Especially since January 6thMuch has been written about the call and response dynamics between donald trump and their supporters.
But since the beginning of Manhattan District AttorneyIn Trump’s criminal trial against Trump last month, a different feedback loop was on display: After the media made observations about the former president’s courtroom arrangements and behavior, the Trump team appeared to make noticeable adjustments in response.
Do not believe me?
After the press noticed that Trump was sitting alone during the sideline sessions when the lawyers met with the judge, we saw a change. Now, at least one lawyer remains at the defense table to talk to Trump and keep him company.
After the press reported that the Republican Party’s presumptive presidential nominee appeared to be falling asleep in court, he began carrying a large stack of press clips in and out of the courtroom every day, as if his team had devised a strategy to keep him engaged and awake.
And after the press noted that there was no other Trump present, despite the defense’s characterization of the former president as a family man, a Eric Trump entered the courtroom behind his father on Tuesday and sat in the front row, next to Trump campaign chairman Susie Wiles.
On the one hand, Donald Trump’s third son, and current co-director of companies bearing the Trump name, is the family member that many would consider the most likely to appear. After all, he is known among reporters for his silent loyalty to his father, often placing his hand gently on his father’s shoulder or back. And he is also recognized, even among some of Trump’s most outspoken critics, for his manner and his calmness; During the civil fraud trial last fall by New York Attorney General Letitia James, in which Eric was also a defendant, I saw him approach James and shake his hand with apparent sincerity. The contrast between Eric’s politeness and his father’s constant complaints about the AG was not lost on me.
However, Eric also insists that Trump family businesses, as well as just his father, were unfairly persecuted. And although he’s not as comfortable in the media glare as his older brother, Don Jr., Eric has increasingly taken on a more public role in defending his father.
And it was the acceptance of this role that made a lost moment in court remarkable. On Tuesday afternoon, as prosecutor Joshua Steinglass walked witness Keith Davidson, an attorney who previously represented Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal, through a series of text messages, emails and contractual agreements related to the payment of the money Daniels’ secret, I witnessed Eric looking not at Davidson or Steinglass, but at a monitor to his left on which the evidence was displayed. And at that moment, the monitor displayed an email between Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen and Davidson attaching Daniels’ settlement documents, including the secret agreement that revealed that Peggy Peterson and David Dennison, the pseudonymous parties to the confidentiality agreement, were actually Daniels and Trump.
As Davidson read that email and recalled Cohen’s “highly unusual” insistence that only Cohen could retain a copy of that agreement, Eric Trump didn’t strike me as much of a Trump. Instead, at that moment, he was neither the heir to an American real estate dynasty nor a second generation fraudster. He was simply the son of a criminal defendant who appeared to be seeing, for the first time, important evidence of the alleged conspiracy that prosecutors said would turn several false business records into 34 criminal charges. (The elder Trump has pleaded not guilty to all charges and denies having a sexual relationship with Daniels or McDougal.)
The defense wants jurors to believe that Trump is someone, like any of them, with a wife and children he adores. But as I watched Eric absorb the details of the Daniels deal, not to mention relive the underlying allegations, I saw nothing more than a dutiful family man — and his name wasn’t Donald Trump.
This article was originally published in MSNBC.com
