If Trump is convicted, should he go to prison? Will he?
Donald J. Trump is currently facing 77 felony counts and a maximum sentence of 516 years in prison.
There are currently three cases where a prison sentence could be the end result, and a fourth where that is probable (Georgia). In each instance, the trial judge would make the decision on sentencing.
A moral case for imprisonment
Conservative attorney George Conway told CNN in June that he believes Trump should be incarcerated in the Florida documents case.
“Given the fact that he shows no remorse and no willingness to bear any responsibility for his misconduct, I think that a substantial sentence of incarceration is in order,” he said. Conway continued:
Now, the question will be, what kind of security can be provided for a former president in a US Bureau of Prisons facility? I don’t really know what — how they’re going to handle that, but I think there’s every reason to believe that they’re going to want to work something out where he is not able to walk the streets. He can, at a minimum, they could use some kind of home detention at one of his residences.
That was before Tuesday’s indictment for his attempts to subvert the 2020 election results.
Historian Heather Cox Richardson wrote Tuesday night that successful prosecution is needed to preserve democracy given the August 1 indictment.
The prosecution of former president Trump…will defend the rights of the victims—those who gave their lives as well as all of us whose votes were attacked—by establishing the truth in place of lies. That realistic view should enable us to recommit to the principles on which we want our nation to rest.
Donald Trump tried to destroy “the free exercise and enjoyment of a right and privilege secured…by the Constitution and laws of the United States—that is, the right to vote, and to have one’s vote counted.” Such an effort must be addressed, and doing it within the parameters of our legal system should reestablish the very institutions Trump loyalists are trying to undermine.
A case for prison: precedent
In the Florida classified documents case, the precedent is prison.
For example, in 2016 the FBI found classified documents at the home of national security contractor Harold Martin. Margin pleaded guilty. His sentence? Nine years in prison.
Former Trump White House lawyer Ty Cobb told CNN in May that he believed Trump will be convicted and go to prison in the Florida documents case.
Nevertheless, Paul Collins, a legal studies and political science professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, told Salon that “if the former president is found guilty and does not strike some kind of a sentencing deal, he may die in prison given his age.”
A case against prison: precedent
In the New York case, defense attorneys told Insider that “that it is beyond rare for a defendant in New York” to serve time for charges like these: non-violent, E felony, no identifiable victim.
“If there was anyone who would be incarcerated over this type of crime, it would be an elected official,” said former Manhattan prosecutor, Jeremy Saland, now a lawyer in private practice. “That said, to think for a moment that Trump is going to be incarcerated? That would shock me, for practical reasons and for reasons of allowing anger and divisiveness to fester.”
Why a prison sentence is a challenge
Trump has Secret Service protection.
How could they protect him if he were imprisoned?
This is uncharted territory.
What do the polls suggest?
In early July an Ipsos found that “a “plurality of Americans” thought Trump should be sentenced to prison if convicted in the Florida documents case or the New York business records case.
That plurality (“the most” but not 50+ percent) was a reported 43 percent. Moreover, the poll did not weight independent voters properly: instead of being the largest group, as it is in the population, it was a distant third. This online poll of 1,005 had a “credibility interval” of +/- 3.8 percent.
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NOTE: All numbers converted from words ($2 billion) to numbers ($2,000,000,000).
Featured image: caricature via MidJourney with prompt by KATHY GILL
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