Darren Van Dreel, a 58-year-old electrician from Oshkosh, Wis., has followed the twists and turns of the investigations into former President Donald Trump over the years: the Mueller report, two impeachments and a flurry of criminal cases, most of which have been mired in delays.
So on Thursday evening, while he and his wife, Misty McPhee, were on a long drive from Wisconsin to the Washington, D.C., area, there was only one thing to do when the verdict came in.
“I high-fived my wife,” said a grinning Van Dreel, as he waited for a sandwich on Friday morning in the liberal Del Ray neighborhood of Alexandria, Va. “I was just so pleasantly surprised that finally somebody’s holding him accountable.”
When a Manhattan jury found Trump guilty of 34 counts of falsifying business records on Thursday, Trump’s campaign declared that the country had “fallen,” and his allies painted a picture of a nation consumed by rage. His supporters flooded corners of the internet with angry imagery (more on that below), and echoed his claims that the verdict was illegitimate.
Tell that to voters like Van Dreel, a liberal-leaning independent who deeply opposes Trump, and for whom the criminal conviction felt like Christmas in May. After years of watching the investigations into Trump come to nothing in the way of legal consequences, of being maddened by his ability to evade punishment, the guilty verdict made for a rare moment of Trump-related joy, mixed with a sprinkling of “I told you so.”
“I texted my nephew — I’m not a big drinker — and said, ‘I’m having a cocktail tonight,’” said Meg Ryan, 68, a mixed-media artist and a Democrat, as she enjoyed a breakfast of petit pain aux raisins in Del Ray. When she heard the verdict, she did a happy dance around the kitchen, she said, and poured herself a nice big gin and tonic.