Opening statements to show the stark personal and political stakes of Trump’s first criminal trial

CNN —

Donald Trump was once, and may soon be again, the most powerful man in the world. But on Monday, his diminished reality as a criminal defendant will become clear in humbling fashion during opening statements in his first criminal trial.

The presumptive GOP presidential nominee has long chafed at the constraints of the law, the Constitution and general decorum as he’s presented himself as an omnipotent force throughout his business and political career. But with jury selection now complete in his hush money trial in Manhattan, Trump’s fate is in the hands of prosecutors, his attorneys, a judge and 12 people, who, according to bedrock principles of the legal system, are regarded as peers of the ex-president. Nothing is more antithetical to Trump’s lifelong operating assumption that because of who he is, he is immune from such accountability.

Just over six months from the election that could see him restored to the White House, Trump has little ability to dictate action in proceedings in which his liberty may be at stake. His normal weapons of histrionics, obfuscation and intimidation have no currency inside a courtroom. The fact that he is compelled to be in court four days a week for multiple weeks is also a serious inconvenience to the Republican candidate. This constraint was exacerbated on Saturday, one of the few windows to get out on the campaign trial, when his rally in North Carolina – a swing state that President Joe Biden is trying to flip – was canceled owing to a dangerous storm.

Regardless of its outcome, this trial – and the way it’s affecting Trump’s schedule and demeanor – is underscoring how the presumptive GOP nominee is like no other presidential candidate in history. Whether or not he’s a