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News of indictment catches Trump and his team off guard
Donald Trump and his top advisers were caught flat footed by the news of his indictment by the Manhattan grand jury over hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels, having expected no charges until at least the end of April and potentially never at all.The former president reckoned – along with his aides – that recent reporting about the grand jury taking a break from next week meant prosecutors in the district attorney’s office were reconsidering whether to seek an indictment over the matter.But that optimism proved to be misplaced when Trump was alerted at Mar-a-Lago to the indictment by his advisers, some of whom had decided to return to Washington after growing tired of waiting with him for several weeks for charges to materialize.The former president issued a pugilistic statement in response to the news and lashed out at the prosecution as political and an effort to hurt his 2024 presidential campaign, before appearing for dinner as usual alongside the other guests at this Florida resort.But in private, Trump was more subdued as he took in the significance of becoming the first sitting or former president to be charged and the changed reality of operating under the threat of an eventual criminal trial, several sources close to him said.The private response showed that for all his outward bravado – including claims that he wanted to be arrested and handcuffed for a “perp walk”because he wanted to project defiance if he was ever indicted – deep down, Trump has always feared the prospect of being criminally charged and its consequences.The charges remain sealed, but are expected to touch on $130,000 that Trump made to Daniels through his then-lawyer Michael Cohen in the final days of the 2016 elections campaign. Trump later reimbursed Cohen with $35,000 checks, and Cohen pleaded guilty in 2018 to federal charges over the money.Trump’s mood towards the hush money investigation has fluctuated in recent weeks – from criticising the prospect of criminal charges, to growing impatient and insisting they should charge him already, and then going back to attacking the investigation with vehemence.After the first rally of his 2024 campaign in Texas, Trump told an NBC News reporter he was not frustrated by the case despite appearing quite frustrated.“I’m not frustrated by it. It’s a fake investigation,” Trump said. “This is fake news, and NBC is one of the worst. Don’t ask me any more questions.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionTrump became more optimistic this week, believing – based on no actual evidence – that reports about the grand jury taking a break for most of April could mean the district attorney was having doubts about prosecuting the hush money case and that it was “all over”.Some of Trump’s advisers took that as an opportunity to get out of Palm Beach where they had been waiting with him for weeks for an indictment to arrive.Shortly after 5pm on Thursday, his 2024 campaign advisers learned from a New York Times alert that Trump had been indicted, catching them off guard in part because they assumed they would hear about it first from the Trump lawyers, who had themselves assumed they would confidentially hear it first from prosecutors.Though Trump had indicated that he expected to be one of the first people to be told if he was charged in the hush money case, the sources said, when the news actually arrived, Trump appears to have been one of the very last people to find out. More
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Reactions to Trump’s indictment run the gamut, cynical to sublime
For Democrats, Donald Trump’s indictment was proof that no one, not even a former president, was above the law. For Republicans, it was the culmination of a years-long political witch-hunt designed to take down Donald Trump.The unprecedented move by a Manhattan grand jury triggered a wave of predictably partisan responses, reflecting a nation deeply divided over Trump and his presidency, which ended after his failed attempts to cling to power culminated in a deadly assault on the US Capitol. News on Thursday that Trump had become the first ever former US president to face criminal charges drew an audible gasp on Fox News, as broadcasters and viewers processed the extraordinary development.Though the charges remain under seal as of late Thursday, the case centered on payments made during the 2016 presidential campaign to silence claims from the porn star Stormy Daniels and the former model Karen McDougal that they had extramarital affairs with Trump. A spokesperson for the Manhattan district attorney’s office confirmed the indictment and said prosecutors were working with the president’s legal team to coordinate a surrender.Trump, who is running again for president, reacted angrily in a lengthy statement that denounced the grand jury vote as “Political Persecution and Election Interference at the highest level in history”.He framed the indictment as part of a long litany of investigations he has faced since he “came down the golden escalator at Trump Tower” to announce his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination in 2015. He was the first president to be impeached twice, first over his efforts to pressure Ukraine’s president into announcing a criminal investigation into Joe Biden, and later for his role inciting the violence that unfolded in his name on 6 January 2021.