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      Trump in handcuffs: it’s a sight I’ve longed to see. The trouble is, that’s what he wants, too | Emma Brockes

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      Of all the accusations and lawsuits that have swirled around Donald Trump, it’s not the one many of us thought would bring the man down. Trump has faced far worse allegations, primarily the ongoing defamation and battery suit brought against him by the journalist E Jean Carroll, and the accusation, via the January 6 committee, that he disrupted the peaceful transition of power. But it is the return of Stormy Daniels, the porn star elevated to Greek goddess of vengeance, that may deliver to the world an image many have longed to see: Trump in cuffs.To that end, all police in New York were ordered to be in uniform this week and on standby for immediate deployment. At the weekend, Trump urged his supporters to “protest, protest, protest” ahead of what he advertised as his likely arrest on Tuesday, after a grand jury in the Manhattan criminal court inched closer to a possible indictment. As it turns out, no arrest has yet been made. But the accusations against Trump, which relate to his alleged payment of hush money to Daniels in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election, appeared to be on the verge of triggering an arrest order from the Manhattan district attorney’s office. If it happens, it will be the first time criminal charges have been brought against a former president.The charges themselves are two-step and complicated, turning on a matter of alleged falsification of business records in the interests of furthering Trump’s election prospects. If Trump paid hush money to Daniels via his fixer, Michael Cohen, then lied about it, the DA’s office will try to contend that this constitutes not only a misdemeanour crime of cover-up, but a more serious felony entailing “intent to defraud”. The $130,000 paid to Daniels may then be framed as an improper campaign donation.It’s all very Al Capone and the bean-counters, which is to say not exactly a snappy charge for the headlines. Nor does it carry a particularly stiff penalty. The maximum prison sentence for a minor felony such as this is four years and it’s extremely hard to imagine Trump getting jail time. If the intention is to publicly embarrass Trump, that seems destined to backfire, too, given the man’s super-human levels of shamelessness. The maximal end point here would, presumably, be to tie Trump up sufficiently to edge him out of the next presidential election. Not a splashy outcome, but a potentially far-reaching one.The cost and the risk involved is considerable. In terms of the former, the mere fact of seeing his face on the news this week is a return to a place many of us don’t want to go. Accountability of any kind, no matter how small, would of course be satisfying in a way, but on the other hand, what mightn’t we give for the bliss of never hearing about this man ever again? Watching the news, I found myself wondering if I would, in fact, sacrifice revenge and justice, poetic or otherwise, for an entirely Trump-free existence.Anyway, that’s not on the cards. The bigger issue with any potential arrest of Trump is what it may do to his election chances. History has taught us that Trump can turn any publicity, no matter how negative, into a persecution narrative that only fans the conspiratorial mindset of his most ardent supporters. At the weekend, as he went the full Joan of Arc and urged his defenders to go out on the streets to protest for him, it was hard to escape the conclusion that he was thoroughly enjoying himself, and that he would far rather be arrested than ignored.It’s best with Trump to get the disappointment out of the way, to dash your own hopes before anyone else does. As the story unfolds, I’m getting in early and trying to come to terms with how it may all play out: the arrest happens, Trump is arraigned and tried, there’s no conviction, and he leverages the attention to stir up his base so that we don’t see the back of him for years. Now universe, prove me wrong!
      Emma Brockes is a Guardian columnist More

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      Trump keeps accusing Black prosecutors of being ‘racist’. Coincidence? I think not | Tayo Bero

