Press conference

Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg officially indicted Donald Trump on April 4 on thirty-four counts of “falsifying business records in the first degree... with the intent to defraud and intent to commit another crime and aid and conceal the commission thereof.” This makes Trump the first president in US history to be indicted on a criminal charge. Not willing to let any opportunity — however ignominious — go to waste, Trump is already selling t-shirts on his website featuring a digitally-created mugshot with the words “Not Guilty” emblazoned below and the prisoner code "45-47" (get it?). The former president was not required to take an actual mugshot by Bragg's office.

What do you do when you are in an argument with an impossible child who sees you as the enemy? Do you shout at them until you sound as unreasonable? Do you keep going back to them to hash out the key points? No, you do not engage. You walk away and leave them to stew in their own rage. All parents know this. Donald Trump is often called childish; petulant; irascible — in his press conferences, he often is. His pride takes him over and he ends up ranting. He takes the bait and the media revels in it. But what the media can’t accept or understand is that, in the president vs media conference dynamic, it is the journalists who play the role of teenage brat. They goad Trump until he flips, then gloat about how mad he went.