“The Democrats have lied, cheated and stolen in their obsession with trying to ‘Get Trump,’ but now they’ve done the unthinkable – indicting a completely innocent person in an act of blatant Election Interference,” he said. “Never before in our Nation’s history has this been done.”Trump ratcheted up his attacks on the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, accusing him of “doing Joe Biden’s dirty work” while failing to prosecute crime in New York. Many top-ranking Republicans followed Trump’s lead.The notional field of 2024 Republican presidential candidates have treaded carefully around Trump’s legal woes even as they prepare to challenge him for the nomination.Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor who is seen as Trump’s strongest potential opponent should he declare his candidacy as is expected, called the indictment “un-American” and assailed Bragg as a “Soros-backed” Manhattan prosecutor who was “stretching the law to target a political opponent”.He added that as governor of Florida, where Trump has lived since leaving the White House, he would not oblige an extradition request should Trump refuse to surrender voluntarily, which the former president is expected to do on Tuesday.Nikki Haley, who served as Trump’s UN secretary and is now running against him for the nomination, has attacked the investigation. So too has Mike Pence, Trump’s former vice-president who is contemplating a run for president.“I think the unprecedented indictment of a former president of the United States on a campaign finance issue is an outrage,” Pence said. “And it appears for millions of Americans to be nothing more than a political prosecution.”The House speaker, Kevin McCarthy, said in a statement that Bragg had “irreparably damaged our country in an attempt to interfere in our Presidential election”.“As he routinely frees violent criminals to terrorize the public, he weaponized our sacred system of justice against President Donald Trump,” McCarthy said. “The American people will not tolerate this injustice, and the House of Representatives will hold Alvin Bragg and his unprecedented abuse of power to account.”Ohio congressman Jim Jordan, one of Trump’s fiercest allies in Congress, tweeted simply: “Outrageous”. Jordan has sought to use his perch atop the powerful House judiciary committee to attack the legitimacy of the various investigations into the former president, while pointing his gavel at the Biden administration.Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, the far-right Trump loyalist, suggested the House retaliate by impeaching Biden “now that the gloves are off”.“Enough of this witch-hunt bullshit,” she concluded.Republican Lindsey Graham, the senior senator from South Carolina, issued a statement calling the indictment “one of the most irresponsible decisions in American history by any prosecutor”. “The chief witness for prosecution is a convicted felon, Michael Cohen, whose previous lawyer said he is untrustworthy. Upon scrutiny, this case folds like a cheap suit.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe White House declined to comment on the indictment of Biden’s predecessor and potential opponent in 2024. But many Democrats, including those who had sought to hold Trump accountable for his conduct as president, sounded a note of satisfaction after years of insisting that no one was above the law.Nancy Pelosi, who presided over the House as speaker during both of Trump’s impeachments, said: “The grand jury has acted upon the facts and the law. No one is above the law, and everyone has the right to a trial to prove innocence. Hopefully, the former president will peacefully respect the system, which grants him that right.”Democratic leaders were more muted in their response. Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer said there should be “no outside political influence, intimidation or interference in the case” and urged calm in response to the indictment.California congressman Adam Schiff, the Democrat who led the prosecution in Trump’s first impeachment trial, said Trump’s “unlawful conduct” was unprecedented in American history.