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Edited by: Fern Sidman
The 45th president of the United States, Donald J. Trump, made a historically momentous court appearance in lower Manhattan as the only ex-president to be charged with a crime. Earlier in the week, a grand jury delivered a 34-count felony indictment accusing him of orchestrating a scheme to bury negative information during his first presidential campaign, as was reported by the Associated Press.
The arraignment in Supreme Court in Manhattan was largely procedural in nature, but was nonetheless a stunning and humbling spectacle for the former president. The AP reported that it put him face-to-face with prosecutors who bluntly accused him of criminal conduct and setting the stage for a possible criminal trial in the city where he decades ago became a celebrity.
The indictment centers on allegations that Trump sought to illegally influence the 2016 election by arranging payments designed to silence claims that he feared would be harmful to his candidacy. The AP reported that it includes 34 counts of falsifying business records for checks that Trump sent to Michael Cohen, his personal lawyer and problem-solver. The checks were earmarked to reimburse him for his role in paying off Stormy Daniels, a porn actress who alleges that she had an extramarital sexual encounter with Trump years earlier. Cohen paid the actress, (who was previously represented in court by disgraced attorney Michael Avenatti) the amount of $130,000 which would presumably buy her silence about the fling that she claims that she had with Trump.
All 34 counts against Trump are linked to these series of checks that were written to Cohen. Those payments, made over 12 months, were recorded in various internal company documents as being for a legal retainer that prosecutors say didn’t exist, the AP reported. Cohen testified before the grand jury. Prior to that Cohen has served time in prison and began to turn on Trump with accusatory statements.
Assistant District Attorney Christopher Conroy said, “The defendant, Donald J. Trump, falsified New York business records in order to conceal an illegal conspiracy to undermine the integrity of the 2016 presidential election and other violations of election laws,” as was reported by the AP.
On his way to the Manhattan courthouse from his Trump Tower apartment, the former president posted on his Truth Social account, “Heading to Lower Manhattan, the Courthouse. Seems so SURREAL — WOW, they are going to ARREST ME. Can’t believe this is happening in America. MAGA!”
Trump was silent as he entered and exited the Manhattan courtroom for the scheduled arraignment. While facing the judge he entered his own not guilty plea after being fingerprinted and processed. Reports indicate that no mug shot was taken. The AP reported that Trump appeared to glare for a period at Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, the prosecutor who brought the case.
For weeks prior to Tuesday’s arraignment Trump had assailed the case against him as political persecution, the AP reported. Commentators and pundits across the political spectrum have expressed their doubt that any or all of the felony counts will stick and that Trump will be found guilty. Others have also indicated that the Manhattan district attorney was politically driven in “getting” Trump as he campaigned for office on wanting to pursue legal matters concerning Trump.
Speaking to the Jewish Voice on the condition of anonymity, a retired Brooklyn Supreme Court justice also opined that the indictment against Trump was motivated by political interest of the Democratic party. “You know the old saying, ‘Bring me the man and I’ll find the crime.’ That about sums it up here. Trump’s political adversaries see him as an existential political threat and they are beyond terrified that he will re-take the White House in 2024 and they will do just about anything to throw him in jail just to prevent him from prevailing in the 2024 presidential race.”
In the New York case, each count of falsifying business records, a felony, is punishable by up to four years in prison — though it’s not clear if a judge would impose any prison time if Trump is convicted, the AP reported. The next court date is December 4 — two months before Republicans begin their nominating process in earnest — and Trump will again be expected to appear, the report indicated.
A conviction would not prevent Trump from running for or winning the presidency in 2024, as was reported by the AP.
The arraignment also delved into Trump’s rhetoric on the case, with prosecutors at one point handing printouts of his social media posts to the judge and defense lawyers as Trump looked on. The AP reported that Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan did not impose a gag order but told Trump’s lawyers to urge him to refrain from posts that could encourage unrest.
The broad contours of the case have long been known, but the indictment contains new details about a scheme that prosecutors say began months into his candidacy in 2015, as his celebrity past collided with his presidential ambitions, the AP reported. Though prosecutors expressed confidence in the case, a conviction is no sure thing given the legal complexities of the allegations, the application of state election laws to a federal election and prosecutors’ likely reliance on a key witness, Trump’s former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen, who pleaded guilty in 2018 to false statements, according to the AP report.
