The reaction to the Trump New York verdict has been exactly what anyone who follows US politics might have predicted. Many people, mostly Republicans, have been horrified and outraged. It’s a terrible outcome for our country, they say, which is true, but will actually make Trump stronger, which is also true. Trump himself had an opportunity to respond immediately to the verdict from outside the very courtroom in NY where it happened. Once again, he trafficked in falsehoods: The judge was biased, the trial was rigged, the country is falling apart and (the usual false non-sequitur) the people coming across our southern borders are being released from jails and mental asylums in their home countries. This apparently is related in some way to the unfairness of the unanimous verdict against him.

He did not blame the jury that had convicted him. Jurors are real people, not politicians, and when they make the huge mistake Trump is claiming they made, they are not to be blamed for it. For one thing, it suggests that normal people who heard the evidence found him at fault, which is not what any politician wants to admit.

This was not a difficult case. He signed many of the checks that were falsely called a lawyer’s fee on his company’s books when they were really used as a payoff to a porn star. It isn’t shocking that the jury found him at fault.

When the smoke clears, we’ll find that nothing much has happened. A local prosecutor in New York City was lucky to get a case against Trump that couldn’t be thrown out or infinitely delayed by the courts. Trump will not go to jail, he won’t be required to stay in the state of NY, and he will be nominated by the GOP at the convention in July, even though—unlike what happened in NY—he really has been charged with serious crimes like violating the laws on the handling of classified information, and attempting to overthrow the 2020 election, which he still won’t admit he lost. Think of that. He’ll run for President again and maybe even win, if none of the serious crimes he is charged with gets to trial before he takes office.

The way commentators are talking on some networks, you might think Trump didn’t have a lawyer, an opportunity to call witnesses, a jury of his peers chosen randomly from the community, a chance to confront his accusers, and all the other guarantees that the American justice system accords to defendants. He could even take the witness stand in his own defence, which he was unwilling to do.

It could be that all the jurors were committed Democrats who were poised to convict Trump from the moment they were chosen, but the chances are that they were ordinary folks who saw it as their duty to serve as jurors.

Perhaps these fellow citizens were trying to tell us something. If so, it makes sense to listen.

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