He’s benefited from an impulse to normalise him. American society treats the office of President with great respect and deference, and extends that deference to the person who holds the office.
As a result of that culture of deference, the media treated Trump as a serious candidate, so he became a serious candidate. He became President and demolished every norm of acceptable Presidential conduct, and his norm-breaking was normalised. The judicial system treated him leniently because he was President or running for President and any attempt to bring him to justice was held to be interfering with the election and politicising justice.
