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“Former U.S. President Donald Trump's historic mug shot, posted by a Georgia courthouse [last] Thursday evening, is being turned into T-shirts, shot glasses, mugs, posters and even bobblehead dolls by friends and foes alike.” Reuters
Both sides agree that the mug shot benefited Trump’s campaign:
“Trump was a showman before he was a politician, and even while governing the largest economy on the planet, Trump was known to call media personalities occasionally to offer unsolicited advice about camera angles, lighting, and posing… If you were a liberal prosecutor hellbent on ending Trump's career as the former (and possibly future) leader of the free world, why would you want to deliver him the most iconic campaign poster in political history?”
Tiana Lowe Doescher, Washington Examiner
“Even at what should be his weakest moment, personally and politically, it’s hard to avoid the impression that Trump is in his element. The bleakly historic nature of his arrest — the first time a former U.S. president has been indicted on criminal charges — is largely undercut by the fact that he’s outpolling the rest of the GOP primary field by 40 points…
“It’s a remarkable turnaround after Trump was left for dead in 2021 and banned from his preferred social-media platform. He spent years in crotchety solitude at Mar-a-Lago, then launched what looked like an extremely ill-advised presidential campaign, all with the coup-related indictments looming. His surrender in Georgia was a coming-out party of sorts, a reminder of what he really is.”
Zak Cheney-Rice, New York Magazine
“Trump quickly posted his booking photo to his Truth Social network, and used it to return to X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. His campaign is already plastering it everywhere – likely to help raise the cash he’s spending on his defense and turning his shame into a new kind of power, in another affront to the justice system. For any other politician, a mug shot would be the end. For Trump, it’s a springboard.”
Stephen Collinson, CNN
“Those who have long been publicly rooting for the moment to be a humiliating experience — among them Lawrence O’Donnell of MSNBC, who said the booking ‘will be the greatest humiliation Donald Trump has suffered in the 77 years of his relentlessly humiliating life’ — are now appreciating the adage ‘be careful what you wish for.’ Trump supporters on social media are declaring the mugshot to be ‘the world’s biggest backfire,’ and they may not be wrong…
“In addition to freshly invigorating Trump’s supporters, the mugshot and booking delivered a one-two punch in virtually wiping [last] Wednesday’s GOP presidential debate out of the national conversation.”
Jennifer Graham, Deseret News
Other opinions below.
“For Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis and many of her supporters, the mugshot clearly holds a type of trophy kill appeal worthy of framing and mounting on a wall. This is one of those moments long portrayed on T-shirts and other merchandise for many on the left…
“For many Trump supporters, it is a moment of gratuitous insult of a president who is now being prosecuted in four different states just before an election where he is the leading Republican candidate. For the most extreme, it will be portrayed as a virtual declaration of war, proof that the establishment will use every means to prevent another 2016 populist victory…
“In that way, the mugshot will be the rallying cry at both extremes in our political system. For that reason, I believe the mugshot was a mistake, an inflammatory moment wisely avoided in New York by another Democratic prosecutor. It is entirely unnecessary for the most recognized face in the United States.”
Jonathan Turley, Fox News
“Mug shots publicize the identity of people who have not yet been convicted. Even when people are found guilty of the crime for which they were arrested, the public’s need for that visual information is so minuscule that the harm of publishing overwhelms it. It’s much less likely that a mug shot will, say, prevent an arrested individual with limited resources from fleeing their jurisdiction than that it will fuel local gossip…
“Yes, I felt some schadenfreude seeing a mug shot of Trump, who has so often thrown baseless accusations of criminality toward my city and others. But is the satisfaction of a broken criminal justice system catching up to someone like Trump reason enough to engage in a practice that is overwhelmingly harmful? It’s not… Let’s hope that [this] helps advance a wider conversation about moving away from photos that label mostly ordinary people as criminals before they’ve even had the chance to go though the justice system.”
Jillian Bauer-Reese, Los Angeles Times
A libertarian's take
“The trucking and bartering of Trump's mug shot is managing to simultaneously satisfy the mutually exclusive preferences of millions of Americans… Regardless of whether you want the man himself in the White House, in prison, or neither, everyone can get a healthy slice of consumer surplus from a Trump mug shot mug or shower curtain…
“The same isn't true of the electoral and judicial processes that Trump is wrapped up in. He'll either win or lose the presidency. He'll either be acquitted or convicted in court. The desires of Trump critics and supporters can't both be satisfied by a political system that only produces binary outcomes. One side is going to be disappointed…
“Markets, and the voluntary, mutually beneficial transactions that make them up, can navigate these intractable divides with ease. The bipartisan boom in Trump merch gives a window into a world where more of people's political passions were devoted to mutually enriching commercial endeavors. Perhaps we can't force all party politics to play out on Etsy. The more of it that does, the better off we'll be and the less cause for division and rancor we'll have in everyday life.”
Christian Britschgi, Reason
