As America’s attention turns to November’s presidential election between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, the prosecutions of the former president have been all but forgotten. But Democrats hope that Harris’s previous role as a district attorney may help jog memories and persuade some crucial swing voters to ditch the felon for the prosecutor. Will it work? Or has the failed assassination attempt against Trump retroactively mythologized the sputtering prosecutions as Stations of the Cross on the way to his near-martyrdom?

The prosecutions have, so far, failed to hurt Trump’s re-election campaign. The prosecution for mishandling confidential documents, filed on June 8, 2023, by Special Counsel Jack Smith, got bogged down as the presiding judge, Aileen Cannon, held hearing after hearing on frequently frivolous motions, before finally dismissing the case on the grounds that Smith’s appointment was unconstitutional.

Similarly, the federal prosecution for election interference, also brought by Smith, has been thrown into disarray by the Supreme Court’s ruling that Trump enjoys immunity for some of the actions listed in the indictment. And the Georgia election-interference case sputtered to a halt when the court learned that the prosecutor, Fani Willis, had been involved in a romantic relationship with a subordinate. The case is now on hold as the Georgia Court of Appeals considers whether she should be removed.

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