The Patriot Post® · A Rorschach Mug Shot

After all these years, the Ahabian Democrats got their white whale.

Or did they?

Yes, President Donald Trump turned himself in to authorities last night at the Fulton County Jail for booking in the criminal case coordinated by brought by Special Counsel Jack Smith District Attorney Fani Willis, thus becoming the first American president ever to submit to a mug shot. And, yes, he thereby gave the Trump-haters what they’ve been drooling for ever since he whipped them in 2016.

“They insisted on a mug shot, and I agreed to do that,” said Trump. “It is not a comfortable feeling — especially when you’ve done nothing wrong.”

The Trump-haters no doubt loved it, but they might want to be careful what they’ve clamored for. Because Donald Trump’s mug shot is the scowl that launched a million shirts.

A quick trip to the MAGA store confirms just this. Team Trump has already seized the marketing moment and turned this ostensible setback into a fundraising bonanza. Brand new “NEVER SURRENDER” T-shirts, coffee mugs, beverage coolers, and car stickers are all available for purchase. And can baby onesies and cornhole boards be far behind?

As an indication of just how petty the Trump-deranged Democrats (but we repeat ourselves) are, they’re now incensed about some of Trump’s booking statistics. He’s not 6'3", and he’s definitely not 215 pounds! they shrieked.

As it turns out, Team Svelte Trump submitted these stats in advance of his booking in order to speed up the process. And it worked: Trump was in and out of jail last night in around 15 minutes. Here again, Trump is teeing up the football. And here again, the Democrats are Charlie Brown.

Yes, Democrats, be careful what you wished for. Because if any mug shot could ever cut both ways, it’d be this one. What Democrats see as the bagging of Le Bête Orange, Trump’s legions see as the ultimate rallying cry and the symbol of the endless persecution of the nation’s 45th president.

And perhaps, somewhere in the middle, folks who don’t tend to fixate on politics might see this as the straw that broke their centrist backs. Oh, sure, as American Majority founder Ned Ryun told Sean Hannity last night, “The low-information chardonnay sippers in the suburbs next fall are going to think, ‘Well, he must’ve been guilty of something.’” But perhaps even more of them will look at the oddity of four indictments conveniently coming down the pike in rapid-fire succession a full 30 months after Trump left office and just in time for the 2024 presidential campaign. And perhaps they’ll see the 91 felony counts against a former president and the potential punishment of 700 years in prison as, oh, a bit excessive.

Perhaps.

Just like a Rorschach test, Americans are increasingly viewing their politics in black and white. Donald Trump’s mug shot is no exception.

As for the architect of that mug shot, Fulton County DA Fani Willis might soon have some ‘splaining to do regarding her indictment of Trump for the non-crime of objecting to a presidential election. She’s deeply political and demonstrably hard-left, and she’s refusing to answer whether she’s been coordinating with Special Counsel Jack Smith, the federal prosecutor overseeing the probes into Trump’s actions around the events of January 6 and his alleged mishandling of government records at his Mar-a-Lago estate. We mention all this because such coordination would be a serious no-no. As the Washington Examiner reports:

The House Judiciary Committee is launching an investigation into Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, demanding the prosecutor turn over key information detailing the criminal indictment of former President Donald Trump over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

In a letter sent by Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) on Thursday, the committee leader accused Willis of using the 41-count indictment to interfere with the presidential election, of which Trump is the current GOP front-runner. The request for information comes just hours before Trump is expected to surrender himself to Fulton County officials for his arraignment in the case.

As Jordan’s letter notes: “News outlets have reported that your office and Mr. Smith 'interviewed many of the same witnesses and reviewed much of the same evidence’ in reaching your decision to indict President Trump. The House Committee on the Judiciary … thus may investigate whether federal law enforcement agencies or officials were involved in your investigation or indictment.”

Additionally, Jordan cites Willis’s purported launch of a new campaign fundraising site “that highlighted [her] investigation into President Trump” several days before her office indicted him. How’s that for blind justice?

“We cannot,” said Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, “turn into a banana republic, where the party in power uses police force to indict and arrest its political opponents in the middle of an election. That is not how we do it in the United States of America.”

Sadly, in Joe Biden’s America, it is how we do things — and fair-minded Americans of every political stripe should resoundingly reject this leftist lawfare come next November.