The Dark Rhetoric After Trump’s Conviction

On Thursday afternoon, in a New York courtroom, Donald Trump wore a glum look on his face as a jury pronounced him guilty of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records, sitting slack as he became the first former president to ever be convicted of a crime.

Then he marched up to the cameras in the hallway to claim, falsely, that it was all a setup.

“Our whole country is being rigged right now,” Trump said. “This is being done by the Biden administration in order to wound or hurt a political opponent.”

That isn’t true. Trump’s trial in New York is a local matter that was brought by District Attorney Alvin Bragg, and it has nothing to do with President Biden or his administration.

But that didn’t stop Trump and his allies from trying immediately to weaponize it — to wield it in his long effort to undermine trust in the courts, the justice system, and perhaps in the 2024 election itself.

Trump was convicted of falsifying business records as part of a scheme to cover up a sex scandal that threatened to erupt while he was running for president in 2016. Prosecutors said it was an unlawful effort to influence that election, and Trump has tried to turn that accusation on its head.

For months, he has been deliberate, repetitive and disciplined in the words he uses to talk about the trial. He calls it the “Biden trial.” He calls it “election interference,” as he did earlier Thursday on his social media website. He calls it a “witch hunt.”