Former President Donald Trump’s conviction in a Manhattan courtroom last week may well spell electoral disaster for vulnerable Senate Democrats who have not only tacitly endorsed the lawfare against Trump, but also embraced every other aspect of the left’s assault on democracy and key American institutions.
Five months out from Election Day, the legal persecution of Trump has now become the dominant political storyline. This development represents a potential disaster for endangered incumbents Sherrod Brown in Ohio, Jon Tester in Montana, Jacky Rosen in Nevada, and Bob Casey in Pennsylvania. None of these Democrats has lifted a finger as Biden’s Department of Justice has ruthlessly targeted Trump in a blatant attempt at election interference – something that will likely become the subject of withering GOP attack ads as campaign season heats up.
With Soros-funded prosecutor Alvin Bragg and Biden’s maniacal grin suddenly becoming the new faces of the Democrat Party, the party’s image may well already be irreparably damaged in the eyes of most voters. Every Democrat candidate in a competitive race will now be pressured to take a stance on the lawfare against Trump and explain why they supported Bragg. While endorsing Democrats’ tactics against Trump will alienate all but the most hardcore liberal voters, opposing the Trump prosecutions will lead to collapse in support on the left.
At least one senator, Sherrod Brown, is already facing such pressures. Republican challenger Bernie Moreno has called on Brown to rescind his endorsement of Biden and condemn the verdict. “Following the guilty verdict in President Trump’s trial in New York – a political witch hunt to interfere in the 2024 election orchestrated by Joe Biden’s allies – Sherrod Brown has thus far cowardly refused to comment,” Moreno wrote in a statement. “If Sherrod supports this corrupt ruling and stands by Biden, he should at least be man enough to admit that publicly to the people of Ohio.”
Thus far, Brown has not responded to Moreno or commented on the ruling – something that is unlikely earn him much support in a state Trump won by more than eight points in 2016 and 2020. Democrats in other Republican and swing states will undoubtedly face similar questions in the days and weeks ahead.
Specifically, Republicans will likely press Democrats to answer for evidence of political influence in the case. For instance, the law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton, & Garrison LLP – where Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s brother is a partner – was involved in the prosecution. There also remain serious questions about whether or not the jurors selected from deep blue Manhattan were truly unbiased in their deliberations.
Every Democrat has also gone along with the Biden Department of Justice’s blatant cover-up of crimes committed by the president’s son, Hunter, even as they have cheered on the DOJ’s persecution of Trump.
Even worse for these vulnerable Democrats, their complicity in the left-wing legal lynching of Trump provides a prime opportunity for Republicans to highlight their involvement in various other liberal schemes to erode and undermine American democracy.
For instance, allowing the weaponization of the justice system against Trump could give then GOP an opening to remind voters that every incumbent Senate Democrat also voted for H.R. 1, the so-called “For the People Act,” in 2021. This bill would have abolished the Electoral College, transformed the Federal Election Commission into a partisan body, and destroyed election integrity by banning Voter ID and mandating ballot harvesting.
These same senators also stood by quietly as left-wing activists threatened and harassed Supreme Court Justices outside their homes following the leaking of the Dobbs decision back in 2022. In fact, Schumer himself openly threatened the justices – again to deafening silence from every Senate Democrat. But that they should not defend the integrity of the Court is perhaps unsurprising given that they have also worked to pack it with liberal justices, thereby turning it into a rubber stamp for liberal assaults on the Constitution.
Biden’s border invasion is another shocking assault on key American institutions that every Senate Democrat has greenlit through their voting record and failure to hold anyone in the administration accountable. Even as Biden and Democrats are attempting to use lawfare to swing the election against Trump, the millions of illegals flooding into the country present an unprecedented threat to both the sacred right of American citizenship and election integrity.
The Trump conviction could become the keystone of a broad-based campaign tying together all of these threads into one devastating narrative about how continued Democrat rule will mean the end of American life as we know it – along with the death of our cherished freedoms and individual liberties. If Republicans can effectively make that case to voters, Democrats may face an impossible task this fall.
B.C. Brutus is the pen name of a writer with previous experience in the legislative and executive branches.