Yes, this, which would be less unpleasant for his Secret Service detail, and less oppressive than max security facilities. But he’d still no longer be the big guy in charge, he’d still be subject to following a routine not of his own devising, and he’d still have his communications restricted and monitored. He’d be miserable.
It often depends on whether it’s 11-1 or 1-11. I imagine as soon as a mistrial is declared the judge will ask the attorneys if they’ll be ready to start the retrial in two weeks.
The Secret Services job is to keep Mr. Trump away from harm, in prison the guards are the source of possible harm. It’s not unheard of for guards to harass and harm prisoners, so this creates a problem for the agents guarding Mr. Trump, as they would have to guard him against the guards.
Sadly, because of this and the political optics involved he will never see an actual prison. I believe house arrest with limited access to social media is the best we can realistically hope for in this situation. Perhaps the judge could levy a significant fine or the prosecutor could work out a plea deal for a significant cash bond, say a billion or so in lieu of actual prison time. Make him sell some of his assets as that would hit him where it hurts.
OTOH, it’s my impression that they’re less patient than thinking people are, and may grow bored because they have Better Things To Do and just throw up their hands and vote Guilty.
Historically, POTUS is the most dangerous job in America. The legitimate job of the Secret Service is to mitigate that risk. Once Trump was in a well-run prison, that mitigation would be complete.
If federal prison guards are harming prisoners, that is, to me, a bigger problem than any one prisoner. I wish it or no one. If it did happen to Trump, I hope it would be not cause him lasting harm, and that resultant publicity would lead to prison reform.
Federal prisoners get to spend up to half the day on an email system. I don’t see how Trump could be prevented from asking his correspondents to put things up on Truth Social or X unless the judge made up a new punishment not in the sentencing guideline. To me, the judge making up punishments not in the guidelines is arbitrary and wrong.
Of course we are getting ahead of ourselves. He may be acquitted.
Which is why it would be more likely that the prosecutor could make it a condition of a plea deal. Either accept these conditions or go to a real prison would be his options. At some point during the trial Mr. Trump may actually see that he is going to lose his case and that Smith is actually going to put him away.
Remember that he was tried recently for libel and sexual assault, and was found liable. Apparently, there was a MAGA person on the jury, but they were persuaded by the evidence and did the right thing.
This trial will be held in DC, so I’m hoping there will be fewer MAGAs to choose from and even the MAGA- leaning may be more aware of what happened on Jan 6 than low-info citizens/voters in the rest of the country. I hope.
Apropos of nothing, I have always like the term “stochastic terrorism:”
the public demonization of a person or group resulting in the incitement of a violent act, which is statistically probable but whose specifics cannot be predicted.
Yeah. Not sure why this occurred to me this morning, but … there it is.
If a “real” Christian believes that Jesus must die so … eternal salvation or the start of the end times or something … wouldn’t they want to convict Jesus? What better way to convince the world that the Deep State really exists than to let Trump be convicted and persecuted for the good of the world. There’s possibly a deranged MAGA-nut juror that might see themselves as furthering the fate of the world and vote guilty, thus ensuring Trump is crowned in glory as savior for “the rest of us”.
(d) Jury Poll . After a verdict is returned but before the jury is discharged, the court must on a party’s request, or may on its own, poll the jurors individually. If the poll reveals a lack of unanimity, the court may direct the jury to deliberate further or may declare a mistrial and discharge the jury.