“A nation of laws must hold the rich and powerful accountable, even when they hold high office. Especially when they do. To do otherwise is not democracy,” Schiff said.Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics, a watchdog organization in Washington, called Trump the “most corrupt president in American history”.“He has spent his entire political career dodging accountability for his wanton disregard for the law. It is finally catching up to him,” its president, Noah Bookbinder, said in a statement. “The charges in New York are the first ever brought against him, but they will not be the last.”This is not the only legal challenge Trump is facing. He remains the subject of three separate criminal investigations, involving his efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election that culminated in the January 6 assault on the US Capitol as well as handling of classified documents that he improperly kept after leaving the White House.Clark Brewster, a lawyer representing Daniels, said Trump’s indictment was “no cause for joy”.“The hard work and conscientiousness of the grand jurors must be respected,” he said. “Now let truth and justice prevail. No one is above the law.”Michael Cohen, Trump’s former fixer and a key witness who testified that he arranged the payments to Daniels on Trump’s behalf, said he took “solace in validating the adage that no one is above the law, not even a former president”.“Today’s indictment is not the end of this chapter, but, rather, just the beginning,” said Cohen, who was sentenced to three years in prison after pleading guilty to campaign finance charges related to his role in arranging payments for Daniels and McDougal ahead of the 2016 presidential election.Meanwhile, Yusef Salaam, who was exonerated in the infamous Central Park jogger case more than a decade after Trump placed full-page newspaper ads in several New York newspapers calling for the death penalty for him and four other Black and Latino teens wrongly accused of raping a white woman, issued a one-word statement: “Karma”. More
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After indictment, Trump will play the victim – and the tactic will work for many Republicans
Comedian Chris Rock gazed out at the audience at an awards ceremony in Washington earlier this month. “Are you guys really going to arrest Trump?” he asked bluntly. “This is only going to make him more popular!”Donald Trump has not yet been arrested but is now the first person to occupy the Oval Office to then be charged with a crime. It also raises the prospect of the Republican favorite for the 2024 presidential race to be running for the White House while also being criminally prosecuted – something likely to bring even more chaos to America’s already deeply fractured political landscape.It emerged on Thursday that a Manhattan grand jury has voted to indict Trump over a hush money payment to the adult film star Stormy Daniels during the 2016 presidential election campaign.Florida-based Trump is now expected to surrender himself on Tuesday to the Manhattan district attorney (DA) to be fingerprinted and photographed for a mugshot – something guaranteed to delight his many opponents, appall his fans and divide the United States even more.30 March 2023 is therefore a day for the history books. It offered an affirmation of the Magna Carta principle that no one, not even the onetime commander in chief, is above the law. The 45th president of the United States is set to stand trial and, if convicted, could find himself behind bars instead of running for re-election.Presidential historian Michael Beschloss said on the MSNBC network: “Tomorrow, in terms of American history, we will be waking up in a different country. Before tonight, presidents in this country were kings.”But while the law is clear, the politics are murky. A criminal charge or even conviction does not prevent someone running for the White House, and Trump is currently leading in opinion polls for the 2024 Republican presidential primary.In the pre-Trump universe, an indictment over a hush money payment to an adult film star would have been career-ending. Candidates have withdrawn from election races for much less.But since 2016, Trump has been a political judo master, turning the weight of opponents and allegations against them to his own advantage. The bigger the alleged crime, the louder he airs grievances and the more he plays the victim – and so far the Republican party has been mostly willing to indulge him.That is the role he will play with an indictment hanging over him. At a campaign rally in Waco, Texas, last weekend, he claimed: “The Biden regime’s weaponization of law enforcement against their political opponents is something straight out of