Trump Can't Wriggle His Way Out After Banning Abortion
Even with elaborate GOP choreography, reminders keep coming
In its original form, the most succinct encapsulation of the early Trump years has been deleted from the internet, but if you follow politics online, you’ve almost certainly come across it in some form or fashion.
It captured Trump’s degeneracy before we knew the extent of it, the zeitgeist of the resistance before there was a resistance, and Trump’s uncanny ability to let consequences fall on other people. Intentionally or not, the hanging comma hints at an endless loops of dashed hopes, or at his critics’ certitude that some kind of justice will eventually come.
Almost eight years later, people still cite this work of art constantly. Even as, if you hadn’t noticed, Trump has to do a lot more wriggling these days. In both of his biggest civil cases, he was unable to wriggle free before facing primary judgments and is now presumptively liable for rape, defamation, and civil fraud to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. He’s wriggled his way into delaying his criminal cases a bit, but not into avoiding indictment or even hiding behind the election. His hush-money trial begins next week.
But his greatest difficulty will be wriggling his way free from accountability for criminalizing abortion. More than the slow-grinding wheels of justice, his responsibility for Dobbs and his boastful ownership of the fall of Roe are wriggle-proof.
GRAHAM WHACKER
Consider the 24 hours spanning Monday and Tuesday, between when Trump issued a heavily telegraphed statement about abortion, and the Republican-packed Arizona Supreme Court banned abortion statewide.