Washington police imposed a security clampdown on Thursday ahead of a high-stakes court appearance by Donald Trump to face federal charges that he tried to overthrow his 2020 election defeat.
A few blocks from where his supporters stormed Congress in January 2021 in a deadly riot, barriers were in place outside the federal court where the Republican former president is expected to plead not guilty to the four charges later.
The Secret Service warned of travel disruption in downtown Washington, as the judge in charge admitted to sleepless nights since being assigned the explosive case - one of four that threaten Mr Trump with legal jeopardy leading up to the 2024 election.
"Please be safe,” District Judge Tanya Chutkan was told by a lawyer in an unrelated hearing on Wednesday. “I’m trying,” she replied, joking that she had wanted to keep her diary clear "in case I can get out of town, which is increasingly looking like a good idea".
A Republican dissident on Thursday branded Mr Trump a “traitor” and cult leader who is dragging America into “crazy times” – but said the legal problems would only serve to clinch him the party’s nomination for 2024.
Joe Walsh, a former congressman from Illinois who has turned against the party’s former leader, said the charges would reinforce the ex-president’s “martyr” image among his fervent supporters.
“This is like crazy times - a crazy town we live in,” he told Sky News from Washington, which Mr Trump is visiting for only the second time since his defeat by Joe Biden.
“He tried to overthrow an election. My god, if you can’t be indicted for that there’s nothing you can be indicted for… Trump is a criminal. But for his supporters, that doesn’t matter.”
Republican rivals vying for the 2024 nomination were in an “impossible position”, Mr Walsh added, after former vice president Mike Pence was named in the federal indictment as one person in Mr Trump’s circle who warned him to accept defeat last time.
“If you criticise Donald Trump or attack Donald Trump, then you’re done as a Republican. Look at Liz Cheney.
“So they just have to wait and hope and pray that something takes out Donald Trump. I don’t think that’s going to happen.”
The Deputy Prime Minister, standing in for Rishi Sunak as he takes a week’s holiday in California, meanwhile insisted on keeping a distance from the drama convulsing Britain’s closest ally.
Oliver Dowden declined to say whether he was a Trump supporter, after he raised eyebrows by giving a speech denouncing “cancel culture” at the right-wing Heritage Foundation in Washington last year.
“I think that Rishi Sunak the Prime Minister will respect what is a strong and stable democracy in the United States,” Mr Dowden said on a visit to Hartlepool.
“The people of the United States are perfectly capable of choosing who they want to be their president and they certainly don’t need British government ministers like me saying from Hartlepool where how I think they should be voting in that election that will take place next year.”