the Stalinist Russia horror show.” He suggested that it is the most serious problem facing America today.In a statement on Thursday following his indictment, Trump said: “This is Political Persecution and Election Interference at the highest level in history… The Democrats have lied, cheated and stolen in their obsession with trying to ‘Get Trump,’ but now they’ve done the unthinkable – indicting a completely innocent person in an act of blatant Election Interference.”Trump will now doubtless set about putting the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, on trial in the court of public opinion. He has already used dehumanising and racist language. A social media post, later removed, showed a photo of Trump holding a baseball bat and apparently looming over Bragg, raising fears of violence against him.America’s tragedy is that the tactic will work with many Republicans. That Bragg is a Democrat from New York will trigger a Pavlovian response in Trump’s favor. That the case is seven years old, based on an untested legal theory and has Michael Cohen, a convicted criminal, as a key witness will provide further ammunition.This pattern came into a focus earlier this month when Trump falsely predicted his own arrest. Republicans leaped to his defence and he reportedly raised $1.5m in three days; on Thursday night he quickly sent out another fundraising email.The drama put Trump back where he wants to be: at the centre of the news cycle. Not coincidentally, it also gave him a boost in the Republican primary polls, extending a lead over Ron DeSantis, even as the Florida governor was on a book tour trying to promote his own brand. Everyone was talking about Trump.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionSo it was that, after news of the indictment emerged on Thursday, Republicans again came to his aid. Trump ally Kevin McCarthy, the speaker of the House of Representatives, accused Bragg of “irreparably” damaging the country “in an attempt to interfere” in the election.JD Vance, a Republican senator for Ohio, described the indictment as “political persecution masquerading as law”, “blatant election interference” and “a direct assault on the tens of millions of Americans who support him”.But the most telling reaction came from DeSantis himself. This could have been the moment for him to break from Trump and prove statesmanlike, calling for dignity and unity in a solemn moment for the nation. Instead he went full Maga.DeSantis said: “The weaponization of the legal system to advance a political agenda turns the rule of law on its head. It is un-American.” Blowing an antisemitic dog whistle, DeSantis twice linked Bragg to philanthropist George Soros, adding that Florida would not assist in “an extradition request” to send Trump to New York.The spineless responses suggested that, in the short term at least, the indictment will provide a rallying cry for Trump and help rather than hurt him in the 2024 Republican primary. In the for-us-or-against-us binary of American politics, the party base will be for him and against the perceived Democratic elites and the deep state.Yet again, he has thrust America into the political unknown, a twilight zone where precedents do not apply and everyone has to respond on the fly. Can the Manhattan court assemble an impartial jury, and will the timing of the trial collide with the Republican primary?Then, what about the other major legal perils threatening Trump: over the January 6 insurrection, over election interference in Georgia and over the mishandling of classified documents? These cases are arguably more clear-cut and consequential – but not necessarily in the eyes of Republicans. Will he recklessly incite unrest among his supporters?The lesson of the Trump era is that most predictions are wrong. The only certainty is that Thursday will go down as the day when Trump’s age of impunity, in which he was never legally held to account, is over. The man who rose to power leading chants of “Lock her up!” is about to get a taste of his own medicine. More
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What does Donald Trump’s indictment say about US democracy? | Jan-Werner Mueller
