In a discussion this Friday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” former federal prosecutor Chuck Rosenberg suggested that former President Donald Trump has made his situation worse with his cascade of complaints about the judge in the New York City criminal case in which he was convicted on Thursday.
A jury convicted Trump of dozens of felony criminal accusations of falsifying business records in connection to hush money from before the 2016 presidential election for a woman named Stormy Daniels, who allegedly had a sexual encounter with Trump years before that point. Rosenberg said that precedent suggested Trump wouldn’t be sentenced to prison following this particular conviction before getting to potentially aggravating factors: particularly, Trump’s aggressive refusal to accept the allegations against him and show any remorse.
“This is a first-time, non-violent offender, and typically, in New York state courts, a first-time, non-violent offender does not get a jail sentence,” Rosenberg said. “That said, continuing to yell at the umpire, to denigrate the ump, the courts, the jurors, the system, the prosecutors is just a bad strategy. And one thing that judges look for at sentencing is what the defendant has to say.”
“I sit there and listen as a prosecutor to whether or not the defendant is remorseful,” Rosenberg continued. “Whether he or she apologizes, whether he or she takes responsibility, and I think Mr. Trump is constitutionally incapable of doing that. […] His fate now resides in the hands of one person, and he’s been spending a lot of time denigrating that one person. So, we’ll see.” He was referring to the judge.
Trump was put under a gag order in the case, but the judge never extended it to block comments about himself. (District Attorney Alvin Bragg, the case’s lead prosecutor and an elected official, was also excluded from Trump’s limits.)
