Trump’s New York criminal trial begins soon – but will the public care?

As the criminal cases mounted against Donald Trump last year, one could be forgiven for not giving much thought to the New York case that charged him with 34 felony counts for falsifying business records.

The episode was a bombshell when the Wall Street Journal first reported it in January 2018. Trump paid the adult film star Stormy Daniels $130,000 on the eve of the 2016 election to keep quiet about an affair. He funneled the payment through his lawyer, Michael Cohen, and then lied about the purpose of the payment in his business records. By the time the case was filed last year, it had largely faded in the public psyche – buried under Trump’s efforts to steal the 2020 election and an avalanche of other lies.

Now, the once-sleepy case will be the first time a former president has gone to trial on criminal charges. It’s an awkward incongruity – the case with what appear the more benign crimes is taking on an outsize importance by going first – and a dynamic that’s been shaped entirely by Trump, who has used an array of legal maneuvers to delay the other three criminal cases against him.

Like all of the trials against Trump, there will also be a case in the courtroom and in the court of public opinion. And first-term district attorney Alvin Bragg will need to clear both hurdles by not only presenting a cut-and-dry case about falsifying business records, but reminding the American public who the true victims are: themselves.

“The prosecutor is going to want to sort of detail a precise case of ‘these are the documents, it was falsified, he knew and he had the intent’ and is going to try, in some ways, to simplify and streamline this case for the jury,” said Cheryl Bader, a professor at Fordham law school who specializes in