Poll: Few Americans Believe Trump Acted Illegally in ‘Hush Money’ Case

How good of a job have the Biden Department of Injustice and the Democrats been doing in selling their series of lawfare trials against Donald Trump to the public? According to the latest AP-NORC poll, not very good at all. And that’s particularly true of the current “hush money” trial unfolding in New York City. Respondents were asked if they believed that Trump “did something illegal” in the Stormy Daniels case as well as the three other criminal cases that are currently pending. Fewer than one-third of people responding said they felt Trump acted illegally in his dealings with Michael Cohen and the adult actress. Other questions followed and while it’s clear that the entire nation hasn’t suddenly fallen in love with the former president, to say that they are “skeptical” of these show trials would be putting it mildly. (Associated Press)

The first criminal trial facing former President Donald Trump is also the one in which Americans are least convinced he committed a crime, a new AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll finds.

Only about one-third of U.S. adults say Trump did something illegal in the hush money case for which jury selection began Monday, while close to half think he did something illegal in the other three criminal cases pending against him. And they’re fairly skeptical that Trump is getting a fair shake from the prosecutors in the case — or that the judge and jurors can be impartial in cases involving him.

Still, half of Americans would consider Trump unfit to serve as president if he is convicted of falsifying business documents to cover up hush money payments to a woman who said he had an affair with her.

It must have really pained the people at the Associated Press to have to publish these numbers. They, along with nearly every other legacy media news outlet have been breathlessly covering every moment of all of these dubious legal proceedings on a daily basis. They surely must have thought they finally had Trump in a trap and Joe Biden would be saved. But that clearly does not appear to be the case.

In addition to the low number of people who believe Trump acted criminally, only 30% said that they believe that the prosecutors who are going after Trump are treating him fairly. Even fewer (20%) believe that the judges and jurors involved in these trials “can be fair and impartial.” In other words, even the people who fall well outside of Trump’s orbit can see that he’s being railroaded and they are not comfortable with this.

The only good news coming out of the poll for the Trump-haters is that a significant number of them believe that a felony conviction on any of the charges could hurt his reelection chances. Almost half said that Trump would be considered “unfit to serve” if he’s convicted. That’s a rather jarring result when you compare it to the other responses. Most people doubt that he did anything illegal and they don’t believe that the juries he will face will behave in a fair and impartial fashion. But if those same jurors find him guilty anyway, these people are willing to declare him “unfit” as a result? There’s some sort of disconnect being observed here.

Of course, the good news in all of this for Donald Trump should be equally obvious. Even if a significant number of people view him as “unfit” if he is hit with a guilty verdict, he is currently running against someone who is obviously far less fit to serve. If some of the votes Trump winds up receiving are from the “lesser of two evils” crowd, he will accept those votes all the same. In the end, that’s all that really counts.

In the meantime, despite what these poll numbers suggest, none of this lawfare appears to be eating into Trump’s overall numbers. As of this weekend, Trump is still leading Biden in a head-to-head matchup, if only barely. When you add in RFK Jr. and the other wannabes, Trump does even better. On a state-by-state basis, Trump remains well ahead of Biden in places like Florida and Texas while maintaining varying leads in nearly all of the swing states. That could all change by next month, of course, but at least for the moment, the nation does not appear to be buying what the Democrats are selling when it comes to Donald Trump.