I have heard judges can have a defendant serve their sentences concurrently. So if Trump did serve prison time for this it would probably only be four years for thirty-four concurrent sentences of business fraud. It's likely Trump will serve prison time for these convictions.

For Trump to appeal this he still needs grounds to appeal. He can't just say he doesn't like the jury's ruling. He needs to argue an actual case to the appeals court that the trial was unfair in some way. For example, that his right to a fair trial was violated because something the prosecution or judge did. I don't see any higher court siding with Trump that his right to a fair trial was violated. I could have missed it, but considering how much coverage the trial got, there didn't seem to be anything obviously wrong with the trial. I honestly doubt the judge would delay the start of Trump's hypothetical prison sentence for the appeals process for that same reason.

He can't claim presidential immunity for this, because it was something he did before becoming president and thus falsifying business records cannot fall under the scope of Official Acts. I think the Supreme Court wouldn't be interested in taking the case as there isn't going to be a constitutional question for them to rule on.

Even if Trump became president, he wouldn't be able pardon these convictions because they are from the state of New York. The president can only pardon federal offenses.

I don't see Trump getting out on parole. He's going to be posting the whole time about how he did nothing wrong.

The judge could choose to fine him instead of giving him prison time or put him under house arrest. Given Trump's conduct during the trial I don't see why the judge would feel the need to give him a more lenient sentence than a four year prison sentence in prison and a $170000 dollar fine.

With an internet connection he could serve his presidential term from a New York prison, pardon himself for federal offenses or simply direct the AG to stop the federal investigations, and have his cronies steal all the secrets he could want for him. He could sign legislation and executive orders while in prison as long as someone delivered the documents to him. The only reason to get out of this is that it might hurt his election chances. At this point the convictions probably only make the race closer. He could probably even do the debates remotely, but he could just as easily use the prison sentence as excuse to not show up.

I feel like people are trying to not get their hopes up. It's likely he will serve prison time for this. It just probably won't be the deciding factor in this election or inhibit his ability to hypothetically serve as president. edit: typo