So it finally happened. Trump has been indicted. For Democrats and scattered anti-Trumpers on the right, it will probably feel not nearly as satisfying or generate as much schadenfreude as they imagined. In fact, it might seem positively anticlimactic.After all, Trump did not get indicted for his political crimes and misdemeanors. Other investigations may still catch up with him. But the fact that there is no choreographed political theater is precisely how democracies tend to work: messy, piecemeal, ensuring that there is no impunity.Trump sycophants like Elise Stefanik and Andy Biggs complain that the country is becoming authoritarian and like “the third world”. Never mind the underlying racism of such pronouncements – the absence of spectacle proves that they are wrong, as does that fact that countries who fare far better on global democracy rankings than the US have not hesitated to go after former leaders for wrongdoing.Former German president Christian Wulff was indicted on corruption charges – and cleared. Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy was indicted for bribing a judge and for campaign finance violations; he was convicted and sentenced to prison (his appeals are pending). Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, a kind of Trump before Trump, was sentenced to four years in prison. In France, it would have once been unthinkable that a president – who, on one reading of the original, rather royalist conception of the Fifth Republic, embodies the country as a whole – could be treated like an ordinary criminal. But that is the point: the law cannot allow for exceptions; in both democracy and according to the rule of law, we are meant to be equals.To be sure, it can easily seem like, in the end, there are different rules, and different punishments, for different people: Berlusconi never saw the inside of prison; for reasons of age, his sentence was commuted to four hours a week of work with dementia patients. If appeals fail, Sarkozy would in the end only have to suffer house arrest with an electronic monitoring bracelet for his illegal campaign spending. Berlusconi has picked up his political career again and today sits very comfortably in the Italian senate. But this is again typical for democracies: there are no comprehensive show trials or even just cathartic moments; yet – unlike in countries congresswoman Stefanik would associate with the “third world” – there is no complete impunity either.Prosecutions send a signal that going into politics is not a path to avoiding justice. Berlusconi, who was in legal trouble for decades, clearly hoped that parliamentary immunity would save him from the consequences of scandal after scandal. But being popular and being innocent are not the same thing; and any good democratic system will discourage a flight forward into politics so as to avoid proper accountability. Trump also appears to have assumed that declaring his candidacy for 2024 would render indictments less likely – and it’s crucial to prove such assumptions wrong.Of course, given the clear and present danger Trump has been posing to the republic already for years, there were two moments when he could have been removed from politics once and for all; in both instances, when successful impeachments might have banned him from holding office permanently, cowardly Republicans stood in the way. Some of them might be secretly relieved that the justice system is doing the work for them now. Yet, in all likelihood, the pattern of duplicity will continue: on the one hand, clandestine hope that Trump is irreparably damaged as a presidential contender, or at least that his capacity to shape the Republican party into a personality cult is diminished; on the other, loud proclamations of loyalty and accusations that Democrats are “weaponizing” the government.No matter what Democrats say, or what a Democratic district attorney does, Republican accusations will be levelled at maximum volume and with maximum vituperation. Trump is making “retribution” central to his politics. Framing democratic contests as matters of revenge is as dangerous as it gets – but it is hardly Democrats who started it.Desires for revenge and resentments are bountiful resources for a political machine which makes a handsome profit on the side: Trump is already monetizing the indictment, just as he profited from the big lie about the election. As authoritarian populist leaders around the world have discovered, shared grievances and making everyone feel like a victim can create solidarity. This would happen no matter how well choreographed indictments are, or what Democrats say or do not say.Ironically, one factor that may undermine this political-financial business model of martyrdom is the sheer tawdriness of the hush money saga. Trump at the time evidently no longer trusted his self-assessment that he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and the base would still come out for him. Hard to believe that people, after the Access Hollywood tape, would have cared about yet another, rather conventional, scandal. As subsequent years were to prove, his followers, especially evangelicals, have not been particularly exercised about his personal life.There is perhaps poetic justice in the possibility that the man who bet on being the ultimate outsider breaking all conventions may have his comeuppance as a result of a very old-fashioned scandal.
