Every set of criminal charges against Donald Trump is another nail in the coffin for a 2024 presidential election fought on policy and by a younger generation of leaders.
The likelihood of Trump being indicted for a third time – after receiving a “target letter” from the Justice Department over allegations he tried to subvert the 2020 election – makes a rematch with Joe Biden more likely.
Not knowing whether he’ll be writing pardons from the White House or writing his memoirs in a jail cell would be a powerful motivator for the former president to campaign as hard as he can.
After all, there’s nothing in the US constitution to stop a prison inmate from becoming president and there’s nothing to stop a president from pardoning himself, either.
The additional focus on Trump’s legal woes overshadows his GOP rivals’ already struggling campaigns, while motivating his loyal supporters to keep backing him.
Trump’s chance of winning the GOP Republican nomination, according to political betting market PredictIt, has crept up from 50 per cent in April, when charges over hush money payments to a porn star emerged, to almost 60 per cent this week.
The more likely Trump is to be the Republican candidate, the more likely Biden, whom a vast majority of even Democrats don’t want to run again, is the Democrat candidate too.
Biden is the Democrat with a proven record of beating Trump, so some Democrat thinking goes.
None of the Trump legal issues will be resolved before the 2024 presidential election.
Aileen Cannon, a Trump-appointed federal judge who is overseeing the case against him for his removal of classified documents, has said she is open to delaying the start of the trial, likely to last years, to 2024.
Juan Merchan, the New York judge overseeing the hush money case, has scheduled March 2024 for the start of his trial, three weeks after the GOP’s Super Tuesday primaries.
A majority of Americans want Trump and Biden to retire. They understand a rematch would only fuel more vicious, divisive debate, while overshadowing any attempt to fix America’s myriad problems.
It is no wonder the two major parties are worried about independent candidates and third-party tickets popping up on the ballot next year. They appear likely to win their biggest share of the vote ever.
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