Democrats thought they could stop Donald Trump with lawfare, but he's getting the last laugh as his court calendar clears up 100 days out from Election Day.
It's an infuriating prospect for Democrats, who are left harping on a single felony conviction that has failed to drag him down in the polls.
The lawfare campaign reached its peak in the spring, with Trump's prosecution in New York for "falsifying business records." Trump was found guilty, but the broader lawfare effort soon unraveled.
The finishing blow came two days after Trump narrowly survived an assassination attempt. In a shock ruling, the judge in his Florida classified documents case threw it in the trash after much back-and-forth with hotheaded prosecutor Jack Smith.
Judge Aileen Cannon found that Smith's appointment undermined the power of Congress. Her decision came after the Supreme Court ruled that presidents are immune for official acts, setting back Smith's attempt to prosecute Trump in a separate 2020 election case.
The Supreme Court narrowed Smith's January 6th indictment against Trump and sent the case to the trial court to finish a painstaking analysis of the charges, a move that all but upended Smith's pre-election timetable.
A separate Georgia case relating to the 2020 election has been derailed by an unforced error from prosecutor Fani Willis, whose canoodling with a co-worker led to a massive scandal.
The 2020 election cases were the most sought after by Democrats, who have accused Trump of an "attack on democracy." In the end, Democrats came up way short, with little to show for their efforts beyond a talking point of dubious impact.
Presumptive Democratic nominee Kamala Harris has made it clear she intends to use the New York conviction to plug a "prosecutor versus felon" narrative. But Trump was surging before Joe Biden ended his re-election bid, and though the race has tightened, the "convicted felon" is still in the lead.
Of course, Trump has borne a great cost nevertheless: in addition to his conviction, he is fighting civil fines of over half a billion dollars and the potential seizure of his property on spurious charges of victim-less business fraud.
Democrats clearly underestimated Trump when they decided to abuse the full power of the legal system to destroy him. What dirty tricks will they turn to next?
