
Trump’s historic conviction isn’t doing much to shift these voters’ 2024 picks
CNN
Some things take time to sink in. But don’t expect committed Donald Trump voters to suddenly waver because their candidate is now a convicted felon.
Some things take time to sink in. But don’t expect committed Donald Trump voters to suddenly waver because their candidate is now a convicted felon. “Just an abuse of the justice system,” Billy Pierce, a semi-retired consultant and Trump backer in Hartsville, South Carolina, said shortly after the former president was found guilty on all 34 counts of falsifying business records in his Manhattan hush money trial. “Biden and Democrats can’t win the 2024 election in the polls, so they use prosecution of Trump to try to keep him out of office. This verdict will not hold up through appeals,” he added, repeating Trump’s false claims about President Joe Biden being behind the New York prosecution. Andrew Konchek, a commercial fisherman and Trump supporter in New Hampshire, responded to the verdict with sarcastic references to former President Bill Clinton’s personal scandals. “There’s no direct evidence and from who, Cohen? Who’s a habitual liar and has been disbarred? I smell some bullshit,” he added referring to the prosecution’s star witness, former Trump fixer Michael Cohen. Another Trump backer in New Hampshire, Debbie Katsanos, texted during the jury deliberations. “I see no crime,” she said. “Certainly at a felony level. I am sorry to say I can’t trust the justice system when it’s being used in a political way. … Yes, no one is above the law, when a law is broken they should be held accountable. I’m just not seeing it in this case.” Iowa Trump supporter Chris Mudd, who owns a solar energy business, said his backing of the former president is solid. “I do think the verdict is bad for America,” Mudd said in a text. “Can’t believe this is happening in this country.”
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The retired Air Force general announced as the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff by President Donald Trump after the abrupt Friday night firing of his predecessor is a respected career F-16 pilot who is described by current and former officials who served with him as a professional with a “strong moral center.”
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Over the past 10 days, Vice President JD Vance put Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on notice, rattled the confidence of century-old allies in Western Europe during his first foreign trip, decamped to Capitol Hill to help in delicate budget talks and delivered a spirited defense of the Trump administration’s first month to a gathering of conservatives outside the nation’s capital.