Allen Weisselberg leaves a New York criminal court earlier this month. The Trump Organisation was charged in a 15-year long tax fraud scheme. Weisselberg, its CFO, was accused of avoiding taxes on US$1.7 million in income. Photo / Getty Images
Allen Weisselberg leaves a New York criminal court earlier this month. The Trump Organisation was charged in a 15-year long tax fraud scheme. Weisselberg, its CFO, was accused of avoiding taxes on US$1.7 million in income. Photo / Getty Images
A DOG'S LIFE
It is good to know that this column has global reach. Only a few weeks ago I suggested it was time for Trump to be brought to justice. And lo, the process has begun.
The sight of the chief financial officer (CFO) of the Trump Organisation being marched to courtin handcuffs will have gladdened every honest heart. And it will have sent Trump's heart into an arrhythmia of rage and terror.
For this is the first step in Trump's exposure as a lifelong fraud, cheat and criminal. Exposure is what the narcissist most dreads. As the pressure mounts and the reckoning looms, Trump will go mad.
The CFO, Alan Weisselberg, is 73 years old. He worked for Fred Trump before he worked for Donald Trump. He knows everything about the Trump Organisation. Everything.
The crimes for which he's been indicted are serious and the indictment shows the authorities have all the evidence they need to convict him. The result will almost certainly be jail. The prospect of jail is always unappealing. At the age of 73, after a soft and wealthy city life, it's appalling.
Weighing also on Mr Weisselberg will be the knowledge that his son, another Trump employee, is a beneficiary of the same alleged crimes. Weisselberg snr may just be able to face jail for himself but he will not want to be responsible for the jailing of his son as well.
Fortunately for him there is a way to avoid the worst consequences, and that is to plead guilty, turn on Trump and sing like a bird. And one purpose of this indictment is to encourage him to do so.
So Trump is about to find out how loyal his chief financial officer is. Like a mob boss Trump demands loyalty, but he offers none himself. All his life he has disowned people who disavowed him.
NZME cartoonist Rod Emmerson's take on Donald Trump's reaction to the US electoral college awarding the election to Joe Biden. Trump continues to deny he lost the US election.
And all his life he has let other people take the rap for his own misdeeds: from the poor sap who went to Vietnam in his place when he faked bone spurs in his feet, to Michael Cohen, his joke former lawyer, who went to jail for helping Trump pay off Stormy Daniels, to the numerous thugs and lowlifes now rotting in jail for having believed Trump's lies about the election and invaded the Capitol because he told them to.
If Weisselberg expects Trump to come to his rescue he is deluded. Trump will disown him at the first hint of danger. And you can expect Weisselberg's attorneys, whose duty it is to look out for his best interests, to point this out.
Some people have expressed disappointment at the recent charges. They see them as too indirect an assault on Trump. After all, there are abundant greater crimes he might be charged with, crimes for which there appears to be a mound of evidence in the public domain alone.
Crimes such as sexual assault, and extortion, and obstructing justice, the last of which is outlined in detail in the Mueller Report. And then there's the obvious crime of inciting an insurrection against the United States. So why this comparatively minor indictment of an underling?
There are several reasons: one is to show Trump that they have something concrete and specific against him already, something that can be proved by documentary evidence. Whatever Weisselberg may be guilty of, Trump is too. Trump signed the cheques.
Another is to let the rats know that the ship is sinking. Those who leap off first will have the best stories to tell and the authorities may be willing to pay for those stories with leniency. But those who delay may lose that chance and go down with the ship.
A third reason is to build an awareness that Trump is doomed. Seventy-five million people chose to believe his lies and voted for him. They need to be released gradually from their delusion.
But the main reason is that this is only the start of the squeeze on Trump. There will be many superseding indictments, each more telling than the one before. The system over there is that a grand jury determines whether indictments should be issued.
Normally such a jury is empanelled for a few weeks. This one has been empanelled for six months.
There's plenty of stuff coming Trump's way and the prosecutors mean to make it stick. Because if there's one thing they know it's Emerson's wise old saw: if you strike at the king you must kill him. And they intend to. And I think they'll succeed.