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      The last several months have seen former president Donald Trump dust off his tired strategy of stoking white nationalist sentiment, and this time he’s taking on the prosecutors.He started with the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, who is currently bringing charges against Trump over alleged hush money paid to former actress Stormy Daniels during the 2016 elections.Earlier this month on Truth Social, Trump declared: “The Racist Manhattan District Attorney, Alvin Bragg, who is presiding over one of the most dangerous and violent cities in the US, and doing NOTHING about it, is being pushed … to bring charges against me for the now ancient ‘no affair’ story of Stormy ‘Horseface’ Danials [sic], where there is no crime and charges have NEVER been brought on such a case before.”Next, he took aim at Fani Willis, the district attorney of Fulton county, Georgia, for working to stop potential state legislation that would undercut the discretion of DAs like her. Interestingly, Willis is also looking at filing racketeering and conspiracy charges, based on Trump’s role in pressuring Georgia lawmakers after his 2020 loss.“The Racist District Attorney in Atlanta, Fani T Willis, one of the most dangerous and corrupt cities in the US, is now calling the Georgia Legislature, of course, RACIST, because they want to make it easier to remove and replace local rogue prosecutors who are incompetent, racist, or unable to properly do their job,” Trump wrote on 5 March.The bill in question would create an oversight board within the Republican-led Georgia legislature that could punish or remove local prosecutors based on a seemingly vague set of criteria. Critics – including Willis – recognize the bill as an effort to stifle and push out prosecutors that Georgia Republicans deem too liberal.The irony of Trump calling Willis racist – because she was calling out racism – feels almost too ridiculous to be real, but it’s the kind of legal, racial and political theater that has marked his most recent return to public politics.Then there’s Letitia James, New York’s attorney general, who Trump took aim at after she announced a $250m lawsuit against him for fraud. “There is nothing that can be done to satisfy the racist attorney general of New York state, failed gubernatorial candidate Letitia James, or the New York state courts which are biased, unyielding and totally unfair,” Trump said in a statement. “This is a continuation of the greatest witch hunt in history, and it should not be allowed to continue.”Trump’s accusations have a few things in common: none of them are supported by any kind of real evidence of racism; in all cases, he alludes to some kind of larger conspiracy; and, of course, all of the attorneys he is maligning are Black.Black people can’t be racist. They simply do not possess the political, social or material power to enact the violence that racism seeks to do to those who suffer under it. Trump probably knows that. Still, one of the impacts of this rhetoric of anti-white racism is that it invites everyday Americans to see themselves as victims of a Black takeover.This isn’t just absurd, it also lends credence to the far-right “white replacement theory” that underpins Trump’s political strategy.Only about 6% of district attorneys in the country are Black. Trump is inflating the legal discretionary power of this handful of people, then extrapolating it to all Black Americans, effectively saying: “Watch out for those Blacks; they’re coming to get you.”The political and racial maneuvering here is obvious, but that doesn’t make it any less dangerous. In remarks late last month, Trump called prosecutors in New York, Atlanta and Washington “radical, vicious [and] racist”.Now that’s a major projection if I’ve ever heard one.
      Tayo Bero is a Guardian US contributing writer More

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      DeSantis hits Republican poll low as Trump tightens grip on primary

