On Tuesday, the verdict came in in Donald Trump’s sexual battery case. The Manhattan jury in the civil case pressed by writer E. Jean Carroll found the former president liable for sexual battery and defamation and awarded Carroll $5 million, although jurors did not find she presented enough evidence to prove her rape case.
What the verdict means going forward, of course, is going to be a matter of vigorous debate. And when I think of someone I want elucidating the left side of that debate, among the names that very much does not come up is Geraldo Rivera of Fox News.
But because this is the new Fox News — where Rivera’s knee-jerk, self-important, uninformed leftism is perfectly welcome as a rotating co-host of “The Five,” but Tucker Carlson is being paid millions to fly-fish instead of host a show — that’s exactly what we got after the verdict was announced, along with Trump supporter Leo Terrell for the right.
Suffice it to say that Rivera got torched.
Rivera’s case for the importance of the Carroll verdict was as follows: “A woman in New York, or a New York jury, has found you liable for doing it,” Rivera said. “Can you imagine being that finger in your face? Is it this — this pales in comparison to a, you know, politically charged Disneyland [sic] that the president can level at DeSantis. This is very, very serious. To minimalize a charge of sexual battery in this day and age, I think that you’re, uh, uh, being naïve.”
What he said.
Geraldo’s arguments, such as they were, relied on two points: 1) sexual battery is an imposing charge “in this day and age” and 2) isn’t this historic and won’t it torpedo Trump’s 2024 nomination?
To which Leo Terrell noted there were other historic “firsts” involving a president that Rivera was ignoring — and that other candidates will use what happened in a Manhattan courtroom “at their own peril.”
“You attack Trump, you attack 75 million Trump supporters,” Terrell said. “That’s why all these other candidates are walking a fine line.”
“So you don’t think that happens on a debate stage?” host Martha MacCallum asked. “You don’t think that anyone brings it up?”
“I think people bring it up at their own peril,” Terrell said. “Here’s the key point: Mar-a-Lago raid, historic. Two impeachments, historic. Criminal charges, historic. A civil case. And guess what? His numbers keep going up.”
Geraldo Rivera:
“It is so parochial and partisan to suggest that a finding of sexual battery is nothing. This is not nothing.” pic.twitter.com/V3xrB59TXI
— Citizen Free Press (@CitizenFreePres) May 9, 2023
“What does that tell you, Geraldo? What does that tell the other candidates?” Terrell continued.
“Trump is popular with the everyday people. Maybe not inside the Beltway, Martha, I’ll give you that, but the everyday people — no candidate on this planet can rally 40 or 50 thousand people on a weekend when he calls for a rally. That’s the magic of Donald Trump.”
Geraldo went on to say Terrell “is right about the charisma and magnetism of Donald Trump” but still thought the verdict would carry some weight.
The full discussion is here:
This is the new Fox News:
Allowing Geraldo to take shots at Trump immediately following the E. Jean Carroll verdict. pic.twitter.com/ltDpNmsvAw
— James Dunn ??? (@dunnrightpodcst) May 9, 2023
Naturally, Geraldo being Geraldo, this rather misses the mark. Considering he’s recently had appearances on “The Five” canceled, it’s enough to make one wonder why he’s still on the show at all.
Look at the “historic” firsts Terrell cited:
The Mar-a-Lago raid, first time a former president had his residence raided by the FBI.
Two impeachments, the first time that has been done against any president (and on rather flimsy grounds both times with no hope of a conviction in the Senate in either case).
Criminal charges, the first against a former president (flimsy though they might be).
Same with the civil case the state of New York is pursuing against the Trump Organization.
Then you have Carroll’s civil case, decided in the bluest part of the country by a jury that couldn’t even decide in Carroll’s favor on the most serious points of her civil complaints.
Given that this was Manhattan, I was halfway surprised the jury didn’t just tack on an extra few million because “we thought Trump shot a man in Reno just to watch him die; although that wasn’t really part of the suit, per se, we thought, you know, what the heck?”
As it turns out, the verdict — even as much as the establishment media tried to spin it as a big win for Carroll, despite the fact Trump didn’t even bother mounting a defense and will cover the costs with pocket change — landed with a thud.
This is how the left and the anti-Trump will end up getting torched just like Geraldo did. The fix is in when it comes to the legal warfare Democrats are waging against Donald Trump, but as Terrell put it, “everyday Americans” know it.
And politicans and pundits who ignore that fact do so at their own peril.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
