TRUMP NEEDED A FOIL, AND LIBERAL LAWYERS VOLUNTEERED

Think back to the Donald Trump of November 2022. A "red wave" was widely expected in the midterms, but it never happened, largely because Trumpist candidates went down in flames. Trump's loyal soldiers were comic-book villains like Blake Masters and Kari Lake; the victors were likable Democrats such as Gretchen Whitmer, Mark Kelly, and the down-but-not-out wounded warrior John Fetterman. Trump seemed like a spent force; he was neck-and-neck with Ron DeSantis in early polls of the Republican presidential field.

Then he was indicted, and indicted again and again and again, and after that he was tossed off the ballot in two states. Trump needed an unlikable enemy to make himself look good in the eyes of Republican voters, and we gave him one: a phalanx of lawyers operating in Democratic cities.

Republicans want him to smite those lawyers. From a new CBS poll:

Instead of dragging him down, the criminal indictments of Trump are actually a net positive for his voters. For those backing him in the general election, more are voting to show support for him in the face of those indictments than voting for him despite concern about what he might have done.

That is true of both the Republicans and independents voting for Trump, and for even more of those supporting him who identify as MAGA.

The New York Times notes that college-educated Republicans came back to Trump after the 2022 midterms, and his legal fights are a major reason.

... voters with a college degree ... have quietly powered his remarkable political recovery inside the party — a turnaround over the past year that has notably coincided with a cascade of 91 felony charges in four criminal cases.

Their surge toward the former president appears to stem largely from a reaction to the current political climate ... according to interviews with nearly two dozen college-educated Republican voters.

Many were incredulous over what they described as excessive and unfair legal investigations targeting the former president....

In a Suffolk University/USA Today poll [in December 2022], 61 percent of the party’s voters said they still supported Mr. Trump’s policies but wanted “a different Republican nominee for president.” A stunning 76 percent of college-educated Republicans agreed.

This month, the same pollster showed Mr. Trump with support from 62 percent of Republican voters, including 60 percent of those with a college degree....

Mr. Trump’s backing from white, college-educated Republicans doubled to 60 percent over the course of last year, according to Fox News polling....

Yolanda Gutierrez, 94, ... who studied education in college, said she had voted twice for Mr. Trump but had been leaning toward Mr. DeSantis....

“But now I prefer Trump because Democrats are trying to find any way they can to jail him,” she said....

Lisa Keathly, 54, who owns two flooring businesses near Dallas, said she still wanted to support Mr. DeSantis, whom she views as more polished and less rude. But she added that she was increasingly likely to back Mr. Trump in her state’s Super Tuesday primary.

She pointed to a ruling last month from Colorado’s top court to block the former president from the primary ballot, which the U.S. Supreme Court is now considering, as a moment that may have sealed her support for Mr. Trump.

“It’s a little bit like a teenager who’s rebelling — a part of me is like, Maybe I should go for Trump because everyone is telling me not to,” Ms. Keathly said. “Part of my thing is: Why are they so scared?”

She added, “Because they can’t control him.”

It's possible to believe that the legal pursuit of Trump is absolutely necessary and also that it has been a near-term bonanza for Trump.

The good news in the CBS poll is that Trump appears to be a weaker general-election candidate than Ron DeSantis or Nikki Haley. The bad news is that all three are leading Biden (Trump by 2, 50%-48%; DeSantis by 3, 51%-48%; Haley by 8, 53%-45%). Trump's obvious criminality isn't hurting him very much with general-election voters, and Republicans who defend him aren't suffering for it either.

Many people fear lawyers. Maybe college-educated people fear them more than most. They're Trump's foil now, and for now, at least, this is working out well for him.