Former President Donald Trump is settling into a routine of taking a motorcade from Trump Tower to the courthouse in lower Manhattan, passing through security and making his way up to the 15th floor, where a bank of cameras waits to collect his daily musings about the hush money trial and campaign politics.
This is Mr. Trump’s routine for the next month or so. It has forced the presumptive Republican presidential nominee to make the most of his confinement in the halls of justice and away from the campaign trail for long periods.
Yet Mr. Trump has shown an uncanny ability to grow politically stronger in the face of numerous legal challenges that threaten to land him in prison and would almost certainly have doomed more conventional candidates.
His supporters insist that Mr. Trump can withstand the ordeal.
“First off, it’s not like in April or May he would be on the campaign trail daily anyway, and secondly, the trial puts in him the center of the media conversation for the next month,” a Trump world operative told The Washington Times. “Based on the data and polling we have seen since the indictments began, I don’t expect the trial to be a big negative with the electorate, regardless of how it turns out.
“Trump and his team have done a tremendous job of framing this case, more so than any of the others, as a witch hunt,” the operative said.
Mr. Trump was at it again Tuesday.
Dressed in a blue suit and red tie, Mr. Trump urged Pennsylvania voters to go to the polls for the primary election. He then unleashed a diatribe against President Biden’s handling of the Israel-Hamas war. He said Mr. Biden has failed to stem the violence, which has led to embarrassing anti-Israel demonstrations at colleges and universities across the country.
“What’s going on is a disgrace to this country, and it is all Biden’s fault, and everybody knows it,” Mr. Trump said. “He is the worst president in the history of our country.”
During the recess, he issued a statement accusing Judge Juan Merchan of taking away his constitutional rights through a gag order and leading a “KANGAROO COURT.”
“THE JUDGE SHOULD RECUSE HIMSELF,” Mr. Trump said on social media.
Mr. Trump is maximizing his time anchored to New York, where he built a real estate empire and tabloid stardom that made him one of the city’s most recognizable figures.
After court Tuesday, Mr. Trump met with former Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso at Trump Tower. He also has met with Polish President Andrzej Duda, British Foreign Secretary David Cameron and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.
“Leaders from around the world know that with President Trump, we had a safer, more peaceful world,” Trump spokesperson Brian Hughes said.
“Meetings and calls from world leaders reflect the recognition of what we already know here at home. Joe Biden is weak, and when President Trump is sworn in as the 47th President of the United States, the world will be more secure and America will be more prosperous.”
Mr. Trump also has called into MAGA-friendly media outlets and ventured into the city.
Last week, he visited a Harlem bodega where a clerk who was violently attacked stabbed an ex-convict and was charged with murder. District Attorney Alvin Bragg dropped the charge amid public outcry.
Mr. Bragg also brought the charges against Mr. Trump that landed him on trial in Manhattan. It is the first time a former president has been subjected to a criminal trial.
Mr. Trump is accused of falsifying business records to conceal hush money payments to adult-film actress Stormy Daniels and two other people during the 2016 campaign. Mr. Bragg elevated the charges to a felony, which his prosecutors argued was part of a federal tax and election crime.
The bodega visit amplified Mr. Trump’s message that leaders in Democratic-run cities have been weak on crime and Mr. Bragg should be spending less time focusing on him and more time focusing on making the streets safer.
“They want law and order. … Every week they’re being robbed,” Mr. Trump said of businesses in New York. “You know where the crime is? It’s in the bodegas.”
Speaking on the “John Fredericks Radio Show” this week, Mr. Trump slammed the judge overseeing the trial, argued that the wars in Ukraine and the Gaza Strip would not have happened on his watch and voiced support for House Speaker Mike Johnson. He said the Louisiana Republican does not have much wiggle room, given the party’s slim majority, to deliver on the MAGA agenda.
“Every one of these trials, every single one of them, is coming out of The White House,” Mr. Trump said of his legal problems. “It is to help Biden get elected, who can’t put two sentences together.”
Despite his bluster, signs show the legal onslaught is taking a toll.
Mr. Trump’s legal bills are draining resources that otherwise could be spent on bolstering his campaign. He also has had limited time to hold the raucous rallies that help energize his supporters.
Bad weather forced him to pull the plug on a campaign rally Saturday in North Carolina. His next rally is tentatively scheduled for May 11 in Wildwood, New Jersey.
Mr. Biden, meanwhile, has had the campaign trail to himself at times and is outpacing Mr. Trump in fundraising.
Mr. Trump has shown some frustration.
“I should be in Georgia now, I should be in Florida now, I should be in a lot of different places right now campaigning, and I’m sitting here,” Mr. Trump said this week. “This will go on for a long time. It’s very unfair. … I should be allowed to campaign.”
• Seth McLaughlin can be reached at smclaughlin@washingtontimes.com.
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