Sitting in a courtroom while facing criminal charges (especially for dozens of felonies) and waiting to hear the outcome while the legal fees pile up is not anybody’s idea of a good time. It’s even less so if you’re Donald Trump.
Trump is used to a level of freedom and privilege most of us will never experience. If he wants to be in a different state before nightfall, he hops on his private jet. If he wants to golf, he can do it on his own property. If he decides he wants to go to a 7-11 at 3 am for a Slurpee, he has a Secret Service entourage to take him there.
Currently, though, four days of his week are scheduled without his permission or consent. He’s sitting in a courtroom that he says is too cold, needs permission to so much as stand, much less leave, and has to listen to witnesses testify against him.
Trump, who thrives on praise and image, has had to listen to David Pecker tell the jury he was known as an “eligible bachelor” — while he was supposedly a happily married man. The man who is still cosplaying as President of the United States has had to hear objections — sustained by the judge — when his attorney refers to him as “President Trump.”
It’s almost like someone made a list of the things that make Trump miserable and put them all together into a single daily experience for him. It could only be worse for him if the courtroom featured a portrait of former president Barack Obama.
How miserable is Trump? If you know how to translate Trump-speak, he’s told us. The Republican nominee is a master of projection. On Friday evening, he posted to his social media:
“THERE’S NO HAPPINESS ON THE LEFT!”
In fact, it seems that those in Trump’s inner circle are doing all they can to perk up his spirits, to little or no avail. The Washington Post reports:
“Despite efforts to schedule dinners where donors, friends and world leaders join him, Trump’s moods are worse on trial days, according to several people close to him. The former president is accustomed to near-daily rounds of golf, ‘constant stimulation’ and cheers when he enters and exits a room at Mar-a-Lago, they said. Instead, he is now reporting four days a week for mundane court arguments and long stretches without permission to check his phone.”
In breaks, Trump pops his head out to complain to reporters about the cold in the courtroom, and about having to sit up and stay awake, and about all the attacks he’s not allowed to make on witnesses, jurors, and the judge’s daughter.
Those in the courtroom are witnessing similar patterns in his mood. Earlier this week, for instance, MSNBC‘s Rachel Maddow described Trump as seeming “old and tired and mad,” in addition to seeming to have lost weight.
"He seems annoyed. Resigned, maybe angry. He seems like a man who is miserable to be here."
WATCH: Rachel @maddow comments on Trump's demeanor inside the courtroom. pic.twitter.com/Gcf8RSPN9d
— MSNBC (@MSNBC) April 22, 2024
Other reporters have described Trump as having a “perturbed disposition” when entering the courtroom and as appearing “frustrated” while listening to testimony.
Even aside from direct projection, Trump’s social media and his public appearances seem to reflect this.
He’s posting in all caps. He’s repeating the same complaints about the case over and over until it looks more like dementia-related memory loss than any effort to follow Joseph Goebbells’ advice on repeating the biggest lie until everyone believes it. He’s shouting and complaining nonstop.
Not that any of those behaviors are too out-of-the-norm for Trump, but the scale and scope make it pretty clear: whether or not he’s eventually convicted — as the evidence so far indicates he should be — whether or not he is inevitably sentenced, he’s already being punished. And he can’t stand it.
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