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      Donald Trump may be in legal trouble over his alleged weakness for vice, but his predicament is increasingly placing Ron DeSantis – his chief rival for the Republican presidential nomination – in a political vise.The Florida governor must join Republican attacks on Alvin Bragg, the Democratic Manhattan district attorney whose indictment of Trump over a hush money payment to a porn star is reportedly imminent, while trying not to lose ground in a primary he has not formally entered.DeSantis has floated criticism of Trump over the hush money payment but on Tuesday a new poll showed how Trump, who is also fundraising off his legal peril, has tightened his grip on the primary race.The Morning Consult survey shows the former president has 54% support among likely primary voters and DeSantis has 26%, tying his lowest score since the poll began in December.The two men are still way ahead of the rest of the field. Trump’s former vice-president, Mike Pence, was third in the Morning Consult poll, with 7%, three points ahead of Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor.Liz Cheney, the former Wyoming representative who lost her seat after turning against Trump over the January 6 attack on Congress, and who has not ruled out a run, had 3% support. No one else, including likely candidates Mike Pompeo and Tim Scott, got more than a point.Like DeSantis, Pence has not declared a run but is seen to be positioning himself to do so. In a telling detail, Morning Consult noted that Pence’s favorability rating “declined from 60% to 55% during a week that featured news coverage of his condemnation of Trump’s behavior surrounding the January 6 attack”.Speaking to reporters in Florida on Monday, DeSantis was asked to comment on Trump’s looming indictment in the Stormy Daniels affair.Using a common rightwing attack line with antisemitic overtones, he condemned Bragg as a puppet of the progressive philanthropist George Soros.But DeSantis also took a shot at Trump, saying: “I don’t know what goes into paying hush money to a porn star to secure silence over some type of alleged affair. I just – I can’t speak to that.”Trump responded with typical aggression, recycling an attack line questioning DeSantis’s behaviour around young women when he was a teacher but also insinuating the governor might be gay.The following day, a close Trump ally warned of worse to come.“If you start this thing,” the South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham told Fox News, “you better be willing to take it. I don’t like it. You know, Trump is not into ‘Thou shall nots’. That’s not his thing.”DeSantis did not seem to listen, repeating his hush money jab to the British journalist Piers Morgan in an interview for Fox Nation excerpted in the New York Post.“There’s a lot of speculation about what [Trump’s] underlying conduct is,” DeSantis said. “[The payoff] is purported to be it and the reality is that’s just outside my wheelhouse. I mean that’s just not something that I can speak to.”Morgan wrote: “The message was clear: I’m nothing like Trump when it comes to sleazy behaviour.”DeSantis also said he would have handled Covid “different” to Trump, including firing the senior adviser Anthony Fauci and claimed that he governed without “daily drama”.He also called Trump’s attacks “background noise” and mocked the former president’s nicknames for him, saying: “I don’t know how to spell the [De]sanctimonious one. I don’t really know what it means, but I kinda like it, it’s long, it’s got a lot of vowels … you can call me whatever you want, just as long as you also call me a winner.”For leaders, DeSantis said, Americans “really want to look to people like our founding fathers, like what type of character … are you bringing?”Trump had switched from flattery to attacking him, DeSantis said, because “the major thing that’s happened that’s changed his tune was my re-election victory”.DeSantis beat the Democrat Charlie Crist by a landslide in November.Amid it all, the Morning Consult poll contained another worrying message for Republicans in general.According to the poll, if Trump were the nominee he would lose a head-to-head with Joe Biden by three points, 44% to 41%. If the Republican nominee were DeSantis, he would lose by one point less. More

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      Trump wants to be handcuffed for court appearance in Stormy Daniels case, sources say

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      Donald Trump has told advisers that he wants to be handcuffed when he makes an appearance in court, if he is indicted by a Manhattan grand jury for his role in paying hush money to adult film star Stormy Daniels, multiple sources close to the former president have said.The former president has reasoned that since he would need to go to the courthouse and surrender himself to authorities for fingerprinting and a mug shot anyway, the sources said, he might as well turn everything into a “spectacle”.Trump’s increasing insistence that he wants to be handcuffed behind his back for a perp walk appears to come from various motivations, including that he wants to project defiance in the face of what he sees as an unfair prosecution and that it would galvanize his base for his 2024 presidential campaign.But above all, people close to Trump said, he was deeply anxious that any special arrangements – like making his first court appearance by video link or skulking into the courthouse – would make him look weak or like a loser.The recent discussions that Trump has had about his surrender with close advisers at Mar-a-Lago and elsewhere opens a window on to the former president’s unique fears and anxieties as the grand jury, which next convenes on Wednesday, appears on course to return an indictment.Trump’s legal team in the hush money case has recoiled at the idea of him going in person and recommended that Trump allow them to quietly turn himself in next week and schedule a remote appearance, even citing guidance from his Secret Service detail about potential security concerns.But Trump has rejected that approach and told various allies over the weekend that he didn’t care if someone shot him – he would become “a martyr”. He later added that if he got shot, he would probably win the presidency in 2024, the sources said.It remains uncertain when the Manhattan grand jury might return an indictment in the hush money case and make him the first US president, sitting or former, to face criminal charges.People close to Trump could not be sure how serious he is about being handcuffed for a perp walk, but he may be thwarted in his supposed ambitions if the district attorney, Alvin Bragg, decides against handcuffing him and refuses to allow him to be marched past the cameras.Trump’s advisers have also been unsure whether he actually grasps the enormity of what an indictment might mean for him legally, in part because he has appeared disconnected at times from the recent flurry of activity in New York as the investigation has wrapped up.In recent days, Trump has generally weighed his predicament only in between lunches and dinners at Mar-a-Lago and playing his usual rounds of golf at his resort in Palm Beach, the sources said.When he eventually gets settled on strategizing his response to the hush money case, the sources said, he has been more focused on how he can project an image of defiance against the prosecution and that he is unfazed by being slapped with criminal charges that could turn out to rise to a felony.The case centers on $130,000 that Trump paid to Daniels through his then-lawyer Michael Cohen in the final days of the 2016 campaign. Trump later reimbursed Cohen with $35,000 checks using his personal funds, which were recorded as legal expenses to Cohen.It remains unclear what charges the district attorney might seek against Trump, though some members of his legal team believe the most likely scenario involves a base charge of falsifying business records coupled with potential tax fraud because Trump would not have paid tax on the payments.Trump has also been fixated on how an indictment might be a boon for his 2024 presidential campaign, betting that it would enrage his Maga base and force the rest of the Republican party to fall in line to defend him, in what he has already characterised as a politically motivated prosecution.In the past, publicity over political and criminal investigations have benefited Trump’s fundraising, and forced Republican rivals to stumble between criticizing prosecutors and defending otherwise politically indefensible allegations.Whether an indictment benefits Trump for the 2024 campaign remains to be seen given his grievance-driven campaigns have faltered in recent election cycles, with independent voters, in particular, seemingly exhausted by his constant refrains surrounding “witch-hunt” investigations. More

