Opinion: Trump’s picture says plenty
Photographs are often loaded with emotional memories, whether they are grainy Polaroids of a baby’s first steps or a smartphone selfie with a celebrity that confirms a rare brush with stardom.
It’s a reason why “a picture is worth a thousand words.” But one recent photograph shows inflation even affects the value of an age-old cliche.
The picture in question is Donald Trump’s mugshot, which was taken Aug. 24 at the Fulton County Sheriff’s Office in Atlanta after the former United States president surrendered to police after being charged with racketeering.
(Fulton County Sheriff’s Office via The Associated Press)
Fulton County Sheriff’s Office booking photograph of former President Donald Trump.
He was indicted along with 18 others, including former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani (Trump’s former lawyer) and Mark Meadows, the former president’s chief of staff, for their efforts in trying to reverse the 2020 presidential election results in Georgia. U.S. President Joe Biden won the state by 11,779 votes — 0.23 per cent of ballots cast — and the triumph proved critical in his narrow victory over Trump in the race for the White House.
Trump looks the same in the image as he does in his many public appearances: he has nary a hair astray on his notorious bouffant and he wears a blue suit with a red tie rather than a bright orange jumpsuit, the usual wardrobe of someone in custody.
Millions of social-media users have rushed to judgment and issued their own cyber-verdicts while posting or reposting the former president’s stern-looking image on the internet.
Police mugshots are often taken at a person’s lowest moment, and defence lawyers will often mention to juries at criminal trials to not presume their client’s guilt from how they look in a picture taken while they were booked by police.
Trump is innocent until proven guilty too, and he joins a long list of politicians, activists and prisoners whose booking images have become symbols for defiance.
It’s a bit rich, however, to compare Trump’s racketeering case with Nelson Mandela’s political imprisonment by South Africa’s apartheid regime or Rosa Parks’ arrest for defying segregationist Jim Crow laws in the U.S. by refusing to give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Ala.
But don’t tell that to Trump’s 2024 campaign organizers.
They raised US$4.18 million the day after police released the photograph, making it the single-highest 24-hour fund-collection for his campaign.
Some say the money will be spent on Trump’s legal bills, because the Georgia charges against him are only the tip of the courtroom iceberg that threaten to sink his political aspirations.
He’s also accused of interfering with the transfer of power when he lost the 2020 presidential election to Biden, keeping classified documents after leaving the White House in 2021 and for his role in hush-money payments to Stormy Daniels, an adult film actress, in 2016.
Trump’s presidency was dotted by a parade of scandals and gaffes he would dismiss as “fake news” creations of the media.
He’s tried to do the same with his indictments, only to find out there’s nothing phony about bail restrictions.
They apply similarly to a real estate magnate, reality-television host and former president as they do to someone accused of drug trafficking, domestic assault or any other felony.
So he could only gripe about being unable to attend a seniors golf tournament held at one of his posh resorts in Scotland.
Trump ought to consider how little freedom he could have should he be found guilty of the Georgia charges next March, and the next famous photograph of him is from a prison cell. Another fundraising opportunity, perchance?
