Lara Trump's Attempt To Gain Sympathy For Donald After Guilty Verdict Totally Backfires

Predictably, Donald Trump is employing every possible strategy to gain support following the historic results of his criminal fraud trial. When he's not lashing out against the judge and prosecutors, Trump is calling the verdict "rigged," "disgraceful," and otherwise totally unfair. His other ploy is a plea for pity due to his age or the fact he's "a political prisoner" brought down by a crooked system. The only way to right the wrong done to this persecuted innocent man, Trump says, is to send money to his campaign and vote for him in November. (His team claims his fundraising website crashed within hours of the verdict because of the flood of traffic.) Many members of Trump's family are also asking for support, but in one case, the efforts aren't going quite as planned.

Lara Trump, married to Donald's second son Eric Trump, posted a short video to her social media the day after the verdict. It appears to have been shot in Trump's opulent living room in Trump Tower shortly after he made a speech outside the building. Eric and Lara's children, 6-year-old Luke and 4-year-old Carolina, enter the room and approach their seated grandfather. Luke accepts a hug from the former president, and Carolina hands him a heart-filled drawing before coming in for a side squeeze. "This is why he does it," Lara captioned the clip, adding two hearts for emphasis.

The moment was meant to be heartwarming, but online critics weren't convinced by Trump's display.

Lara Trump's video of her children greeting grandfather Donald Trump drew "awws" from most of her Instagram followers, including Kimberly Guilfoyle, fiancée of oldest Trump son Donald Jr. "So sweet the best!" Guilfoyle wrote. Many users on the X platform, however, saw it as just another shameless sales plug similar to Lara's promotion of a collectible metal "Trump Black Card." They accused the former commander-in-chief of being just as uninvolved a grandfather as he was a father. Influencer JoJo From Jerz eye-rolled, "If you offered him a reversal on his convictions if he could tell you their middle names or birthdays without cheating, he couldn't do it. And you damn well know it." Seconded a user, "So lame using innocent children for pity points smh."

Composer/singer Mike Batt accused Lara of setting up the whole scenario. "Staged," he wrote. "The boy walks to him as if he's just been cued, and doesn't look as if he gets hugged often. The girl hands Trump the picture immediately, as if told to, (but Trump doesn't even look at it), and Trump smiles into the camera. It's fake-family lovey-dovey acting." Another critic agreed Trump seemed to dismiss Carolina's artwork: "Notice the little things. It's all about the little things." A sharp-eyed writer noticed Carolina wrote "Donald Trump" on the picture instead of "Grampa" or "Pop" — not something you'd expect from a preschooler.

Is the hush money trial about to be outdone by GrandpaGate?