Trump skips rape trial and will not attend GOP debates

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25 April 2023

The alleged rape and defamation trial of the criminally indicted ex-president, Donald Trump, began Tuesday morning, just hours after President Joe Biden launched his campaign for re-election, and just hours after news broke that one of the Supreme Court Justices he appointed failed to disclose the name of the attorney who has business before the Court, and had bought property from that Justice just nine days after he was confirmed.

Donald Trump has largely been silent on that civil rape and defamation trial, possibly because the judge overseeing the trial was forced to decide all jurors and potential jurors would remain anonymous, for fear they could be subjected to harassment and intimidation by the ex-president or his followers.

As expected, Trump did not show up for trial. The ex-president, a current Republican presidential candidate, has not been asked by attorneys for the plaintiff, journalist E. Jean Carroll, to testify. Trump’s attorney, Joe Tacopina, struggled to give U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan a straight answer last week about the ex-president’s intentions.

Trump did, however, on Tuesday respond to last week’s news about the upcoming GOP debates: “NO!” he shouted on his Truth Social platform.

“I see that everybody is talking about the Republican Debates, but nobody got my approval, or the approval of the Trump Campaign, before announcing them,” Trump wailed on his Truth Social platform. Candidates used to be consulted about nearly every facet of every debate, but the Republican National Committee last year announced it would no longer participate in debates organized by the bi-partisan commission that has been organizing them for decades.

“When you’re leading by seemingly insurmountable numbers, and you have hostile Networks with angry, TRUMP & MAGA hating anchors asking the ‘questions,’ why subject yourself to being libeled and abused? Also, the Second Debate is being held at the Reagan Library, the Chairman of which is, amazingly, Fred Ryan, Publisher of The Washington Post. NO!”

Trump on Tuesday did not mention his rape and defamation trial was beginning in his apparent declination to participate in the upcoming GOP presidential debates, nor did he mention the other women (some reports put the number of women at 18, others at 26) who have accused the ex-president, before he was president, of sexual misconduct, harassment, or assault.

The ex-president also did not mention the 34 criminal felony violations he was recently indicted for, felony violations related to his payoff of a porn star he allegedly had sex with just months after his third wife gave birth to his fifth child, and the subsequent alleged attempt to cover up his hush money scheme through falsification of his business records by allegedly funneling the cash through his now-former lawyer while declaring they were legal fees.

He also did not mention the U.S. Dept. of Justice’s Special Counsel who is investigating his possibly unlawful removal, retention, and refusal to return hundreds of documents with classified markings, including top secret documents, along with thousands of other pieces of federal government property he absconded with when he left the White House in January of 2021.

Nor did he mention that the same Special Counsel, Jack Smith, is also investigating candidate Donald Trump for his actions surrounding the January 6, 2021 insurrection and his actions attempting to overturn the 2020 presidential election he lost, which he has yet to concede.

The ex-president also did not mention the news that Futon County District Attorney Fani Willis announced Monday she will have a decision on whether or not to criminally indict Trump sometime this summer, after her July 11 grand jury is seated.

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