Trump takes presidency as felon

It would be hard to see a New York court’s order to Donald Trump to appear before it for sentencing as being other than an outrageously vindictive attempt to continue the lawfare campaign used against him until virtually the last minute before he re-enters the White House. Judge Juan Merchan has told Mr Trump he will be sentenced on Friday morning (Saturday AEDT) over the so-called hush money case involving 34 felony charges, including a $US130,000 payment to porn star Stormy Daniels over an alleged sexual encounter, that a jury found him guilty of last year.

Mr Trump, 78, had argued in an appeal that his overwhelming victory in last November’s election and imminent return to the White House mandated that his conviction be vacated. But Justice Merchan ruled that it did not, and his decision to proceed to sentencing means Mr Trump is set to become the first US president, former or sitting, who is a convicted felon.

Justice Merchan, in dismissing Mr Trump’s appeal, wrote that a sentence of “unconditional discharge” – meaning non-custodial, and with a penalty that involves neither a monetary fine nor probation – will be “the most viable solution” in the case. That sums up the pointlessness of what is clearly a malicious attempt by Mr Trump’s adversaries to cause maximum embarrassment to him and ensure that he is forever labelled with the moniker of being the first convicted felon to become US president. That is not what the US needs after the deep divisions opened by the 2024 battle for the White House between Mr Trump and first Joe Biden and then Kamala Harris.

However, with only days left before he brings down the curtain on a political career spanning a half century, Mr Biden showed on the weekend that at 82 he remains determined to the last to use his presidential powers to reward the establishment that Mr Trump regards as the Washington “swamp”. All outgoing US presidents, Mr Trump no less than Mr Biden, in one of their final acts, award the Presidential Medal of Freedom to a select few individuals and Mr Biden’s list of 18 nominees issued on Sunday leaves no doubt about the scale of the gap between the outgoing establishment and the incoming Trump regime. Near the top of Mr Biden’s list was former first lady, senator and secretary of state Hillary Clinton. Also on the list was American Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour, who twice put Mr Biden’s wife, Jill, on the front cover while spurning Melania Trump during Mr Trump’s first term, and liberal financier George Soros, whom Mr Trump’s Republicans have cast as the Democrats’ evil power behind the throne.

America’s national interest after what was a bitterly contested election demands better than pointless vindictiveness – from both sides of politics – on the eve of the swearing in of the new administration.