‘We are the jury’: Legal expert calls on public to tune into Trump’s election fraud trial

A legal expert is calling on an American public that's grown fatigued from following current events during the Donald Trump era to tune into the former president’s Jan. 6 election conspiracy trial.

Former U.S. Attorney Joyce Vance in a Substack opinion piece writes that the Trump era has fueled a collective exhaustion that has become a “real problem.”

Vance writes that “Many people in our country have become inured to Trump’s behavior. He is selfish. He is greedy. He is narrow minded and cruel. He had no problem ripping babies from their mothers’ arms; he permitted it on his watch as president. He made fun of people with disabilities. He sexually assaulted a woman and continued to make cruel comments about her the day after a jury convicted him of defamation.”

She added:

“A real problem with Trump is that there is just so much of it that he is exhausting. For some people, it's easier to tune it out than it is to try and keep all of it in focus. The details get submersed in the morass. This new indictment is the moment where those who’ve said they just can’t follow the new should be able to reconnect, to follow the progress of these most important charges, whether they agree with them or not.”

Vance adds that “It’s every American’s obligation to follow this process.”

Vance finds one count the former president is facing to be especially troublesome. Count Four, the conspiracy to disenfranchise voters, she notes, is described in the indictment as the president conspiring to “injure, oppress, threaten, and intimidate one or more persons in the free exercise and enjoyment of a right and privilege secured to them by the Constitution and laws of the United States—that is, the right to vote, and to have one’s vote counted.”

Vance writes that “Only 12 people will sit on the jury in the courtroom when his case is called. But we will all still play a big role. Because we are the jury in the court of public opinion, and the outcome of the 2024 election really is every inch the most important election of our lives. The indictment itself is not evidence, but it lays out the narrative of the facts we saw unfold before our eyes and helps us make sense of the crimes that Trump is charged with committing. It is an important document for every American to read. Not everyone will, but that's where we can come in, sharing details, and helping people around us, understand the procedures that begin today. It's the real work of saving the republic.”

Read the full article here.