Trump on trial: 'Free the New York One!'

Warren G. Harding is not often on the list of “bests” when it comes to presidents of the U.S. Actually, he might be a competitor for “most mediocre.”

He only served three years, dying of a sudden cardiac event (the specific cause is still unknown) at the age of 57.  His relatively unremembered presidency might have gone entirely unnoticed but for the swirl of scandal that sank his reputation after his death. He had apparently been paying off a mistress to keep quiet and was alleged to have fathered a baby out of wedlock.

Former President Donald Trump is in similar trouble, though unlike Harding, he has to face down the issue of the mistress, and there’s no credible mention of a baby.

Salacious weirdness is hardly foreign to American politics, and surely Trump is one of the weirdest of the weird (and most salacious) in this regard. I am certainly easily persuaded that he might have done some of these things, but I’m not sure at all that he’s legally in the wrong.

I was brought up short the other day, in a class with a guest speaker. A friend of mine is in public service law, and she graciously stopped by my “Law and The Courts” class to give a talk.

She was speaking on criminal defense and its complexities, and in this, tried to explain the difference – often obscure to those of us outside the process – between what is called “factual guilt” and “legal guilt.” These two things may be at odds: Basically, this means that a defendant might have done the thing they are accused of. But it might, because of various factors of context and situation, not be a violation of the law.

No one would ever, I hope, accuse me of being overly sympathetic to Trump, but the current circus going down in New York has now raised, at least for me, some real questions about the purpose and nature of this trial, and the believability of the charges.

The New York trial is one in which the defendant (Trump) is accused of paying “hush money” to a woman with whom he allegedly had an affair, hoping to silence the story so that it would not do him electoral damage in his runup to the 2016 election.

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There is a heap of evidence that suggests he might have paid this woman off. There is pretty decent evidence that he might have had an affair with said woman. And at least enough evidence to convince a grand jury that he or his agents then tried to fix the books to cover it up.

All of this is supposed to have been in aid of his run for the presidency, which might have been harmed, should the story come out.

I’ll buy all of it. Up to the last point. And as I understand it, the last point must be proved in order to demonstrate “legal guilt.”

No.

This is the candidate who told us he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue, and his people would still support him. This is the guy who publicly suggested that Sen. Ted Cruz’s dad had helped assassinate JFK. This is the cat whose disgusting “hot mic” talk from “Access Hollywood” was aired nationwide, which he dismissed as “locker room talk.”

A parade of people had spoken openly about his abuse of women prior to the election, to no great reduction in his popularity.

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I can be sold that Trump had an affair. I can believe that he paid “hush money” to keep it quiet. I can even believe they fixed the books. What I cannot – what I refuse to believe – is that Trump at any point believed that if this news got out, it would somehow harm his chances of election.

I simply do not believe the charge. Let him go.

R. Bruce Anderson is the Dr. Sarah D. and L. Kirk McKay, Jr. Endowed Chair in American History, Government, and Civics and Miller Distinguished Professor of Political Science at Florida Southern College. He is also a columnist for The Ledger and political consultant and on-air commentator for WLKF Radio in Lakeland.

This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Trump on trial: 'Free the New York One!'