It centers on payoffs to two women, porn star Stormy Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal, who said they had extramarital sexual encounters with Trump years earlier, as well as to a Trump Tower doorman who claimed to have a story about a child he alleged the former president had out of wedlock, the report indicated.
When asked how the three separate cases were connected, Bragg told reporters, “It’s not just about one payment. It is 34 false statements and business records that were concealing criminal conduct.”
Bragg also said in a statement that Trump “went to great lengths to hide this conduct, causing dozens of false entries in business records to conceal criminal activity, including attempts to violate state and federal election laws.”
Subsequent to the arraignment, Trump’s lawyer Todd Blanche told reporters that it was a “sad day for the country. “You don’t expect this to happen to somebody who was president of the United States.”
John Banzhaf III, a professor emeritus at George Washington University Law School, said he wouldn’t be surprised if the seemingly excessive charges will induce jurors to acquit Trump, the Epoch Times reported. “They may see the whole case as unfair. I think even a jury which may not have too much legal expertise is going to look over at this and say, ‘Well, this is repetitious,’” Banzhaf told The Epoch Times.
He used this analogy: If a person was accused of a bank robbery, instead of charging him with robbing one bank, the prosecutor would load up 33 other charges, such as “he crossed the street against the red light, was double parked, shot off his gun and he carried a gun when he shouldn’t,” Banzhaf said. “But, you know, to most people, they would say that was one crime, one bank robbery.”
Banzhaf, ironically, was the attorney who filed a complaint against Trump in Georgia, leading to an investigation there for alleged interference in the 2020 election, according to the report in the Epoch Times.
Earlier on Tuesday, protesters both for and against Trump’s indictment gathered across the street from the courthouse where the arraignment took place, according to a report on The Epoch Times web site.
As chants of “No Trump, no KKK, no racist USA!” echoed on one side of Collect Pond Park, on the other side, Trump supporters gathered in solidarity with the former president.
The Epoch Times reported that among the latter group was David Rem, 59, who attended the same private school as Trump—Kew-Forest in Forest Hills, Queens—and has known the Trump family since 1974, when his father died of a heart attack.
“Three days after my dad’s body was buried, Donald Trump’s father, Frederick Trump, knocked on my door at my house, asked to speak with my mother, and said, ‘From this day forward, Mrs. Rem, you’re not paying for two out of your three children. I’m on the board at Kew-Forest, and I am paying for those kids because I do not want them to be forced to go into the public school system,’” Rem recalled, overcome with emotion, The Epoch Times reported.
That experience, Rem said, had informed his opinion of why Trump continues to “put up with this nonsense.”
“He loves this country, like no one ever has and no one ever will,” Rem said, as was reported by The Epoch Times. “And that is why he is running in 2024.”
Further pushing back against claims that the indictment was an “embarrassment” for Trump, Rem countered that the charges against the former president were an embarrassment for the United States and called for Bragg’s resignation.
The Epoch Times reported that he criticized Bragg’s alleged soft-on-crime policies, noting that he had downgraded 52 percent of felony cases in his jurisdiction to misdemeanors. “Violent criminals don’t do any jail time—that is an embarrassment. … That is disgraceful.”
Supporters of the 45th president have maintained that Bragg has chosen to pursue the case for political reasons in an attempt to keep him from returning to the White House.
Headlining at the pro-Trump rally outside the courthouse was Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican from Georgia.
The NYT reported that wearing sunglasses and speaking into a megaphone, Greene delivered brief remarks, attacking Democrats as “communists” and “failures” and reeling off a list of her and her party’s policy positions.
“We’re the party that wants to protect the lives of the unborn, we’re the party of male and female, two genders only,” said Greene, who had been invited to Manhattan by the New York Young Republican Club, according to the NYT report. “We’re the party of secure borders. We’re the party that will bring peace to the world like President Trump did, not World War III, like Joe Biden is doing.”
Greene’s arrival was accompanied by heavy security. “Go back to Georgia!” one person shouted, the NYT reported.
Some Trump supporters started chanting “U.S.A.! U.S.A.!” as the congresswoman concluded her remarks.
