It was a decision that everyone expected to come. But it still had all the drama of a made-for-television legal show: would the government seek the death penalty for Luigi Mangione, the man accused of murdering a top health insurance executive on a Manhattan street?

The answer came last week: yes.

Donald Trump’s attorney general, Pam Bondi, announced she was directing prosecutors to seek the death penalty in Mangione’s case. Calling the killing “a premeditated, cold-blooded assassination that shocked America”, Bondi said her decision was in keeping with “President Trump’s agenda to stop violent crime and Make America Safe Again”.

Mangione maintains his innocence in the shooting of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson. But in a country where loathing for the for-profit healthcare industry is widespread, Thompson’s murder and Mangione’s coming trial have taken on broader cultural significance far beyond any normal slaying. The death penalty decision deepens that even further.

Veteran defense attorneys told the Guardian that the death penalty decision also means it’s all the more important for Mangione’s legal team to present context as part of their legal strategy in his federal case; the defense might now even de-emphasize core questions of guilt or innocence and focus primarily on fighting the death penalty.

“There is a guilt phase and a penalty phase, and you have to be strategizing about both phases going into it,” said Eric Faddis, a trial attorney and founding partner of the Denver, Colorado, firm Varner Faddis. “The thing that really changes the game is the death penalty phase.”

For the first phase – in which jurors determine guilt or innocence – Mangione’s team will probably present defense strategies as they would at a normal trial. For the second phase, the defense will present mitigating factors – and argue against whatever “aggravating” circumstances prosecutors present, Faddis said.

“You try to put the case in perspective. Any death is a grievous loss, but some acts are more horrific and multiplicitous and impactful than others,” Faddis said. He pointed to mass shootings or serial killings, whereas Mangione is charged in the killing of one person. “Trying to have the jury maintain a sense of perspective would be important.”

Indeed, the last time Manhattan federal prosecutors sought the death penalty was with Sayfullo Saipov – an Islamist extremist who killed eight people in a truck attack. A jury could not unanimously decide on whether to impose death in the penalty phase of his mass murder trial, resulting in Saipov automatically being sentenced to life imprisonment without parole.

Mangione’s defense will probably point to the fact that he doesn’t have a criminal history, and appears to have lived a harmless and productive life until the shooting, “giving the jury a full picture of who this person is in this case, [which] would cause the jury to be disinclined to impose death”.

That might also play into the broader context of the trial. Thompson’s killing – despite him being a family man well regarded in his industry – sparked an outpouring of anger and hatred by many Americans at the health insurance industry, which is notoriously expensive and profits from rejecting claims for medical care. Mangione rapidly developed a small but enthusiastic fanbase that has protested in his favor.

Faddis said it wasn’t clear what “aggravating factors” were at play in federal prosecutors’ push for the death penalty, and felt only two seemed potentially applicable: that this act was “particularly heinous, cruel or depraved”, and that it required significant planning and premeditation.

Julie Rendelman, a longtime New York City defense attorney and former prosecutor, also pointed to the importance of mitigating factors.

“When you’re dealing with a homicide case as a defense attorney, one of the main issues in your defense is whether or not they have the right guy,” Rendelman said. But with a case such as Mangione’s, where alleged evidence of purported guilt appears abundant, “most would agree that this is not a ‘who done it’ case”.

Mangione’s defense could argue in the first trial phase that there was some sort of mental issue that affected his decision-making, mitigating his actions to some extent – or maybe even making them a lesser crime. This could prove far more effective than insisting he didn’t commit a crime from the get-go in arguing against the death penalty.

“In some of the trials that have happened with the death penalty, [there’s] a defense attorney that’s been spending the entire trial saying, ‘He didn’t do it, he didn’t do it, he didn’t do it,’ and then the jury finds him guilty,” Rendelman said. In the penalty phase, this same attorney “has to get in front of that scene jury and say, ‘OK, he did it, but let me give you mitigation.’”

“That’s incredibly much more difficult than a scenario where all along you’re saying, ‘He did it, but these are the mental health issues, or these are the mitigating factors that I want you to consider in navigating why he did it,’” she said.

Gregory Germain, a professor of law at Syracuse University’s College of Law, said the death penalty raises the stakes and adds “pressure” on Mangione to accept a life sentence if such a plea deal were offered.

German noted, however, that almost all the recent death penalty cases unfolded under Trump’s first term and surmised that his justice department would not agree to a deal for life imprisonment.

“He has political reasons, wanting to seem ‘tough on crime’ by supporting the death penalty,” Germain said.

Politics aside, prosecutors have a difficult road in convincing jurors to vote for the death penalty.

Even if jurors find Mangione guilty, they could feel sorry for him, or somehow see him as likable – and the defense has extensive leeway in presenting evidence about his character in the penalty phase. Jurors, especially in New York, might also just be against the death penalty.

“I think they would have a good chance of beating the death penalty in the penalty phase, while I think they have virtually no chance of getting a determination that he’s innocent,” Germain said.

As much as the Trump administration has used the death penalty to tout his tough-on-crime policies, it’s unlikely that Mangione’s case will say anything whatsoever about his success with law-and-order issues – whatever the outcome. If a jury makes the shocking decision to impose a death sentence, Mangione’s case would wind through appeals processes for years and years.

“Trump will be long out of office by the time Luigi Mangione would actually be facing execution,” Germain said.

Mangione’s team slammed the justice department’s move, saying the decision was “political and goes against the recommendation of the local federal prosecutors, the law and historical precedent”.

“Luigi is caught in a high-stakes game of tug-of-war between state and federal prosecutors, except the trophy is a young man’s life.”