CNN
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Former President Donald Trump’s next campaign rally will be his first since his conviction.
Just when that will be remains to be seen — one of countless unknowns heading into an unprecedented election made even more unusual by the events of the past week.
The 34-count guilty verdict handed down by a Manhattan jury on Thursday was the first criminal conviction of a former president and hit the American political landscape like a bombshell. The Trump campaign had been preparing for the verdict for a long time, preparing the candidate and his supporters for an adverse outcome by portraying the case as a political show. But now that the verdict has been delivered, uncertainty lurks behind every decision.
No one can say with confidence how voters will react to this historic moment or how they will weigh Trump’s conviction against other factors, such as their views of President Joe Biden or issues that affect their pocketbooks and personal health, such as inflation and abortion rights.
Even if the small minority of Americans who are still undecided ultimately aren’t swayed by the jury’s decision, it’s unclear whether they will be drawn to an angry candidate and a party clearly seeking revenge.
Trump’s instinct to attack when backed into a corner was on full display Friday, when he gave his first extended glimpse into how he plans to move forward after the verdict.
In a freewheeling, grievance-filled 33-minute speech at Trump Tower, the former president reeled off a standard string of speeches about border security and Biden’s governance of the country before blasting the individuals he saw as responsible for his legal crisis. Trump likened the judge overseeing the case, Juan Marchan, to “the devil” and called the prosecution’s central witness, his former lawyer Michael Cohen, a “scumbag.”
Trump continues to claim that Biden was behind the New York hush-money scandal, a claim he repeats frequently without evidence.
At the end of his remarks, the former president indicated he was ready to move on to the campaign trail after spending the past two months largely tied up in a Manhattan courtroom.
“November 5th is the most important day in the history of our nation,” Trump declared Friday, a day after saying the election would deliver a “real verdict.”
But it’s unclear when Trump plans to take this message to the streets: His schedule is conspicuously empty, with no upcoming public events announced — a schedule designed to accommodate jury deliberations that could have continued indefinitely.
Instead, Trump plans to spend the weekend at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, two sources familiar with his schedule told CNN. He begins a West Coast fundraising trip next weekend, with stops in California and Nevada.
The hush money lawsuit is also not over and will remain an issue through the election season. Trump and his lawyer, Todd Blanche, have indicated they intend to appeal, a process that could continue even after the campaign ends. The gag order that limits who Trump can talk about during the legal process also remains in effect.
Marchan set his sentencing date for July 11, four days before Republicans gather in Milwaukee to formally nominate Trump for their national convention. CNN reported Thursday that the former president’s legal team hasn’t decided whether to ask Marchan to postpone the sentencing date, which could make his sentence a focal point of messaging at the party’s convention.
Trump has been capitalizing on his legal troubles since a New York jury handed down the first of four indictments against the former president in March 2023. The indictment effectively encouraged Republican voters to support Trump’s third presidential bid and helped him win primary competition against other candidates who the party thought were ready to move on from the former president, including well-funded Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley.
In campaign speeches across the country over the past year, Trump has often fixated on his case, using it to rally his supporters and even win new ones. He has suggested that a mug shot of him at his arrest after he was charged with trying to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia would appeal to black voters. Over the weekend, Trump sought to connect with his libertarian supporters by mentioning the charges he faces.
“So if I wasn’t a libertarian before, I’m definitely a libertarian now,” he said.
But the campaign plans to continue to push its message about his conviction, and will do so with renewed vigor. The Trump campaign was quick to capitalize on Republican anger over Thursday’s verdict. A series of fundraising calls raised about $53 million in donations within 24 hours of the jury announcing the verdict, the campaign said.
Across Washington, Trump’s allies, some of whom are vying for the vice presidential nomination, responded Friday with increasingly vocal calls for retaliation on Trump’s behalf.
Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, has called on Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and Attorney General Matthew Colangelo to testify next week “regarding the unprecedented political prosecution of President Trump.” Several Republican senators, including vice presidential nominee Senator Marco Rubio of Florida and Senator J.D. Vance of Ohio, have signed a letter saying they will not work with the Biden administration on passing legislation, confirming judicial nominees, or increasing non-national security spending.
During a Friday appearance on Fox News, Judge Vance vowed to “fight back” with investigations into Democrats and their donors and with subpoenas for Judge Marchan and his daughter, who served as president of a campaign consulting firm that supports Democratic candidates and was a target of Trump’s attacks until Marchan included her in his gag order.
“We need to get to the truth and make sure that if wrongdoing is found, it is actually punished,” Vance said. “That’s the only language I think these people can understand.”
The Trump campaign has already made clear its intention to denounce Republicans it sees as not being loyal enough at this point.
After former Maryland governor and Republican Senate candidate Larry Hogan called on Americans to “respect the courts and the legal process,” Trump campaign manager Chris LaCivita responded on social media, “We just got off the campaign trail.”
LaCivita also criticized the College Republicans for posting on social media that “the outcome of this trial should be respected.”
“Opinions are like dicks,” LaCivita writes. “Everyone has one.”
CNN’s Kristen Holmes contributed to this report.
