Some "anti-Trump" voters say they will vote for the former president to "save democracy" after the guilty verdict in Manhattan

The controversial guilty verdict of former President Donald Trump in Manhattan, New York, has been the line marked by many “anti-Trump” American voters who have now decided to support the Republican leader in the upcoming November elections.

In a report published in The Free Press, a group of seven people who never voted for Trump explained their reasons for now joining the former president's cause.

Most explained that, although they do not like Trump, they believe that President Joe Biden and the Democrats now represent a greater danger to the United States and its institutions.

One of them is Shaun Maguire, a well-known partner at the venture capital firm Sequoia, who publicly announced that he donated $300,000 to the Trump campaign after the verdict in Manhattan.

After publishing an extensive essay of more than 3,000 words explaining his decision to support Trump, Maguire told The Free Press that the former president's condemnation simply caused him to support him even more. But what really bothered him was the blatant accusation, in his opinion, of the Prosecutor's Office.

“It wasn't the conviction as much as it was the charges being brought in the first place. These are not democratic tactics being used,” said Maguire, who later detailed that in 2016 he disagreed so much with Trump that he decided to support Democrat Hillary Clinton.

In fact, Maguire said that the 2016 “version” of him “would have hated this version of myself.”

“In 2016, I thought it was likely that Trump was both owned by Russia and that he would be highly corrupt and undemocratic. That made me deathly afraid. But after seeing his actions as president, that foreign influence never seemed to have materialized. I think he was one of the strongest foreign policy presidents we’ve ever had,” acknowledged Maguire, who also said that some of his colleagues in Silicon Valley are also changing their perception of Trump.

Lifelong Democrats and Libertarians will support Trump

Maguire is not the only “anti-Trump” who has changed his perception of the former president in recent years.

Kate Nitti, a marketing consultant with two children who now resides in New Jersey, said she was a Democratic voter her entire life until 2021, when she first voted for a Republican candidate while still residing in New York City.

At the time, Nitti voted for Curtis Sliwa, the Republican Party candidate for Mayor of New York. She said it was a punitive vote against Democrats to demonstrate her discontent against the abuse of power committed by authorities during COVID-19, especially draconian health measures such as school closures or vaccine and mask mandates.

Nitti's political position adapted and moved toward the center, even changing her registration from Democrat to Republican in hopes of finding a “centrist” candidate. In fact, this year, everything indicated that Nitti would vote for the independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., but after the verdict in Manhattan, the decision is no longer so clear to her.

The marketing consultant told The Free Press that she is open to voting for Trump because she feels “the need to send a message to the Democrats that their dirty politics will not be rewarded.”

According to Nitti, who defined herself as “liberal,” her vote will largely depend on the punishment Trump faces in the sentencing scheduled for July 11.

“I’m no fan of Trump. That said, I have a huge problem with contorting the law or using prosecutorial authority in the name of ‘saving democracy,’ which has been the Democrats’ message for the past four years," Nitti said.

Another citizen who has toyed with voting for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was Eric Brakey, a Maine state senator who considers himself a Ron Paul Republican and has voted for the Libertarian Party candidate in the last two elections.

Brakey, who had not yet defined his vote for November, has now made his decision: Donald J. Trump.

The state senator said that his decision is simple: He wants to preserve a simple and inviolable principle: “The principle is that the people get to choose our president.”

Jack MacGuire, a travel consultant in Houston, Texas, perhaps had the opposite path as Kate Nitti.

MacGuire in 2016, angry that the Republican Party had veered toward Trumpism, registered as an independent.

In fact, he said he “couldn't stand Trump” and voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016. In 2020, disappointed with the two candidates, he confessed that he did not vote. Now, after the verdict in Manhattan, he says he is with MAGA voters.

“What happened has every level of corruption and deceit and a willingness to use whatever means necessary to stay in power. It just absolutely galvanized me to say enough is enough. I’m all in with the MAGA people because this has to end,” he said.

Neither MacGuire nor Nitti are alone on the list.

Emery Barter, a guitar instructor and recording engineer in Oakland, California, called himself a “lifelong Democrat” and is now ready to vote for Trump, too.

Barter confessed that he voted and campaigned for Clinton in 2016 and voted for Biden in 2020, but became disenchanted with the Democratic Party due to the radical progressive policies pushed by leftist district attorney Pamela Price.

According to Barter, progressive prosecutors in California have generated a tremendous increase in insecurity through their lax anti-crime policies.

Regarding Trump, Barter was clear: he is no longer afraid of him.

The instructor said that many Americans suffer from “Trump Derangement Syndrome” and that it prevents them from seeing the real problems facing the country, such as judicial harassment against political dissent. He also fiercely questioned the press.

“I used to trust the media, but now I feel the media has drifted away from reporting the truth. I just feel everything is completely made up," said Barter, another former Democrat who will vote for former President Trump because he believes that a small group of twelve jurors cannot decide the electoral destiny of the country.

“It is a danger to democracy that Biden triumphs”

In Nashville, Tennessee, some voters are not only already considering voting for Trump but are also donating money to his campaign.

Adam Mortara, a professor at the University of Chicago Law School, said he didn't vote in 2020 because his vote wasn't going to make a difference. Now, after the jury's decision in New York, he donated $3,300 to Trump's campaign.

Mortara is part of that large group of new and small donors who led former President Trump to raise more than $200 million in three days after the disputed guilty verdict.

“What’s gotten me off the sidelines is that if he does not win, and by a rather sizable margin, that will validate this type of weaponization of the judicial system in the future,” Mortara told The Free Press, arguing that he hopes Trump's victory will serve as a retaining wall against the “politically motivated and targeted and retributive prosecutions of high-ranking political officials.”

Mortara ended his participation in the report by explaining that, before the guilty verdict, he thought that a victory for Joe Biden did not mean a danger to democracy, “Now, I kind of think it is.”

From voting for Obama to Trump

Daniel Kotzin revealed to The Free Press that he not only voted for Obama twice, but also campaigned for him.

In 2016, he voted for Clinton and, finally, in 2020 he decided not to support a Democrat, but rather the Libertarian Party candidate after being enraged by the government's excesses during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Kotzin now says it was enough for him and he will vote for Donald Trump for the first time, even though he doesn't like him as a politician and would prefer another option on the ballot.

“The persecution of Trump is what decided for me because it made me think that perhaps he is different. He is going to put some dirt in the gears. They hate him too much. It really literally is because they’re pursuing him so aggressively and relentlessly that I want to support him. And I can’t be the only one. It’s too much," said Kotzin, who expressed serious concerns about the persecution of Trump, stating that it could happen to any American citizen.

“It’s frightening because he’s obviously a very powerful and well-connected person. If they’re able to go after him, any time any of us could have the rug pulled out from under us and have our lives taken away. I don’t want to live in a world like that," he said.