After Donald Trump’s New York civil fraud trial ended with a whopping fine on Friday, Fox News’ “hard news” anchors immediately complained that the former president was being treated worse than an accused wife murderer.
In his ruling on Friday, New York Supreme Court Justice Arthur F. Engoron ordered Trump and his corporate entities to pay at least $355 million for engaging in bank fraud by overstating the value of his properties to get better loans. Besides ripping away the family’s control from the Trump Organization, Engoron also blocked the ex-president from borrowing money in the state of New York for three years.
Reacting to the eye-popping judgment, Fox News anchor Martha MacCallum was beside herself over the punishment that the current GOP presidential frontrunner received. Speaking to Fox News Sunday anchor Shannon Bream and conservative pundit Ari Fleischer, MacCallum brought up Trump’s other criminal charges to suggest he has been unfairly maligned.
“When you think about 91 indictments against this individual,” she said. “Shannon, just looking at other civil cases which have a monetary price tag on them. As I said, this is not a criminal case here.”
MacCallum continued: “I looked back. O.J. Simpson was found civilly liable in the deaths of two people, his wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend, who was at the property at the time. $33 million. In the deaths of two human beings in one of the most high-profile cases in American history. What do you think about that?”
Bream agreed, saying there were “clearly victims in that case” before asserting that “nobody complained” over the Trump fraud allegations. “Everyone got paid back,” she added. “So regardless of how you feel about the outcome, when the former president and his supporters have this argument that it’s political, it looks that way.”
They would also argue that this massive judgment against Trump, along with the other criminal indictments he’s currently facing, will only help his political fortunes moving forward. Fleischer, after calling New York a “legal banana republic,” also suggested that conservatives could make all the federal cases go away by merely electing Trump.
“If Donald Trump wins re-election, he will be able to tell his attorney general to drop all of those federal charges,” he said. “How will that decision get made? If the American people elect Donald Trump, that’s what will happen. If they elect Biden, those will continue.”