George Conway on Trump: 'He is a narcissistic sociopath, he's not a normal, he's unwell'

Donald Trump has many, many, many things right, a disgraced, twice impeached, four times impeached former president who never knew a conspiracy theory he didn't love and who wants nothing more than to become a careful member of the cards from the Autocrats Club, but this week and for weeks to come he is just another of America's estimated 400,000 criminal defendants in the New York State people's trial of Donald J. Trump. The former president faces a dynamic in which he has virtually no control to which he is subject. courtroom rules and Judge Juan Mara's orders, as Politico says. Quote: Could you attend his son Baron's high school graduation on May 17?

I will put contact you. Maran said: Can you skip the trial on April 25 to attend the Supreme Court? Arguments over whether he is immune from special counsel Jack Smith's charges for attempting to subvert the 2020 election likely didn't say Maran can be exempt from any proceedings that arise on Wednesdays. Ran's courtroom is usually dark, so he can't campaign if the jury is in on the judge. He now, to make matters worse for Donald Trump, has to listen to jurors express their honest, unvarnished and unfiltered opinions about him, has to listen to memes of him mocking him. Politico reports that this quote Maran fired a man after Trump decoy Todd Blanch introduced a social network. post in which the jury wrote this quote, good news, Trump lost his court battle over his illegal travel ban along with the suggestion to cite locking him up in other cases, however, Michon refused to whitewash his efforts to expel certain potential jurors, including one whose husband shared a post suggesting that the comic book team The Avengers are uniting against Trump, about all she has done is earn the nickname the sleepy Dawn by seemingly nodding off, resting her eyes, napping, catching up on some z's, whatever you want to call it.

On the first day, we should not be surprised when the Washington Post reported that on Tuesday during the long day of questioning, Trump's mood seemed to go from disinterested to angry. His behavior earned him a slap on the wrist as reported by Judge M Times at the time. this way I quote when a potential juror was being interviewed about his old Facebook post Trump began mumbling and gesticulating attempting a reprimand from the judge Juan said quote I will not tolerate the judge saying by raising his voice once the potential juror had left the courtroom appointment I will not allow any juror to be intimidated in this courtroom now the jury could meet later this week opening arguments could begin as early as Monday, after which Trump will take a seat at the table of the defense as his former allies and AIDS expose a criminal plot to cover up a sex scandal in order to hide it from voters Politico writes this quote even though the accusations are widely known, some of the people most intimately involved in them They have never spoken about them publicly and the former president learned that life comes at you fast during his first criminal trial is where we begin today with some of our favorite reporters and friends here with me at the table MSNBC legal analyst Andrew Weissman also tells us accompanying Atlantic contributing conservative attorney George Conway is here NBC News correspondent Bon Hilard is with us at the table and Politico legal reporter Erica Orton is here George Vaugh and Erica have spent the last few days in and around the courthouse Andrew has been chained to the studio here with me, we start with you, the best. that's not true gimme tell me tell me tell me what you were telling me outside fair I mean tell me tell me what the pace of jury selection means in terms of when this trial will start for sure um so I think something that surprised people Okay, later having seen this, there's kind of a slow jury selection part and a fast part, so the slow part is the veneer, the first group shows up and there's a lot of questions and that's the part where everyone thinks, oh, this goes. take forever um and all these questions are asked to know if they are going to hit people because they can't be fair um so there are a lot of questions that people think it's very slow, but once you have all those questions, it's really quickly because it's okay for these people to go and then for the so-called peremptory challenges, where each side has up to 10 people, they can hit the judges, it tells you what your position is and that and that happens very quickly and now we.

We will be in the next part where the next group will enter, but we are already at 7 um. We need to get there by 18. I'm pretty sure, unless something unusual happens, that the judges are probably right that we could see opening arguments on Monday. and Trump is already complaining about what you just described. Anyone who watches Law & Order knows that each side can reach its number. He thought you could have as many as you want, yeah. So you know, listening to your opening. He was thinking. about when you're a defendant, you've lost control, you're subject to a judge, that criminal justice system is a particular problem for people who are used to being in control, obviously, if you used to be the president of the United States, that It's kind of Uber's position of being in control, but I've seen it when you've prosecuted, you know, heads of corporations, um, and that's part of the problem, but you have to learn to deal with it and you have to learn to trust. your advice um and again you're out of control it's someone else who has experience and the way you help yourself is by getting very good advice and trusting it, that's their problem um and you know we saw it in the egene case Carol um where you see, you know that in trial two, by all accounts, he says I can do this better than my lawyers.

