His lawyers have claimed Trump would willingly surrender himself in the event of an indictment. His lawyers have claimed all kinds of things. The most interesting thing would be if Trump doesn't submit willingly and DeSantis finds himself on the hook to extradite Trump to New York. But yeah I think Trump just won the primary and lost the general. These charges are child's play compared to what he could/should be facing from Fanni Willis and Jack Smith. But it does help break the seal, so to speak, on indicting a former president. Still, he won't see the inside of a prison cell this side of the 2024 election no matter what happens from here.
Holy shit, this is almost as big as the indictment news! Meatball Ron has already come out and said that Florida will refuse to extradite, before even reading the text of the actual indictment: Part of me thinks that Ron is daring Trump to refuse to surrender, but Ron's opening himself up to serious charges if he follows through on this. We are careening towards constitutional crisis. :(
Naah. Fauvus refused to desegregate Alabama so Eisenhower called in the national guard. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Rock_Nine?wprov=sfti1 70% of Americans don't want to see Trump re-elected and 100% of Ron DeSantises don't want to appear impotent before the federal government.
MAGA isn't exactly known for adhering to legal precedent. Nor does DeSantis have to worry about public appearance in a nearly 100% insular media environment spearheaded by Fox, who is more or less desperate to de-throne Trump. In fact, Ron may have calculated that the imagery of federal intrusion (i.e. enforcement of the literal constitution) will help his campaign. This could get interesting.
Interesting? Yes. Constitutional crisis? No. It's like Disneyville or whatever - can DeSantis take it away from Disney? Absolutely. Can he do it without looking like a clown? Yes: to the fact-immune fascists for whom Trump is the god-emperor of Dune, this is exactly the kind of persecution they're looking for. Fortunately for the world, their number is dwindling... and this is the sort of thing that cuts their numbers. Trump is setting himself up as the guy whose principle claim to fame is an utter disregard for the rule of law, while DeSantis is setting himself up as the guy who wants minute control over every school board but doesn't think the federal government has the right to enforce arrest warrants. I think we can agree that they're courting corner-case appeal. And yes - I agree. For the people who are already true believers, none of that will matter. But there haven't been enough of them for three general elections in a row.
I doubt he would have said it if he didn't know 100% dead-to-rights that he wouldn't have to put his money where his mouth is. I think you also need to consider that fascists don't want your facts, they want that outrage and in-group unity injected directly into their veins. "I am with the mob" is exactly what you say when saying anything else will cause you blowback. So is "not my mob." It isn't about having a coherent policy, it's about weather-vaning.
He can’t out Trump Trump though, so I guess his play is to assume Trump is going to have to drop out of the election so some point and he’ll be the logical next choice? Otherwise he’ll have to murder the king at some point, and there’s no better time than now.