MORE FROM JACK GOLDSMITH: More on How to Think About the Costs of the Trump Election Fraud Prosecution. “Jonathan Chait closes his critical response to my piece with a smidgen of agreement and two questions: ‘[Goldsmith] is right that the outcome from Smith’s prosecution will be terrible. But worse than the alternative? How could it be worse?’ My worry, though not my hope, is that we are going to learn the answer to this last question.”

If there’s any lesson from the past couple of decades, it’s that “how can it be worse?” pretty much always gets answered.