A primer on Trump’s criminal trials

RUNNING FOR : the American presidency is a full-time job. “There was essentially no day or night” from the first presidential debate in September 1976 to election day, griped James Fallows, now a journalist, who worked on Jimmy Carter’s campaign. Donald Trump, now sure of the Republican Party’s nomination for this year’s election, has had to combine that gruelling endeavour with his role as a criminal defendant. Eighty-eight felony charges were brought in all. He was found guilty on 34 counts of falsifying business records on May 30th, but it is unclear whether the other trials, in which he is charged with defrauding the country and mishandling sensitive documents, will return verdicts before election day. So far, Mr Trump, who denies all the pending charges, has reconciled the roles of defendant and candidate by making his campaign largely about the cases against him. He rallies Republican support with his claims that he is the victim of a political witch-hunt. Whether most American voters will agree is uncertain. The revelations that emerge in court may well shape the race between Mr Trump and Joe Biden, the Democratic nominee. These are the prosecutions that await the former president.