Trump now faces a major Jan. 6 indictment. Will his feverish faithful budge? | Mike Kelly

Dear Trump Nation:

Are you happy now?

I wrote those words in a column on Jan. 6, 2021, asking whether the trashing of the U.S. Capitol — the People’s House — by Trump-inspired insurrectionists was worth it. Did such mayhem contribute to the often-expressed desire of Trump loyalists to “Make America Great Again”?

Today, America — in particular, Trump supporters — must ask a slightly different version of that question now that former President Donald Trump faces new federal criminal charges of helping to spark the violence of that terrible day when our nation almost became a banana republic.

And so, Trump Nation: Do you get it yet? Are you still happy with your president?

Did Trump really “Make America Great Again”?

A consequential indictment

This first day of August 2023 — 30 months after the Jan. 6 attack — began with the polls telling us that Trump, despite his growing legal problems, was miles ahead of other Republican candidates vying for the their party’s nomination for president in the 2024 election. The day ended with Trump facing yet another criminal indictment. Yet another yin-yang day in American politics.

This set of criminal charges is the most consequential, however. These allegations are about how our nation runs. Simply put: Do we abide by the results of our elections? Or do we allow someone to twist the law to their own ends?

To put it more bluntly: Do we condone cheating in order to promote a political agenda?

Such is the message to voters at the heart of the 45-page indictment, released just after 5 p.m. on Tuesday by the special federal counsel, Jack Smith, that charges Trump with four counts of violating federal laws.

Consider, for a moment, the language in these allegations:

• “Conspiracy to defraud the United States.”

• “Conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding.”

• “Obstruction of and attempt to obstruct an official proceeding.”

• “Conspiracy against rights.”

This is not about paying a porn star to shut up and not tell American voters that Trump was a sleazy guy who doctored his business records — as the criminal indictment in New York City charges. And this is not about withholding top-secret government documents for some weird reason — as yet another federal criminal indictment in Florida from Smith’s investigation charges.

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What can we learn from the new indictment?

This new indictment, from a Washington, D.C., grand jury, cuts to the heart of Trump’s worldview and his belief that he did not have to listen to the will of the voters but could simply operate with a mobster’s mindset and behave as he pleased. It's also a reminder of what was lost — namely injuries to dozens of police officers. And then there was U.S. Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick of South River, New Jersey, who was badly beaten and doused with pepper spray by a rioter. He later died of complications from a stroke.

The underlying narrative of this indictment is that Trump believed he was really King Trump. His behavior does not summon up Lincoln or Kennedy or Reagan. It reminds us of every tinhorn despot who has sunk into the dank basements of world history.

Almost every sentence of this indictment seems to tell us that Trump felt he could do whatever he wanted. And to that end, he believed he could lie and push his cadre of sycophants into carrying out his cheating claims.

“Despite having lost, the Defendant was determined to remain in power,” the indictment says.

That statement, in itself, should resonate across this nation now. Anyone who values our system of elections — indeed, anyone who believes in the Constitution — ought to wonder about the man who would harbor such a self-centered view of himself.

And yet, that’s not the case. With his own behavior in recent months, Trump has spun a web of deceit that continues now in his daily fundraising emails in which he claims he should still be president.

As the indictment points out, however, this belief began on Election Day in 2020:

“For more than two months following election day on November 3, 2020,” the indictment says, “the Defendant spread lies that there had been outcome-determinative fraud in the election and that he had actually won. These claims were false, and the Defendant knew that they were false. But the defendant repeated and widely disseminated them anyway to make his knowingly false claims appear legitimate, create an intense national atmosphere of mistrust and anger, and erode public faith in the administration of the election.”

The result was the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

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Can anything bend Trump's feverish supporters?

But let’s be honest: That erosion of public trust continues with Trump’s torrent of nonsense each day now in which he claims that a “deranged” prosecutor is conducting a “witch hunt” against him — all in an attempt to deny him a seat in the Oval Office. Perhaps even worse, Trump now regularly claims that the various criminal prosecutions against him — from New York to those from the federal government and perhaps Georgia in the coming weeks — are really an attack on his own supporters in MAGA-ville, or what has come to be known as “Trump Nation.”

“They're coming after you — and I'm just standing in their way," Trump told his supporters at a recent rally. By 7 p.m. on Tuesday, the "Official Trump Store" sent emails offering commemorative indictment T-shirts inscribed with the date of the new federal charges and a message: "I stand with Trump." Buyers had to make a minimum contribution of $47.

Whether “Trump Nation” will buy into this latest Trump scam remains to be seen. But if the polls are correct, Trump’s followers are not breaking from his fold.

If the election were held today, Trump and Biden would be running neck and neck. Or to put it more plainly: Half of America would be supporting a man who is facing at least three criminal trials and possibly a fourth. If convicted, he would could be sent to prison for the rest of his life.

What’s interesting in this latest indictment is that plenty of people — all Trump supporters — attempted to tell him that he had not beaten Biden in the 2020 election and that, in fact, he should bow out gracefully.

The list of truth-tellers begins with Vice President Mike Pence. It continues, the indictment says, with “the senior leaders of the Justice Department appointed by” Trump “and responsible for investigating credible allegations of election crimes.”

Others who tried to inject truth and sanity into Trump’s nihilistic fantasy world include America’s director of national intelligence, cybersecurity experts at the Department of Homeland Security and “Senior White House attorneys selected by the defendant to provide him candid advice.”

Also on the list of those sending up warning signals were senior staffers on Trump’s election campaign, “State legislators and officials many of whom were the Defendant's political allies, had voted for him and wanted him to be re-elected,” and state and federal courts across the nation that ruled dozens of times against Trump’s efforts to challenge the results of the election.

In other words, Trump had plenty of warnings that he was venturing down a dangerous path.

As we all know, Trump declined to listen. He behaved like a little boy who refused to go to bed on time. In the end, Jan. 6, 2021, was a violent version of a juvenile temper tantrum by a boy who was accustomed to getting his way.

After the indictment was released on Tuesday, special counsel Jack Smith stood behind a lectern at the U.S. Justice Department in Washington, D.C., and delivered a simple message to the nation that lasted less than three minutes.

“The attack on our nation’s Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, was an unprecedented assault on the seat of American democracy,” Smith said, adding that it was “fueled by lies — lies by the defendant, targeted at obstructing a bedrock function of the U.S. government.”

He urged America to read the indictment.

Let’s hope Trump Nation heeds his advice.

Mike Kelly is an award-winning columnist for NorthJersey.com, part of the USA TODAY Network, as well as the author of three critically acclaimed non-fiction books and a podcast and documentary film producer. To get unlimited access to his insightful thoughts on how we live life in the Northeast, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Email: kellym@northjersey.com

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Trump indictment in Jan. 6 case: What is meaning for 2024 election?