In the public spotlight, Trump can’t seem to stop barking about how all of these trials, lawsuits, and indictments against him are only serving to bolster his 2024 presidential campaign and will ultimately help to catapult him back into the White House where he belongs — and where he believes he will be safe from any further criminal charges.
However, according to a new report from Axios, insiders are telling a far different story about the Donald Trump they see behind doors, who is terrified that a criminal conviction — particularly one that’s connected to his actions surrounding the January 6th insurrection — will effectively ruin him.
Axios’ Mike Allen and Jim VandeHei report that behind closed doors, Donald Trump is convinced that if a guilty verdict in the J6 case, being heard by Obama-appointed Judge Tanya Chutkan, comes down on his head before the general election, his political career as he knows it is over, particularly among Independent voters who may have been leaning toward him, but will jump the fence the moment he’s convicted.
The report reveals Trump “in private, is bracing for the genuine possibility that he’ll be the first convicted felon in U.S. history to represent a major party.”
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“Trump believes he’d likely be convicted if the Jan. 6 case comes to trial later this spring in Washington. If that’s delayed, he could face a guilty verdict in the Manhattan hush-money case.”
Axios notes that both the D.C. and the Manhattan trials are expected to see jurors who have no love lost for Donald J. Trump, leading the former president to “continue to groan, moan and bemoan — then hit the TV cameras parked outside.”
One Trump insider admitted to the publication, “You can’t be defensive or never talk about it, because that just makes you look guilty. Your only option is to play it up.”
While the former president continues to brag and boast in public, he’s not coping nearly as well in private, as he continually panics over the never-ending onslaught of legal trouble he’s facing, with one inside source telling the publication, “If he really thought it was a good thing, he wouldn’t be so unhinged.”
You can read the full report from Axios here.
Featured image via Political Tribune Gallery
