Former President Donald Trump and his supporters are claiming his hush money trial was "rigged" in part due to a biased jury—but a graph showing where each juror said they get their news from tells a different story.
These claims have garnered further attention after Trump became the first former president to be convicted of felony crimes. The jury found him guilty on all 34 counts of falsifying business records to conceal hush money payments to porn star Stormy Daniels to illegally influence the 2016 election.
But they don't hold up under scrutiny as shown by a graph showing where jurors get their news.
Jury questionnaires revealed that while the majority of jurors, including alternates, read The New York Times, only one watches MSNBC. Another juror gathers news from a variety of sources from both sides of the aisle, including Fox News, MSNBC, the Daily Mail, and the Times.
Perhaps most interestingly, one juror indicated that they get news from Trump’s Truth Social platform, which had earlier raised concerns that this juror could be a staunch Trump supporter, potentially reluctant to vote for conviction. In fact, Bernarda Villalona, a former New York prosecutor and ABC political commentator, questioned why prosecution didn’t use a peremptory challenge to dismiss that juror.
One X user focused on this juror in particular, noting that they "answered that Trump’s Truth Social was their only source of news and not even THAT person voted Not Guilty on even ONE charge."
You can see the post and the graph below.
@RyanSilvey/X
Critics quickly seized on this info and stressed that the jury was not at all biased despite Trump's bogus claims.
The 34 felony guilty verdicts against Trump sparked a wave of violent rhetoric targeting the prosecutors, judge, and jurors involved in the case.
Advance Democracy, a nonprofit organization that conducts public interest research, reported a high volume of social media posts containing violent rhetoric aimed at Judge Juan Merchan and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, including one post revealing Bragg’s purported home address.
The group also discovered posts on a fringe internet message board, known for pro-Trump content and violent posts, sharing the purported addresses of jurors. However, it remains unclear if any actual jurors were correctly identified.
Trump has continued to lash out even after sitting in silence while the verdict was read. Outside the courtroom, he addressed reporters, labeling the trial as a "rigged, disgraceful trial" and asserting that the "real verdict" will come on Election Day this November.
@jessicachastain/Instagram
