Judging by the swiftness of the verdict, the judge needn’t have worried about rigging the instructions. This jury was never going to let their friends and family down or risk being shunned by them. If Merchant was smart he would have played it down the middle and let the jurors do his dirty work for him.
That’s what I’ve been thinking all along. What liberal, Trump-hating New Yorker wants to go home to his/her friends and say, “We could have found Trump guilty but didn’t”? I’m sure now, the jurors will all be treated as conquering heroes by their friends. I hope it’s worth it to them.