Donald J. Trump, the first US president to be impeached, is expected to arrive in Manhattan on Monday night as he prepares to turn himself in to the authorities on Tuesday.
Even before Mr. Trump was indicted last week, law enforcement officials from several agencies were preparing for the possibility of protests or riots. On his website Truth Social, Mr Trump himself called on his supporters to protest and warned of “death and destruction”.
The Manhattan District Attorney’s office, which brought the charges, focuses on the former president’s involvement in gagging payments to a porn star, Stormy Daniels, who said she had an affair with him. ta. Michael D. Cohen, Mr. Trump’s fixer at the time, made the payment in the final days of the 2016 presidential campaign. The district attorney, Alvin L. Bragg, began looking into it. thorough gag payments last summer and in January, forced a grand jury. The jurors voted to indict Mr Trump last week.
While the events are dramatic and the indictment explodes, the case against Mr. Trump may revolve around an untested legal theory. A belief is far from guaranteed.
Here’s what we know and don’t know about the criminal case against Mr. Trump:
Why is Donald Trump indicted?
The charges against Mr. Trump are still unknown, although two people with knowledge of the matter say there are more than two dozen charges in the indictment.
The charges allegedly stem from a payment made to Ms Daniels, who in October 2016, during the final weeks of her presidential campaign, tried to sell her affair story. with Mr. Trump.
Daniels’ agent initially contacted The National Enquirer to provide the exclusive rights to her story. David Pecker, the tabloid publisher and a longtime Trump ally, agreed to search for potentially damaging stories about him during the 2016 campaign, and even had agreed to buy another woman’s affair with Mr. Trump and never publish it, a practice known as “catch and kill”.
But Mr. Pecker did not buy Ms. Daniels’ story. Instead, he and the tabloid’s top editor, Dylan Howard, helped broker a separate deal between Mr. Cohen and Ms. Daniels’ attorney.
Mr. Cohen paid $130,000 and Mr. Trump later reimbursed him from the White House.
In 2018, Mr. Cohen pleaded guilty to a number of charges, including federal campaign financing related to hush money. Federal prosecutors concluded the payment was an inappropriate donation to the Trump campaign.
In the days after Mr. Cohen pleaded guilty, the district attorney’s office opened its own criminal investigation into the matter. While federal prosecutors focus on Mr. Cohen, the district attorney’s investigation will focus on Mr. Trump.
What happens next?
Mr. Trump is expected to arrive in New York on Monday after traveling from his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida and to Trump Tower. The exact time of the former president’s arrival is unknown, but supporters reported a protest outside the building in Midtown Manhattan at 11 a.m.
Mr Trump is expected to stay overnight there before heading to Lower Manhattan on Tuesday to turn himself in at the Manhattan district attorney’s office, before being charged at the Manhattan Criminal Court Building.
His supporters planned a midday rally nearby.
How will Mr. Trump turn himself in?
Mr. Trump will be guided through the usual steps of handling a felony arrest in New York.
While by standard, defendants arrested for felony charges will be handcuffed, it remains unclear whether an exception will be made for the former president. Most defendants were handcuffed behind their backs, but some white-collar defendants considered less dangerous had their hands tied in front of their faces.
Mr. Trump will almost certainly be accompanied every step of the way — from the moment he is taken into custody to his appearance before a judge in the majestic Criminal Court Building — by armed agents of the Agency. US Secret Service. The law requires them to protect him at all times.
Security in the courthouse is provided by state court officials with whom the Secret Service has worked in the past. But the agency’s chief spokesman, Anthony J. Guglielmi, said he could not comment on the measures that would be imposed on Mr. Trump.
Once he is charged, he will almost certainly be released on his own admission, because the indictment is likely to contain only serious nonviolent crimes; Under New York law, prosecutors cannot request bail in such cases.
So what could Trump possibly have done wrong?
When he pleaded guilty in federal court, Mr. Cohen pointed a finger at his boss. It was Mr Trump, he said, who directed him to pay Ms Daniels, an argument prosecutors later corroborated.
Prosecutors also raised questions about Trump’s monthly return checks to Cohen. They said in court papers that Mr Trump’s company “falsified” the monthly payments as legal expenses and that company filings cited an upfront settlement with Mr. Cohen. . Although Mr. Cohen is an attorney and became Mr. Trump’s personal attorney after he took office, there was no such upfront agreement and the reimbursement was not related to any legal services he provided. Cohen did.
Mr. Cohen has said that Mr. Trump was aware of the forged hire agreement, an allegation that could form the basis of a lawsuit against the former president.
In New York, falsifying business records can be considered a crime, albeit a misdemeanor. To elevate the charge to a felony, Bragg’s prosecutors must prove that Mr. Trump’s “deceptive intent” included intent to commit or conceal a second crime.
In this case, that second offense could be a violation of electoral law. While gag money is not inherently illegal, prosecutors could argue that the $130,000 payment actually became an inappropriate donation to Mr. Trump’s campaign. , on the theory that it was beneficial to his candidacy because it silenced Ms. Daniels.
Would it be a difficult case to prove?
Convicting Mr. Trump or sending him to jail can be a challenge. However, Mr. Trump’s lawyers will certainly attack Mr. Cohen’s credibility by citing his criminal record. Prosecutors can counter that the former fixer lied years ago on behalf of his boss at the time and is now in the best position to detail Mr. .
The case against Mr. Trump may also revolve around an untested legal theory.
According to legal experts, New York prosecutors have never previously combined an allegation of forging business records with violations of state election laws in a case involving the presidential election or any other any federal election campaign. Because this is uncharted territory, the judge can remove it or reduce the felony to a misdemeanor.
Even if the charge is allowed to stand, it is still a low-level felony. If Mr Trump is ultimately convicted, he will face a maximum sentence of four years, although jail time will not be mandatory.
How did Mr. Trump react to the indictment?
Trump responded with a statement, calling the Manhattan grand jury vote “the highest level of political suppression and election interference in history.”
Mr. Trump’s statement echoes what has been an extraordinary and intense effort to try to stop Mr. Bragg from prosecuting him.
However, the statement is notable for its aggressive tone against prosecution and a signal that something else might be going on.
“The Democrats have lied, cheated and stolen in their obsession with trying to ‘Catch Trump,’ but now they have done the unthinkable,” Trump wrote. “Prosecuting a completely innocent person.”
He shaped the investigation that led to the indictment as the latest in a long string of criminal investigations he has faced, none of which have resulted in a charge.
