good measure, just in case anyone had any doubts as to who penned this work of art. The second post fulminated:
“If the District Attorney of Manhattan would spend half as much time trying to solve the Murder and Violent Crime epidemic that is taking place in our once great City, as he does in perpetuating the greatest Witch Hunt of all time, at the behest of the Department of Injustice (D.C.), New York would be a much safer place to live, and perhaps people would stop leaving in RECORD NUMBERS!”
It’s interesting that he takes ownership of “once great” New York City, seeing as the city’s inhabitants have made it pretty clear how they feel about him, and the state’s attorney general Letitia James is suing him, his children, and his businesses for fraud.
This may all feel like old news — and it is. In May 2018, Trump admitted in a series of tweets to authorizing the payment, though he denied both the affair and the accusation that the money came from his campaign. What’s new is the faint specter of accountability on the horizon for the former resident of the White House. If Trump is ultimately charged and convicted of first-degree falsifying business records, he could get up to four years in jail. That sentence is a long way off — and it’s unlikely he’d get the maximum sentence even if convicted — but if we’ve learned one thing in the past three years (or, honestly, the past seven) it’s that, for better and worse, anything’s possible.
Here’s hoping for more better, less worse.