He’s had trouble finding a first-class attorney to represent him at his Miami arraignment. His White House associates are now witnesses. His vice president is running against him.
But Miami, oh Miami — alleged capital of democratic yearnings for the rest of the hemisphere — is staging a love fest for America’s caudillo in his darkest hour.
The special counsel bringing Donald Trump to justice said the ex-president “put our country at risk.”
But that Trump has been indicted on 37 felony counts of documented treasonous behavior — grave acts like bragging about possessing a military plan to invade Iran, knowingly stealing thousands of classified documents and storing them at Mar-a-Lago and obstructing justice instead of returning them — is only fuel to show him more adoration.
“We love you!” a woman in an unmistakably rhythmic Miami accent kept shrieking as Trump entered his hotel in Doral Monday for an overnight stay before his arraignment Tuesday at the downtown Miami federal courthouse, where Florida groupies camped out — including Blacks for Trump.
Didn’t dawn on the throngs of devotees — affirming their faith in Trump as if an arraignment were a Catholic confirmation — that to get a grand jury in Miami to indict this president, the abundance of evidence had to be overwhelming, as the charging document indicates.
But, why would people know better when Miami’s Republican leaders are playing golf with Trump and displaying all sorts of deplorable behavior in support of an accused criminal?
Showing Trump love
The local politicians know that Trump is accused of breaking espionage and presidential-records laws and obstructed federal investigators. They know they’re being hypocrites defending the twice-impeached, twice-indicted ex-president when they’ve told voters they stand for “law and order.”
But from their posts in Washington D.C. and Miami City Hall, instead of blaming the only culprit — Trump — they march to the tune of “Hail to the celebrity president,” who Tuesday reached a new milestone, being the first ex-president about to making a first appearance in court under the Espionage Act.
As Trump was being indicted, U.S. Rep. Carlos Gimenez giddily played golf with the former president at his National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey.
“Tee Time With Trump!” Gimenez tweeted, shamelessly.
He was telling Miamians and the country: nothing to see here. His gesture doesn’t hurt either the business affairs of his lobbyist son, once a Trump consultant.
Not to be outdone, Miami Mayor Francis Suarez, under FBI investigation himself for alleged shady City Hall dealings, confessed to Fox News a suddenly-developed enamoramiento with Trump.
He didn’t vote for him in 2016 or 2020, but he’s now all in for Trump and was seen entering the federal courthouse Tuesday after making his way through the crowd.
Why the drastic change now?
“The problem here is a fear of Joe Biden’s America,” Suarez said. “We’ve gotten a taste of what a dysfunctional government can do.”
Funny thing is, the “dysfunctional government” is a more apt description for his mayoral tenure than Biden’s presidency.
Plus, Suarez likely is hedging his bets should his delusion of winning the GOP presidential nomination, a run said to be announced this week, doesn’t come to fruition.
All for the party
Neither of these Miami Republicans would be so supportive Hillary Clinton or Biden being prosecuted. But Trump is the man polls say GOP voters want in the White House — and that makes grown politicos behave like betrayed lovers who just can’t let go of a bad choice.
They understand the gravity of this historic moment of disgrace for the nation, but they’re going to milk Trump for all he’s worth to the Republican Party.
In ethics-challenged, corrupt and pliable Miami, supporting Trump translates to political capital.
It’s an unspoken rule of the culture and political history: Public service doesn’t include independent-thinking, gutsy leadership. Elections are decided on crafty pandering to the wounds of exiles, passed along from one generation to the next.
Fanatical caudillismo, a lesson never learned, comes with the demand for one-party loyalty, just like in Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua, no matter what.
Hence, those who rallied at La Plaza de la Revolución in Havana for Fidel Castro, repented and crossed shores, now find it an obligation to show up at the Wilkie D. Ferguson, Jr. U.S. Courthouse — and the quintessentially political stop at Versailles.
The 49-page indictment detailing how Trump tried to lie his way through an FBI investigation and a grand jury probe doesn’t matter. Nor being found liable for sexually abusing a young writer at a New York store. Nor that he’s a criminal defendant, indicted, arrested and arraigned for a multi-count felony case involving hush payments to stripper Stormy Daniels during the 2016 campaign.
The irony that Trump trolled Clinton with chants of “lock her up!” for a bunch of emails on the wrong server is lost on GOP loyalists.
Even a crude attempt to steal an election. Even an attack on the Capitol. Even the rise of fascism, the other side of communism, isn’t a problem.
Trump, a chronic liar, called the exhaustive investigation and resulting criminal indictment against him “a hoax” on Truth Social — and those were all the marching orders his perennial bootlickers needed.