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      Biden vetoes Republican effort to overturn socially conscious retirement rule

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      Joe Biden issued the first veto of his presidency on Monday, rejecting legislation to overturn a labor department rule related to an investment strategy for Americans’ retirement plans that Republicans have derided as “woke capitalism”.“The legislation passed by the Congress would put at risk the retirement savings of individuals across the country. They couldn’t take into consideration investments that would be impacted by climate, impacted by overpaying executives,” Biden said in an Oval Office video released by the White House. “And that’s why I decided to veto it.”Republicans have railed against so-called “ESG” investing, an acronym that stands for “environmental, social and governance”, arguing that it prioritizes allocating money based on liberal political causes, such as efforts to combat climate change and divest from fossil fuels, instead of earning the best returns for retirement accounts.“In his first veto, Biden just sided with woke Wall Street over workers. Tells you exactly where his priorities lie,” the House speaker, Kevin McCarthy, wrote in response. “Now – despite a bipartisan vote to block his ESG agenda – it’s clear Biden wants Wall Street to use your retirement savings to fund his far-left political causes.”Their willingness to challenge corporate America, long seen as a reliable Republican ally, is just one front in the right’s “war on wokeness” that they claim has affected schools, companies and government.The veto underscores Biden’s new, more confrontational relationship with Republicans in Congress after two years of working with Democratic majorities. Now the White House is readying for even more consequential battles in the months ahead over government spending and the nation’s debt limit. House Republicans, in turn, are using their control of the chamber to advance legislation they intend to use against Democrats in next year’s election.The White House has argued that the legislation would have made it illegal for pension fund managers to consider “risk factors Maga House Republicans don’t like” such as the climate crisis when making investment decisions.“Your plan manager should be able to protect your hard-earned savings — whether Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene likes it or not,” Biden said in a tweet, referring to the far-right Georgia congresswoman who has made opposition to progressive ideas her political brand.House Republicans advanced the bill after taking control of the chamber this year. And earlier this month, two Democratic senators, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Jon Tester of Montana, voted with Republicans, sending the measure to Biden’s desk. Tester is running for re-election next year in states Donald Trump won handily.In a statement, Manchin called it “absolutely infuriating” that Biden had chosen to “put his administration’s progressive agenda above the wellbeing of the American people”. The coal country Democrat said the rule threatened the nation’s economic security as Americans contend with high inflation and Russia’s war in Ukraine upends energy markets.The veto, which was expected, sends the legislation back to Congress. House Republicans have scheduled a vote on Thursday in an attempt to override the veto, though to succeed would require support from at least two-thirds of each chamber, which appears unlikely.Biden’s veto effectively preserves the status quo, allowing – but not requiring – retirement fund managers to consider environmental, social and corporate governance factors when making investment decisions. The rule ​reversed restrictions imposed by the Trump administration that ​made it harder for ​​retirement fund managers to consider such factors.Though ESG is often framed as a socially-conscious way of investing, proponents say weighing a company’s working conditions​, pending lawsuits​ or its environmental record can help uncover more stable and​ crucially, they argue,​ more profitable savings opportunities. ​The popular investment strategy has become a target of conservatives, with several Republican-led state legislatures passing or proposing legislation that would limit or ban their state governments from considering social or environmental impacts when making investment choices.In a formal statement notifying Congress of his veto, Biden said that the labor department rule allowed “retirement plan fiduciaries to make fully informed investment decisions by considering all relevant factors that might impact a prospective investment”. By refusing to allow these considerations, Biden said, Republicans were “disregarding the principles of free markets and jeopardizing the life savings of working families and retirees”.In a statement, Chuck Schumer called Biden’s veto “totally appropriate” and that Republicans’ efforts to stop the practice were “counterproductive and un-American”.“Maga Republicans were ostrich-like in their actions, putting their heads in the sand, denying the realities of the changing world and trying to force American companies to do the same,” the Senate majority leader said. “This veto was the right thing for American companies and families alike.” More

