Donald Trump lost this one already

Out of all the motions, requests, and appeals that Donald Trump has filed since his criminal indictments started coming down, none of those filings have managed to delay Trump’s scheduled trial dates by even so much as a single day. This isn’t some surprising development; it’s just how these things work.

Criminal defendants can’t just flood the court with nuisance filings and expect to benefit from it. The only way Trump could meaningfully stall his trial would be if prosecutors didn’t care when it got to trial anyway. And since these prosecutors do indeed care, Trump has no power here. Trump’s trials were always going to take place well before the 2024 election. The prosecutors involved chose their indictment timeframes based on knowing how much time they’d need to safely get these cases to trial well before the election.

Now that Trump has gotten stuck with a March 2024 trial date in federal court for trying to overthrow the 2020 election, he’s vowed to appeal his trial date as well. The tricky part: that’s not even a real thing. Trump can file an appeal in court over his trial date, and I can file an appeal in court over the fact that I’m not taller than I am, and we both have the same odds of getting our way.

Of course once you flat admit that Trump can’t do anything to delay his trial date, you’re taking some of the drama out of it. How can you milk the scary “Trump is going to magically get away with it all” narrative for ratings if you’re admitting that he’s going to be tried and convicted well before the election?

But it’s good to see that some of the mainstream media is indeed admitting that Trump is indeed going to be stuck with his trials taking place before the election. Well, mostly. This weekend the Washington Post wrote an article titled “Why Trump’s vow to appeal his D.C. trial date probably won’t work.” Nothing in the article supports the “probably” disclaimer; instead the article explains why it definitely won’t work.

But strangely worded headlines aside, it’s good to see the media accurately acknowledging that, yes, Donald Trump will go on trial well before the 2024 election – and that he does not have some kind magic “delay” wand.

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