It will be the first time a previous inhabitant of the White House has faced criminal charges when former U.S. President Donald Trump is formally arrested and charged on Tuesday.
A grand jury in New York decided to indict Trump on charges linked to paying off a porn star during his 2016 presidential campaign, in a step that has never before occurred in American history.
Trump is the first president, present or past, as well as the only presidential candidate, to be indicted; the widely expected allegations come as Trump pursues a return to the White House following his defeat in the 2020 reelection campaign.
Trump has not yet been charged with any crimes, and the indictment’s contents are unknown because to its ongoing secrecy. More than 30 counts have been brought against the former president, according to CNN. The report was not verified by VOA.
To organise Trump’s surrender to the Manhattan D.A.’s Office for arraignment on a Supreme Court indictment,” the office of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg stated in a statement that it had contacted Trump’s lawyers.
Trump would need to fly to New York with his Secret Service escort in order to surrender himself in. Trump resides in Florida.
He would undergo fingerprinting and a picture shoot once in detention before being brought before a court for an arraignment and being freed on his own recognisance.
Trump is to go to New York on Monday and stay the night at Trump Tower before making his court appearance on Tuesday, according to several news sites citing anonymous sources.
A tour of the courthouse where Trump will be arraigned and a security planning meeting were conducted on Friday by representatives of the Secret Service and the New York Police Department.
Former president will enter a not guilty plea, according to Susan Necheles, one of Trump’s lawyers, who spoke to Reuters.
In a Friday fundraising email, Trump declared, “I am not fearful of what’s to come.
Trump’s campaign reportedly generated more than $4 million on the first day after the indictment was released by using the indictment as leverage in its fundraising efforts.
In the U.S. Department of Justice’s main office in Washington, on August 29, 2020, signage is visible.
Trump denounced Judge Juan Merchan on the social media site Truth Social, which is where Merchan’s case is supposed to be heard. The Trump Organization was found guilty of tax fraud in a trial last year, and the court “HATES ME,” the businessman said in a letter on Friday.
Trump, who has previously denied any involvement in the case, said in a statement released on Thursday that the charge is a result of a protracted investigation launched by Democrats to discredit his “Make America Great Again” programme.
The former president remarked that “this is political persecution and election interference at the greatest level in history.” “The Democrats have lied, cheated, and stolen in their fixation with attempting to ‘Get Trump,’ but now they’ve done the unimaginable – indicting a perfectly innocent individual in an act of obvious election tampering.”
The indictment “will backfire dramatically on [President] Joe Biden,” according to Trump, rather than harming his campaign.
Trump warned of “possible murder and devastation” if he were to face charges in a post on his social media platform last week, which some detractors saw as a call to violence.
The indictment sparked a commotion in Washington despite being largely anticipated.
Republican congressman and fervent Trump supporter Jim Jordan tweeted, “Outrageous.”
In accusing Bragg of using the legal system as a weapon against Trump, Republican House Leader Kevin McCarthy warned that the prosecutor will be held accountable for “his extraordinary misuse of authority.”
A similar political motivation was shown in the prosecution by other Republicans who are not particularly sympathetic to Trump.
Democrats, however, responded in a way that was to be expected: positively.
Nancy Pelosi, a former House Democratic leader, said in a statement that the grand jury “has proceeded upon the facts and the law.”
Everyone has the right to a trial to establish their innocence, she said. “No one is above the law.” The former President has a right to do that, therefore perhaps he will exercise it peacefully.
On Friday, President Biden told reporters that he would not be commenting on the topic because Trump had been charged.
The indictment resulted from a federal investigation into hush payments made to porn star Stormy Daniels by Trump’s then-attorney Michael Cohen in the final weeks of the 2016 election.
Early in 2018, information about the covert payment surfaced. Turning the tables on his former employer, Cohen said in August 2018 that, at Trump’s request, he had paid Daniels $130,000 to stay quiet about an alleged sexual encounter with the real estate magnate-turned Republican candidate. Afterwards, Cohen was paid back for his “legal” services by the Trump Organization.
Although while paying hush money is not against the law, federal prosecutors said that doing so in violation of federal campaign financing rules.
Among other federal criminal counts, Cohen pled guilty to some of them in 2018 and was sentenced to more than a year in jail.
Although though Trump was not charged at the time by federal prosecutors, the issue was later taken up by the Manhattan district attorney’s office, and grand jury testimony started to be heard in January.
The prosecution’s key witness, Cohen, appeared in front of the panel several times to provide testimony.
Cohen delivered a statement on Thursday in which he stated he stood by his testimony and the proof he had given the authorities.
Legal experts think the accusations against Trump are most likely based on New York’s false business records law, despite the fact that the indictment is still under seal.
Normally considered a misdemeanour by the law, misrepresenting business documents. When done with the intention of committing or concealing a second offence, it becomes a felony punishable by up to four years in jail.
We don’t yet know if Trump has been charged with any further crimes.
Legal experts feel that there is little chance that Trump will be convicted, even though prosecutors seldom charge a suspect unless they think they can get a conviction.
Although acknowledging that he paid Cohen back for the hush money, Trump has insisted that it had “nothing to do with the campaign.”
Cohen is accountable, according to Cohen’s legal team.
According to one of Trump’s attorneys, Joseph Tacopina, on MSNBC yesterday, “the payments were paid to a lawyer, not to Stormy Daniels.” He claimed, “The payments were sent to Donald Trump’s lawyer, which would be considered legal expenses.
Tacopina recalled that Cohen, who was his lawyer at the time, “informed him that this was the correct way to do this, to shield himself and his family from disgrace. It’s as simple as that.”
Nonetheless, other legal professionals contend that prosecutors ought to follow a well-established rule: treating similar cases similarly.
A recent article on the website Just Security by co-editor-in-chief and law professor at New York University Ryan Goodman highlighted cases that, in his words, demonstrate how New York prosecutors “have thrown the book at individuals for falsifying business records — some cases involving actions far less egregious than Trump’s alleged conduct.”
For stealing more than $35,000 in workers’ compensation benefits, a mental health treatment assistant was charged in 2021 under the law.
A broker of insurance was charged with fraud last year after it was claimed that he had filed false certificates of liability insurance as part of a larger fraud operation.
The former president is accused of other crimes in addition to the hush money charge.
In Georgia, prosecutors are considering filing criminal charges in connection with Trump’s attempt to have the state’s 2020 presidential election results overturned. Joseph Biden, a Democrat, nearly defeated Trump in Georgia.
As this is going on, special counsel Jack Smith, who was appointed by the US Justice Department, is looking into Trump’s involvement in the attempt to overturn Biden’s victory and his handling of sensitive materials after leaving office.
While in office, Trump was twice impeached, but he was never found guilty.
Reuters and The Associated Press contributed some information to this article.
