I agree. I’m a little surprised he didn’t do that on January 6th.
Trump wants to be Dictator for Life. He’s already said that his first tenure doesn’t count because he couldn’t be President will all of the opposition he had.
No, the Republicans prefer Marshall law.
I cannot speak to the running for office idea, but I’ve made a few plea deals with the prosecution. Typically, they’re just an agreement as to sentencing. During sentencing arguments, the prosecution asks for (let’s say) a year for my client, I’ll ask for a year for my client, and we don’t argue the matter; and if there is nothing unreasonable about such a sentence, the judge will often grant it.
But not necessarily. It’s all up to the judge, and if he or she feels the sentence should be shorter or longer, he or she will say so. But a plea deal is in no way a contract, needing as it does, a third party’s approval; such third party not being privy to plea deal negotiations.
Naw, I’m sure there are plenty of people in jails nationwide who were unwilling to cut any sort of deal. What makes this situation unique is that an ex-president is using “running for the Presidency” as a get-out-of-jail-free card, and he’s getting away with it because no law, and no person, says he can’t.
Here’s Galloway’s answer to people who say Trump will never cut a deal:
The closer we get to a Trump loss in 2024, the more his currency for a plea deal diminishes. A loss would cement the notion that he has cost the party too much for too long. Traditional Republican leaders can’t wait to see the last of Trump, and his acolytes now have power bases of their own. Fox will abandon him, the cloud cover provided by Lindsay Graham, Kevin McCarthy, and other sycophants will disappear, and the pool of jurors who’d refuse to convict will shrink. He’ll also lose access to any backroom influence his political allies might bring to bear on the DOJ or state and local prosecutorial offices. His currency is a single token, his potential return to the Oval Office. And once that’s gone, so is his leverage.
Trump won’t like the deal, but the decision will be easier to make than many people think. He has no observable ideological commitment or loyalty to the Republican Party compelling him to run again. In the 2022 midterms, Trump amassed a war chest of $108 million and gave none to GOP candidates.
And he gives up all the time. His track record is quitting: from his six bankruptcies, including the Trump Taj Mahal Casino, to his innumerable abandoned projects, such as his defunct New Jersey Generals football team and the disgraced education for-profit Trump University. And people who know him, including his former chief of staff, John Kelly, and his former footstool, Chris Christie, say he has a real fear of going to jail.
In sum, Trump’s odds of landing in prison are perhaps 50/50 right now and likely to get worse as we approach the election.
[Emphasis mine.]
Answering my own question, provisionally, at least, I happen to have had dinner tonight with two lawyers: a public defender and a prosecutor. The latter said that a plea deal can include any conditions that the two sides agree to. She serves here in the Boston area, and is not a Federal prosecutor.
I really don’t think this is true. Plenty of people predicted that his power would shrivel up and blow away after a 2020 loss and that didn’t happen either.
He’s absolutely dominating the GOP primary field right now. Even if half his followers were to turn on him he’d still be a force to be reckoned with.
Or better. It really depends on your POV.
@commasense ref the quote from Galloway …
That logic ignores the existence of the 100 million or so dedicated trumpies. Who most certainly can express their displeasure at the ballot box. The rest of the R party folks whether traditionalists or trump replacement wannabes, all depend utterly on getting and keeping those 100M people both angry at the Ds and the world and also on-side for them.
Woe betide the Rs when that crowd turns upon them or goes back to sleeping rather than voting.
@Johnny_Bravo and @LSLGuy: in the quote I posted, the “currency” Galloway is referring to is his bargaining chips with the prosecutor in making a plea deal, not his general political influence. I don’t think the two are the same.
Drat. “Might as well make that one zebra.”
News flash. He did try an insurrection.
*From commasense’s link:
The establishment republicans (those in Congress might drop Trump like a hot potato, but the hoi polloi will carry his water until the Second Coming.
Understood. But …
This part of Galloway’s thought is IMO wrong …
All of those things will NOT happen as long as 100M raging trumpies are stomping around the country. And trump will keep that going as long as he’s alive for the grift possibilities. As will lots of websites and news media that are nominally Republican / Conservative, but are really just grifting behind the most griftable source of reactionary outrage.
Which source will remain trump utterly regardless of his electability. He’s the ultimate showman in the ultimate show. The Vince McMahon of politics.
IOW, IMO trump’s power is his noisy MAGAt populist base, NOT his presidential electability. The traditional Rs would love to magic-wand trump away but not if it costs them the MAGAt hordes of reflexive (R) voters.
IOW, it’s really like this:
Exactly right. Trump’s secret sauce is that he brings out lots and lots of people who don’t and won’t otherwise vote. If Trump isn’t on the ballot, they won’t settle for a second choice, they’ll just stay home. That’s one of the many reasons DeSantis’s strategy of being “more Trump than Trump!” is turning out to be such a miscalculation.
If the stars align and the benevolent gods smile on us and Trump is quickly convicted of multiple felonies and imprisoned and effectively removed from the field by the spring, the Republican successor will not be the person who manages to claim Trump’s mantle, it will be whomever can motivate the GOP electorate on his or her own terms, absent the vast majority of Trump’s drooling horde.
I agree with all of this:
What I don’t agree with is:
Some of those things have already happened. From what I have heard (I never watch it) Fox is no longer supporting Trump, at least not as strongly as they once did. (Am I mistaken about that?) And ISTM that he has NO politician allies with any real clout who would try to pressure Smith or Willis on his behalf. As if that would even work with either of them.
Once he gets to the point of making a deal, I expect most of his erstwhile political supporters (office holders, not hoi polloi) will drop him, with varying degrees of speed and ostensible reluctance.
So I don’t see how Trump’s legions of MAGAts could have much of an effect on negotiations for a plea deal.
There aren’t nearly that many. That’s a significant exaggeration.
There are about 225M people in the US of voting age.
About 45% identify as Republicans. (It varies a lot from month to month but it’s above 40% and below 50% so I’ll split the difference.) So that works out to about 100M. So that’s 100M Republicans.
However, only about 28% of people polled in Republican primaries are “always Trumpers”, in the sense that they vote for the man over the party. That’s a shockingly high amount, but definitely a minority, just over a quarter. That works out to about 28M.
That’s still enough people that the Republicans have to cater to them or lose. So I agree with your basic point. But I just wanted the numbers to be accurate.
Thank you. It’s easy to overestimate and make the enemy 10 feet tall when he’s really only 5’8".
Hey, don’t discriminate against 5’8’’ tall people! That’s exactly my height. 
My Dad too. I started out taller than that but on present trends I’ll get there:
Hah, my dad used to be two inches taller than me, but now that I’m 55 and he’s 87, we’re even. If my dad makes it for a few years more (his prospects are good, he’s physically and mentally healthy for his age), I’ll be also shrinking and maybe he’ll be taller than me again…