The gaslighting continues because Donald J. Trump is not handling the aftermath of his 34 felony convictions very well.
In the atrium of Trump Tower, the ex-president ranted and raved and blamed and whined in Vintage Trump style, to the point that CNN cut him off. He wove in his usual hits of false claims about the Judge, the DOJ, President Joe Biden, and he claimed he had wanted to testify in his defense but was advised against it and falsely claimed they weren’t “allowed” to use an election expert witness.
“I would have testified. I wanted to testify,” Trump said. “The theory is you never testify because as soon as you testify — anybody, if it were George Washington, don’t testify because they’ll get you on something that you said slightly wrong, and then they sue you for perjury.”
“As far as the trial itself, it was very unfair. We weren’t allowed to use our election expert under any circumstances,” the presumptive Republican presidential nominee and convicted felon said.
“You saw what happened to some of the witnesses that were on our side,” Trump continued. “They were literally crucified by this man who looks like an angel but he’s really a devil. He looks so nice and soft. People always say he seems like such a nice man. No, unless you saw him in action. And you saw that with a certain witness that went through hell.”
Katie Phang, host of MSNBC’s The Katie Phang show, called Trump’s excuses out, writing that he could have testified and that he and his team could have chosen to put on the elections expert, but chose not to.
Let’s be crystal clear:
Trump could have testified. No one stopped him from doing so. No one forced him to sit there and not take the stand in his own defense.
Trump, himself, decided not to testify.
Trump also lied when he said that his defense “wasn’t allowed to put on an elections expert [witness].”
The defense chose not to do so.
That was Trump’s decision not to call an expert witness.
Donald Trump can make himself the victim of anything just by inhaling. It comes to him as naturally as breathing, because this is how he sees the world. The law doesn’t apply to him and it’s an outrage if anyone tries to apply it.
Trump’s own defense lawyer claimed on Fox News that Trump was in charge of the defense calls, so really Trump is mad at Trump. But facing that would require the ability for self-examination. So instead, Trump is playing the victim by making up lies that he was only convicted because he was stopped from defending himself.
Todd Blanche says Trump was very involved with the decisions about his defense, ” He wanted to be the litigator. You want to be the one that was actually arguing because he’s a smart guy and he knows what he’s doing. We made every decision together.” pic.twitter.com/9Z5Xe2S3DI
— Sarah Reese Jones (@PoliticusSarah) May 31, 2024
Trump appears to have put his defense at risk by calling the shots and running the board like it was a political game he could control via a narrative. Unfortunately for him, evidence presented in court isn’t the same situation as a campaign and it can’t be controlled with Trump’s usual blame game on social media.
