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CNN
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The Platte River flows eastward through Nebraska at depths far too shallow for shipping. “In some places it is a mile wide and three-quarters of an inch deep,” the writer Edgar Nye said in 1889, coining a phrase still in use.
Last week, as former President Donald Trump’s legal troubles continued to mount, so did a fundamental question about the 2024 Republican presidential campaign. Is Trump’s support in the GOP rock-solid, as suggested by the many party figures who rushed to his defense and the fans who attended his rally Saturday – or is it only a mile wide and an inch deep?
If prosecutors in New York City, Atlanta and Washington bring any charges against him – and there’s no assurance they will – would it strengthen his support or complicate and potentially weaken his campaign for the Republican nomination?
So far, Trump is leading the pack in early primary polling and could even see his numbers grow if he is arrested – as he predicted last weekend. That arrest has not happened.
“The danger facing Republicans is that they will either have to bind themselves even tighter to the mast of an intensely polarizing figure, or risk splitting the party by not coming out in his defense,” wrote Patrick T. Brown. “Navigating between those pitfalls will require some willingness to criticize Trump,” he added.
“The more daring Republicans may try to ding Trump for his seamy behavior even while attacking the politicized prosecution. One of Trump’s presumed rivals for the nomination, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, took a not-so-veiled shot at the former president’s behavior,” Brown noted.
“I don’t know what goes into paying hush money to a porn star to secure silence over some type of alleged affair,” DeSantis said even as he accused Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg of “pursuing a political agenda and weaponizing the office.”
If Trump is prosecuted, he could reap short-term gains, wrote Republican strategist Karl Rove in the Wall Street Journal. “An indictment would likely provoke many MAGA Republicans to rally around…
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