Jan-Werner Mueller is a Guardian US columnist More - in US Politics
Trump’s indictment will probably hurt him with the electorate. But how much? | Lloyd Green
On Thursday, Manhattan prosecutors indicted Donald Trump. The charges against him stem from $130,000 in hush-money paid to an adult film star, Stormy Daniels.The question now looms whether the nation will face Trump-incited violence as a result. The former president threatened “death and destruction” if charged. In a now infamous social media post targeting the Black district attorney Alvin Bragg, Trump depicted himself brandishing a baseball bat at the District Attorney, and called him as an “animal” and “degenerate psychopath”.Some critics have characterized the indictment as an aggregation of record-keeping infractions, the “zombie case” that Bragg initially declined to bring. In his book People vs Donald Trump, Mark Pomerantz, a onetime lawyer in Bragg’s office, previously argued that this particular set of charges was legally wanting.Regardless, the latest fireworks will likely damage Trump with the broader electorate even as Joe Biden struggles with a banking crisis and persistent inflation. “Trump won’t change, and that shows he can’t win,” intones the Murdoch-controlled New York Post. Still, don’t bet that Fox News changes its tune.Faced with a court order, a passel of senior Trump advisors and administration officials may soon be witnesses, including Mark Meadows, Trump’s last chief of staff.The drumbeat continues. Next month, Trump stands trial for defamation and sexual assault. He faces a civil suit brought in New York by E Jean Carroll. Unlike his purported relationship with Daniels, this case centers on rape and degradation.Carroll contends that a quarter of a century ago Trump attacked her in the dressing room of a Manhattan department store. He parried that she was not his “type”. But at a recent deposition, he mistook her for Marla Maples, his second wife, raising questions about his credibility and mental acuity.The Trump-Carroll square-off will also provide the country with another opportunity to revisit history. Her lawyers will probably play the infamous Access Hollywood tape. “When you’re a star, they let you do it,” Trump said on a hot mic. “You can do anything.”Separately, a New York judge has refused to delay a $250m civil fraud action commenced by the state against Trump, his three older children and the Trump Organization, the family business. The October 2023 trial date is “written in stone”, Judge Arthur Engoron said last week.More than two decades have lapsed since a Republican-controlled House of Representatives impeached Bill Clinton over the Lewinsky affair.Lindsey Graham, then a congressman, acted as a manager at Clinton’s impeachment trial. These days, the South Carolina senator prattles about dire consequences for Democrats, anything to golf with Trump.Senator Rand Paul, the self-styled libertarian, calls for Bragg’s arrest. Marjorie Taylor Greene demands that George Soros, foreign-born and a Bragg-backer, be stripped of his US citizenship.Meanwhile, McCarthy, the speaker of the House, ordered Republicans to “immediately investigate if federal funds are being used to subvert our democracy by interfering in elections with politically motivated prosecutions”. Faced with a letter from congressional Republicans demanding documents and testimony, Bragg refused to yield.Their missive “only came after Donald Trump created a false expectation that he would be arrested,” the District Attorney shot back. Such circumstances, he wrote, did not represent “a legitimate basis for congressional inquiry”. Jim Jordan and the rest of the crew refused to take “no” for an answer. On Saturday night, Bragg told them to pound sand.Congressional Republicans now mull legislation to immunize past and current presidents from “politically motivated prosecution”. Conveniently, the Republican party has forgotten those chants of “lock her up”. The law-and-order party meddles with a live criminal investigation.The ex-reality show host closed the week with a campaign rally in Waco, Texas, site of the fatal 1993 Branch Davidian standoff. The fiery siege left more than 80 cult members and four law enforcement officials dead.Personal grievance pocked Trump’s remarks. The investigations surrounding him were “something straight out of the Stalinist Russia horror show,” he declared. Trump tore into Bragg for “prosecutorial misconduct.”After the rally, Trump reportedly suggested that Bragg had dropped the Daniels case. That couldn’t be farther from the truth.
Lloyd Green is an attorney in New York and served in the US Department of Justice from 1990 to 1992 More - in US Politics
Who is Alvin Bragg, the DA who got a grand jury to indict Donald Trump?
