Trump turns his trials into a soapbox. Does he know he's channeling Hitler?

When Adolf Hitler was convicted of treason on April 1, 1924, for leading an armed insurrection against Germany’s democratically elected government, he discovered something remarkable: Courtrooms can make excellent soapboxes for political grandstanding. In real time, 100 years later, we’ve been watching another political leader, former president and current Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, do the same. The echoes are uncanny and disturbing.

During his monthlong trial in March 1924, followed by his conviction, Hitler railed against Germany’s democratic leaders and constitutionally anchored legal system. He chastened his judges. He threatened his prosecutors. He insisted that it was not he who had committed treason against the state but the Weimar Republic’s political establishment who had betrayed the German people.

“You can declare us guilty a thousand times,” Hitler defiantly told the judge after receiving his conviction and a five-year prison sentence, “but the … eternal court of history will tear up the indictment and conviction with a smile and will acquit us.” The trial and conviction proved to be a political boon for Hitler, catapulting him and the National Socialist German Workers Party from the fanatic fringe to the national stage. Hitler emerged as leader and spokesman for aggrieved, right-wing nationalists across the country.

In the decade that followed, Hitler was “dragged into courtrooms” (he told his followers at a rally) more times than he could remember. He invariably emerged politically stronger thanks to the toxic alchemy of his courtroom antics and constitutionally guaranteed freedoms of expression. When Hitler lost the 1932 presidential election by more than 6 million votes, he went to court to have the results annulled amid claims of voter fraud and irregularities by state officials. The presiding judge dismissed the case out of hand, observing that the 6-million-vote margin precluded any possibility that irregularities could have changed the outcome.

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2024-04-08/donald-trump-legal-battles-indictments-adolf-hitler