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      Republicans tried to delay release of US hostages to sabotage Carter, ex-aide claims – report

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      A former Texas governor met Middle Eastern leaders in 1980 to convince Iran to delay releasing American hostages as part of a Republican effort to sabotage Jimmy Carter’s re-election campaign, according to a news report.The New York Times reported on Sunday that John Connally, who served as Texas’s Democratic governor from 1963 to 1969 and ran for the Republican presidential nomination in 1980, traveled to a number of countries in the summer leading up to the 1980 election.By that time Ronald Reagan had secured the Republican nomination, and the re-election campaign of his Democratic rival Carter was struggling in the midst of the crisis that resulted from more than 50 Americans being taken hostage from the US embassy in Tehran.In an interview with the Times, a then protege to Connally named Ben Barnes said he was with Connally as he met leaders in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Israel. Connally was there to deliver a message, the Times reported:“Don’t release the hostages before the election. Mr Reagan will win and give you a better deal.”Carter, who had ordered a failed attempt to rescue the hostages in April 1980, lost the election amid criticism of his handling of the Iran crisis and a stagnating economy. The hostages were eventually released on 20 January 1981, the day Reagan took office.“History needs to know that this happened,” Barnes said in one of several interviews with the Times.Barnes said he decided to come forward with his account after news last month that Carter, 98, had entered hospice care at his home in Plains, Georgia, after a series of hospital visits.“I think it’s so significant and I guess knowing that the end is near for President Carter put it on my mind more and more and more,” Barnes said. “I just feel like we’ve got to get it down some way.”Barnes – a Democrat who served as lieutenant governor of Texas and was vice-chair of John Kerry’s 2004 election campaign – told the Times that on returning from the Middle East, Connally reported to the chairman of Reagan’s campaign, William J Casey.“Carter’s aides have long suspected that his campaign was torpedoed by Reagan affiliates who wanted to delay the release of American hostages until after the election,” Axios wrote on Monday.It added: “Ronald Reagan’s subsequent presidency ushered in a conservative era that remains a model for Republicans. If Carter had secured the release of the hostages, he might have won instead.”Being able to confirm Barnes’s account, the Times said, is difficult “after so much time”.“Barnes has no diaries or memos to corroborate his account. But he has no obvious reason to make up the story and indeed expressed trepidation at going public because of the reaction of fellow Democrats,” the Times wrote.Connally died in 1993. And Casey, who went on to become the director of central intelligence, died in 1987.John Connally III, Connally’s eldest son, told the Times that he remembered his father taking the Middle East trip but had never heard about a message being sent to Iran.Barnes told the Times he had shared the information with four people over the years: Tom Johnson, a former Lyndon B Johnson White House aide who later became president of CNN; Mark K Updegrove, president of the LBJ Foundation; Larry Temple, a former aide to Connally and Lyndon Johnson; and HW Brands, a University of Texas historian.All four, the Times reported, confirmed that Barnes had told them the story. More