To the Editor:

Last week, Trump was indicted on 34 criminal counts by a Manhattan grand jury. He was arrested and arraigned Tuesday of this week, pleading “not guilty” to all counts. He is presumed innocent at this point.

Over last weekend, social media exploded with horrific threats of violence, civil war, and assassination if Trump were arrested. Threats that the arrest would further motivate and outrage MAGA were ignored, and our system survived. We are still a nation of laws. The NY DA declined to require a “mugshot” or to handcuff the former president for the arraignment. Undeterred, MAGA printed shirts for sale with a fake photo.

MAGA Republicans stood by their man. Weepy Republican Senator Lindsey Graham begged for donations to “help the man.” This is the same guy who warned about Trump’s presidential ambitions in 2016, “if we make him our nominee, he'll destroy the Republican party and we will deserve it.”

The judge, who did not issue a gag order at the outset, expressed deep concern for the language used by the parties, and cited Trump emails and posts predicting “death and destruction” following his indictment, threats to the NY DA and his family, one calling him “an animal,” and otherwise engendering hate and resentment against officers of the court.
Outraged hyperbole scudded like flying monkeys. Fox's Gerri Willis proclaimed that, “people are not going to want to run for office if this is where it goes... You’re not making a lot of money [$400,000 as president]. The downsides are so much bigger than the possible upsides. We are kind of signing our own death warrant." She said the quiet part out loud: that’s why people run for president, for the money! And to be unaccountable.
But she’s wrong about the upside. You can bawl “persecution!” “unfair!” and “witch hunt!” when held answerable for anything. You can pay off a porn star for sex, laugh about assaulting women, get sued for rape, deny you ever did anything wrong and have no need of forgiveness, and still have evangelicals celebrate you as a Jesus stand-in. You can profit from foreign countries in your elected office. You can tell deliberate, relentless lies in order to overthrow a legitimate election and claim innocence.
And you can inspire Fox to claim we will all imminently die if Trump is not the political ideal.
Kelly Scoles,
Fillmore, Ca