Opinions can differ as to whether this was a coup attempt, any more than Stacy Abrams’ continued claims to be the duly elected governor of Georgia or Hillary Clinton’s now debunked (but still repeated) theory that the Russians elected Donald Trump. I think voters are beginning to see that this is about more than one orange-haired blowhard politician who drives a lot of people crazy. Indeed, the shutting down of a politician on Facebook or Twitter may be just fine for many as long as it’s the Donald, but the law teaches us that what goes around comes around. Imagine if this technology existed in the 1960s and suddenly MLK and Robert Kennedy were banned, and pro-civil rights posts were either shadow-banned or imprinted with a warning? This four-year interregnum between Trump and the next Republican President (it’s hard to see a Democrat winning in the wake of the last nine months) will, if nothing else, allow this realization to sink in and then turn up in voting behavior in 2022 and 2024. We live in interesting times.

IMO the systemic efforts by the Republican party to normalize Trump’s failed coup attempt will have far stronger consequences on Trump’s efforts to “return to power” than anything that happens in this lawsuit.