Despite the sordid details, former President Donald Trump's criminal hush money trial has come as a welcome relief to Republicans, a new analysis contends.
Political commentator S.E. Cupp Wednesday made this claim in a New York Daily News editorial Wednesday unpacking GOP responses to Trump's ongoing trial in Manhattan criminal court.
Trump stands accused of falsifying business records to cover up hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 presidential election, and key witnesses include the film star, a tabloid publisher and the former fixer who spent time behind bars.
"Believe it or not — and here’s the kicker — Republicans are relieved this trial is finally underway," Cupp writes. "Yes, I said relieved."
Cupp argues these salacious details are just what Republicans ordered amid a novel election year that pits a Democrat incumbent against a former president facing four criminal court cases.
"These are not ordinary times," Cupp writes. "And today’s Republican Party abandoned ordinary years ago in favor of extraordinary, unprecedented, self-destructive, even disastrous."
Also read: Trump has two ways to win SCOTUS immunity fight — even if he loses: legal expert
Trump has "simultaneously been the Republicans’ biggest boon, energizing and consolidating the base in ways never before seen, as well as the biggest drag on a party that lost the White House, House and Senate in four short years," Cupp writes, adding that many think Trump will lose the hush money trial.
According to Cupp, the trial distracts the public from the fact that the GOP is on the defensive when it comes to subjects like abortion and fallout from the overturning of Roe v. Wade, for which Trump has taken credit.
"The blows have come steadily since the 2022 overturning of Roe, forcing Republicans to defend or disavow the ramifications of that decision on a regular basis," Cupp writes.
"So the hush money trial — unseemly as it is — is a welcome relief from the battering ram of unpopular abortion measures."
