Yes, Trump may lose his hush money trial – but he’s got bigger things to worry about

Hell hath no fury like a Donald Trump forced to spend all day in a dingy, cold courtroom at 100 Centre Street in downtown Manhattan. Here on the 15th floor, he has spent the last two weeks fulminating. But he can’t do that while the court is in session. Here, it is Judge Juan Merchan who is in charge, not the former president. Here, the president has to do what he’s told.

For a man for whom being not just in charge but in total control is so much a part of his heavily curated image, this is proving tough. Defendant Trump turns up when the judge tells him to and leaves at the end of the day. In that sense, he is being treated like any other suspected criminal on trial. In others, of course, this is all totally abnormal.

As the first former president ever to face a criminal trial, the security is high – all other routine cases due to be heard on the 15th floor have been scattered to other municipal buildings. The president addresses the cameras on his way in and out. And every day it is much the same: the judge is conflicted, this is all being orchestrated by crooked Joe Biden and his corrupt justice department, America has never seen anything like it.

He has also attacked witnesses and court staff – which has brought a gag order that Trump seems determined to break, and potential imprisonment if Judge Merchan rules he’s crossed a line. It is all very testy, and though some thought this would be a perfect campaigning moment for Trump, is it really working out like that?

The reporters in court to witness the trial have observed that at times Trump has dozed off. That his eyes have closed, his head drooped, and his mouth lolled open. “#SleepyDon” started trending on Twitter/X. Ouch.

You just need to look at the fake tan and the extraordinary confection that is his hairstyle to know how much that image means to Trump. Being described as just another frail old man, not able to concentrate and unwittingly nodding off, is not what the former president wants to project.

And yet, some of it is so Trumpian. He has been complaining that this “jumped-up” charge he’s facing of paying off the former porn star, Stormy Daniels, $130,000 before the 2016 election and not declaring it, has stopped him from campaigning. All part of the Biden plot. Grossly unfair. On Wednesday, there was no court sitting. So, finally, a chance to get out on the stump and catch up on lost time. To press the flesh with wavering voters. Or was it instead an opportunity to go and play golf at his course in New Jersey? Sorry, I’m going to have to hurry you…

It is normally governments that run job creation schemes, but Donald Trump is a one-man job creator for the legal industry. His legal woes in Manhattan are the least of it. There are myriad other cases, another whole mountain of litigating and a big chunk of the Trump 24 campaign funds going to keep hundreds of well-heeled lawyers in country club subscriptions.

Unarguably the most important court hearing this week was not what was unfolding on the 15th floor of the Centre Street criminal court buildings – it was happening in the Supreme Court in Washington DC. It was there that another group of Trump attorneys were arguing before the nine justices that the former president had immunity from prosecution for what happened on 6 January.

This is a case where, on technical grounds, Trump could lose, but still, in real terms, win. Though before we get to that, there was one jaw-dropping moment when Justice Samuel Alito – a longstanding conservative member of the court who was appointed when George W Bush was president – suggested that unless a president is given immunity from prosecution while in office, he might be tempted to cling onto power unlawfully for fear of prosecution when he moves out of Pennsylvania Avenue.

What an extraordinary and morally bankrupt argument. In other words, the only way to stop sitting presidents from trying to overturn elections that they’ve lost is to give them immunity for trying to overturn an election. Bizarre. But it was a straw in the wind for the way the six conservatives on the court were thinking. The special counsel who is seeking to bring the prosecution against Donald Trump for the attempted insurrection on 6 January was hoping that the court would rule decisively that he has no immunity, paving the way for the trial to begin before the November election.

Donald Trump wants to play everything long, and there are two very good reasons for wanting to do that. One is that he doesn’t want to spend more weeks sitting and fuming in a draughty courtroom; and secondly, if he wins in November, that will halt the trials in their tracks.

So, victory in the Supreme Court doesn’t need a ruling that he does have immunity. It is sufficient for the justices to decide they need more information; to refer it back to a lower court to look at before they consider it again. Running down the clock is the name of the game. And from the line of questioning pursued by the clear majority on the Supreme Court, it looks as though that is what is going to happen.

Trump might still be in a funk over being stuck, day after day, in Manhattan – and the trial is likely to last six to eight weeks – but the bigger picture is that the most perilous indictments are cans that his legal team look like they’ve managed to kick miles down the road.

Jon Sopel is the former BBC North America editor and now presents Global’s ‘The News Agents’ podcast