Donald Trump’s allies rallied to his defence days before the former president surrenders to authorities on criminal charges, amid rising political tensions over what is set to be a protracted legal battle during a US election campaign.
Trump is expected to be arraigned in Miami, Florida, on Tuesday. He will plead not guilty to 37 criminal counts in connection with his alleged possession of sensitive material after departing the White House in 2021.
The charges range from violating the Espionage Act with the wilful retention of national defence information without authorisation, to conspiracy to obstruct justice and making false statements.
Many Republicans have continued to back him. Speaking on Sunday, Lindsey Graham, the Republican senator from South Carolina and one of the leading defence hawks on Capitol Hill, said Trump was “overcharged”.
“President Trump will have his day in court, but espionage charges are absolutely ridiculous,” he said in an interview with ABC News. “He did not disseminate, leak or provide information to a foreign power or a news organisation to damage this country. He is not a spy.”
Congressman Jim Jordan of Ohio told CNN on Sunday that the indictment is “as political as it gets” and represents an “affront to the rule of law”.
The indictment unsealed on Friday by special counsel Jack Smith has sent shockwaves through the US political system. It has propelled Trump’s legal troubles and questions about his fitness for office to the top of the 2024 election agenda. It also presents a new test for American democracy that will be closely watched around the world.
Trump’s tumultuous term in office was capped by a failed attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 election, which led to the January 6 2021 attack on the US Capitol by his supporters. There have been concerns about more political violence ever since federal agents searched the ex-president’s Mar-a-Lago estate to seize the classified documents at the heart of the case last August.
“We have now reached a war phase,” Andy Biggs, a Republican lawmaker from Arizona, wrote on Twitter on Friday.
Not all Republicans have come to the former president’s defence. Asa Hutchinson, former Arkansas governor and 2024 presidential hopeful, has called on Trump to drop out of the running in the wake of his second indictment.
Trump’s own former attorney-general, Bill Barr, on Sunday said Trump is “not a victim here”.
“If even half of it is true, he’s toast,” he told Fox News. “It is a very detailed indictment and it’s very, very damning.”
Former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, who announced last week that he is joining the 2024 race, drew a similar conclusion.
“The bigger issue for our country is, is this the type of conduct that we want from someone who wants to be president of the United States?” Christie told CNN.
Underscoring the sharp political divide over Trump’s indictment, two new polls showed Americans evenly split over the Department of Justice’s decision. According to an ABC News/Ipsos poll released on Sunday, 48 per cent of Americans thought Trump should have been charged with a crime compared to 35 per cent who said he should not. The people surveyed were similarly split on whether the former president should suspend his bid for the White House.
A separate CBS News poll released on Sunday showed that among likely Republican primary voters, most are concerned that the indictment was “politically motivated” rather than being a national security risk.
Of Republican primary voters, 61 per cent said the federal indictment would not change their views of Trump, while 14 per cent said it would change their view for the better. For just 7 per cent had it changed their views for the worst.
Trump has so far been defiant in the face of the allegations, slamming them on Saturday in his first appearance since the indictment as “among the most horrific abuses of power in the history of our country”. At an event in Georgia, he also boasted that the charges had boosted not only his poll numbers but also fundraising.
“We’re beating the hell out of Joe Biden. That’s why they are doing it,” he said. “If I wasn’t there’d be no witch hunt, there’d be no indictment.”
He later told Politico in an interview that he would continue running for president even if he was convicted. “I’ll never leave,” he said.