We saw how it worked and that for me is going to be the Achilles heel here, which is if you want a lawyer who is just going to do your bidding and is not going to give you honest and direct advice and is not going to take control over how you run the case. case, he knows what he has prepared, he knows what is going to happen and I think all the signs are that this is Donald Trump's problem is that he believes he knows more and in this forum I don't think he knows it, he is also the boy who cried wolf right this was going to break America Lindsey Graham was on TV I think right after Alvin Bragg I accused this case a year ago saying there were riots in the street.

I mean, if any of you have walked around New York City today, I would say that most people you run into have no idea that Donald Trump is on trial. Yes, downtown was very quiet there. There really wasn't much going on except for the TVs and, you know, a few Jersey barriers here and there, it was all a perfectly

normal

day in lower Manhattan, um surprisingly, except you know we had to do it. go through two levels of security screening because because the Secret Service had an extra one, it forced them to do another one on the 15th floor, but other than that, it felt very

normal

, so you're in a unique position because you're a lifelong conservative.

You're still conservative, but you've been calling for accountability for wrongdoing more forcefully for longer. What is it like personally to see him at trial? At the same time, I fell asleep on myself a little bit on Monday morning because okay, you know, we're listening to this discussion about whether the Access Hollywood takeover is coming or not and there's no surprise about Access. The Hollywood tape and the arguments were, you know, I could present the arguments any way in my sleep and it put me to sleep at one point, it wasn't, you know, it was so normal and, um, and you've been, you know? are you a test or have you been a test sometimes it's really the battle is staying awake during a test and and and and this you know it wasn't like that, it really wasn't that interesting, which was the best thing about this because it showed that this could be normal, it's normal holding someone accountable, you have an interesting perspective on how thin Donald Trump is, your tweets drove him crazy, it's a little early in the broadcast to be swearing, but I don't know.

I don't know how to say it right, so on Twitter you got it out of his head. Yeah, what do you think it was like for him to hear that? I mean, his lawyers went and basically examined the potential jurors and it was like, oh no, no. this one and I'm sure he said why what he said let me see and it's, you know, a giant, unflattering photo of him in one of those tight white shirts on the, I mean, who knows what was on social media who got these He swears he can't help because he hates hate look at this chain, right?

Don't you know he might be watching right now? and and and he's probably throwing something at the television. Don't know. I mean, he can't, he can. He can't help it, but he reacts emotionally and that's him and he knows that one of the things is that he's a

narcissistic

sociopath

and that's what everyone has to get used to, that's why you can't normalize it, you can't treat it. like a normal human being because he is not well and that is why he cannot follow the instructions of his lawyers, that is why you know that he played into the hands of the plaintiff in the Egene Carol case that they are trying. to basically show that he's an idiot and what he does, he acts like an idiot right in front of the jury, he shows a lack of respect towards the jury and you know, I mean the fact of the matter is that he, you know, says Oh.

Did none of this happen? Well, where is your testimony? Where is your testimony? And that will be the interesting thing. He knows that they are going to tell him that it would be absolutely crazy for any lawyer to give him the advice that he testify on his behalf. defense, but then you know what's going to happen when someone like me comes on the show like that and says Donald Donald, you're scared, your lawyers make you look scared, you know, or guilty or guilty, right, and you know it, and it's going to start to get It's more interesting because there's something you know, assuming jury selection goes as fast as it starts to go, it speeds up, there's something called an arena hearing, um, on Friday, which is this a hearing that you have to do on NY. law that basically, where you basically go through the judge, rules on what things the defense defendant can be questioned about previous crimes, previous litigation, previous things, um, that goes to the credibility of the accused, he is not going to like it hear all that and what it is Hello everyone, MSNBC has a new and improved app.

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