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Notes -
Trump spent large parts of his career running his business in a way which intentionally invited litigation (of both good faith and bad faith varieties). You can't stay out of court entirely as a real-estate developer, but Trump's "so sue me" attitude to contractors expecting to be paid is an indication that he is more comfortable in the courtroom than the average guy who isn't a lawyer or a career criminal, as does the aggressive tax avoidance.
He is also notoriously sue-happy as a plaintiff - to the point where the ABA tried to spike an article about his litigation history because of the fear that he would sue the ABA for saying how sue-happy he was! And of course he didn't have a problem instructing people to file numerous frivolous lawsuits based on patently false claims of election fraud. (Even if you think the jury is still out on whether there was fraud somewhere in the 2020 election, the specific fraud alleged in the key post-election lawsuits didn't happen, and he probably knew this).
Trump's behaviour is entirely consistent with someone who sees the litigation against him as kayfabe, and is entirely comfortable responding without breaking kayfabe. This is easier for him than it would be for you or me because it was already clear by January that even if he was convicted he could gum things up for long enough that he wouldn't be reporting to jail this side of the election.
Indeed, it is entirely plausible that the whole Trump persecution complex is kayfabe - Trump knows what storylines play well with his MAGA fanbase, and "They're coming after me because I'm fighting for you" with himself as face and Uncle Sam as heel is one of the best. My out-of-posterior probability that when he is around family and personal friends Trump is enjoying himself like you would expect of a rich powerful old man who can buy anything and anyone and expects to be protected from the consequences of his behaviour by his popularity is about 25%. This would explain his apparently counterproductive litigation strategy - provoking judges to slap him around a bit makes the shoot more impressive, and he assumes that any verdict against him is reversible (if necessary after he wins the election, where given what we know about him he will be even more confident of victory than the bookies).
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