Alvin Bragg’s official biography describes him as a “son of Harlem” who became Manhattan district attorney after “a lifetime of hard work, courage and demanding justice”.In obtaining a grand jury indictment against Donald Trump over his hush money payment to Stormy Daniels in 2016, the Democrat has now carved himself a place in history, as the man behind the first vote to criminally indict a former president.Now 49, Bragg is a Harvard-educated former assistant New York state attorney general and assistant US attorney in the southern district of New York.In 2021, he was elected as the first Black Manhattan DA and only the fourth permanent occupant of the post in 80 years.In office, his biography says, he has focused on “protecting everyday New Yorkers from abuses by the powerful, and correcting past injustices by vacating wrongful convictions”.The biography also highlights the creation of a Special Victims Division, handling “extremely sensitive cases in a trauma informed and survivor centered manner”, and an expansion of a Hate Crimes Unit.Bragg has prominent critics, however. Chief among them is Mark Pomerantz, an experienced New York prosecutor who joined an investigation of Trump begun by Bragg’s predecessor, Cyrus Vance Jr, but resigned in February 2022.In his resignation letter, Pomerantz said Trump was “guilty of numerous felony violations” in his business and political affairs and called Bragg’s initial decision to stop pursuing an indictment “a grave failure of justice”. The two men exchanged shots in the press.Last month, Pomerantz published a book in which he described efforts to make Trump’s hush money payment to Stormy Daniels a viable path to prosecution.Pomerantz called the Daniels payment a “zombie case” because it would not die. A month later, it emerged that Bragg was homing in on a Trump indictment in the very same case.Bragg’s official biography now highlights a six-count indictment against the Trump ally Steve Bannon for fraud, and the conviction of Allen Weisselberg, the Trump Organization chief financial officer, for tax evasion.Bragg has also faced criticism for his approach to crime, not least from the New York City police commissioner, Keechant Sewell.In early 2022, Bragg issued a memo instructing prosecutors to avoid seeking prison time for all but the most serious crimes. In a city where crime is always a key political issue, and in an atmosphere of heightened concern fueled by the disruptions of the Covid pandemic, Sewell told NYPD officers she was “severely troubled”.Bragg said the memo had been misunderstood. After a meeting, he and Sewell agreed that “police and prosecutors would weigh the individual facts and circumstances of each case with a view toward justice and work together to keep New Yorkers safe”.Later in 2022, the issue of crime and punishment in New York flared forth again. After a Hispanic Harlem shopkeeper stabbed a Black assailant, Bragg charged the shopkeeper with second-degree murder. After an outcry, the charges were dropped. More
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Donald Trump indicted on criminal charges in hush money payment case – live
Donald Trump and his legal team were reportedly not given advance warning that an indictment was coming down.But they have now been informed of the decision, the Associated Press has confirmed.We have not heard yet from the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, whose office is in charge of that case.A lawyer for Trump said moments ago that the former president has now been told that he’s been indicted. It has not been made public what the charges are or whether such charges will be of misdemeanor or felony status. The grand jury will have filed the indictment under seal.Observers believe this has taken the president’s team, at least in the moment, by surprise, where they are gathered at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s residence in Palm Beach, Florida.Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the indictment of Donald Trump, the former president and current presidential candidate, on criminal charges related to his hush money payment to the adult film star Stormy Daniels.Numerous US media outlets are reporting that the grand jury in New York has voted in the last few minutes to indict Trump.It is a historic move. No former president has ever been criminally indicted. We are waiting for details to emerge and for reactions from Trump or his legal team.Daniels says she had a short sexual affair with Trump in 2006. Trump denies that.Trump also denies wrongdoing, despite admitting reimbursing the $130,000 payment made by his then lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen, as election day approached in late 2016.Trump claims to have been a victim of extortion, and says, via lawyers, he initially lied, saying he knew nothing of the payment, because it involved a non-disclosure agreement.News of the Daniels payment broke in early 2018, when Trump was president. Cohen later pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations, contributing to a three-year custodial sentence.Trump faces wide-ranging legal jeopardy, also including investigations of his election subversion at federal and state levels, a civil suit over his business affairs in New York and a defamation trial arising from a rape allegation by the writer E Jean Carroll.He denies all wrongdoing. In the Manhattan hush money case, as in the investigation of his election subversion in Georgia, where an indictment is thought to be imminent, Trump claims to be the victim of prosecutorial racism.According to Mark Pomerantz, a New York prosecutor who worked under Bragg, as the Manhattan DA continued an investigation begun by his predecessor, the Daniels payment came to be seen as a “zombie case” that simply would not die.It has now risen to bite Trump, potentially roiling the race for the Republican nomination to face Joe Biden at the polls next year.Stay with us for rolling coverage. More