As Trump returned to his Palm Beach, Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, he prepared to deliver a primetime address to supporters. On the plane back to the Sunshine State, Trump again protested his innocence and asserted on his Truth Social platform that the “hearing was shocking to many in that they had no ‘surprises,’ and therefore, no case,” the Epoch Times reported.
During his Tuesday night address, Trump received a standing ovation as he blasted his arrest and arraignment as a political witch hunt and focused on the political agenda of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and that of his wife.
Trump referred to Bragg’s campaign pledge to “get” him as well as other elected officials such as New York State Attorney General Letitia James who has also made prosecuting Trump as her raison d’etre.
He said that the only crime that he has committed is “defending our country from those who seek to destroy it.” Trump also said that those who orchestrated his arrest are “coming after you and that I am only standing in their way.”
Tuesday’s arraignment shows how even as Trump is looking to reclaim the White House in 2024, he is shadowed by investigations related to his behavior in the two prior elections, with prosecutors in Atlanta and Washington scrutinizing efforts by Trump and his allies to undo the 2020 presidential election. Those probes, as well as a separate Justice Department inquiry into the mishandling of classified documents, could produce even more charges, the report said.
John Kaley, former assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District of New York said that Trump could deploy several legal tactics to fight off criminal charges against him, the Epoch Times reported.
“They’ll make a claim that prosecution is barred by the statute of limitations,” Kaley told The Epoch Times on April 3, adding that Trump’s defense team may also argue that the case should be dismissed because there is the problem of selective prosecution.
Under New York law, the statute of limitations is capped at five years, and it can be extended if the defendant has been out of state.
“I don’t know if they’ll claim that he has any kind of immunity, because acts occurred during the period of time that he was president, not that that would necessarily preclude anyone from charging him for those acts,” Kaley said.
Trump’s defense team may also make motions based on attorney-client privileges, he added.
The Epoch Times also reported that Trump’s attorney Joseph Tacopina has previously announced his plans to file “a host of” motions to dismiss the case, including one based on selective prosecution and prosecutorial misconduct.
Tacopina has also laid out another defense strategy, which is questioning the credibility of former Trump attorney Michael Cohen. It is believed that the case against Trump relies heavily on Cohen’s testimony.
Under normal circumstances, the false business records charge would be a misdemeanor. To elevate it to a felony, the charge could be linked to a federal charge of covering up or committing campaign violations, the Epoch Times reported.
One possibility is to connect the business records charge to a conspiracy charge, Kaley added.
“I wouldn’t be surprised also, if there is an overarching conspiracy charge,” he said. “I can see them elevating a conspiracy charge to wrap it all up into a ball. And that also might facilitate the admission of evidence later on.”
According to the Epoch Times reported that he added: “And it also has something to do with, what statements of others are admissible in evidence, as statements of co-conspirators in furtherance of the conspiracy. So it all gets intertwined.”
Prosecutors could file additional charges against Trump by working in synergies with New York Attorney General Letitia James’s civil investigation into Trump, and the criminal investigation of the Trump Organization that led to then-Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg’s guilty plea, according to Kaley, as was reported by The Epoch Times.
“They’re considering tying any of that to Mr. Trump now,” Kaley said.
The Trump Corporation and the Trump Payroll Corp, both part of the Trump Organization, received a $1.6 million fine on multiple tax fraud-related felony convictions in January.
The Epoch Times reported that Weisselberg was sentenced to five months in jail in the same month for his involvement in a tax fraud scheme at the Trump Organization.
Kaley is now in private practice. His practice includes representing clients in white-collar criminal and complex commercial litigation matters.
Mike Allen, a former judge and prosecutor in Ohio, said the New York case might not even make it to trial.
“I think there’s a very good chance” that Trump’s team will prevail on a motion to dismiss, “which will be filed post-haste,” Allen told The Epoch Times.
The Epoch Times reported that Allen also thinks the case, on its face, seems “weak,” because it’s “a mishmash” of statutes—the combining of state falsification-of-records charges with federal campaign finance violations.
The indictment, however, doesn’t specify which additional crime Trump is accused of intending to commit, as was reported by The Epoch Times. Bragg, during a news conference after Trump’s appearance, told a reporter that the law doesn’t require him to specify that additional alleged crime.
But when asked what the other crime was, Bragg pointed to New York state election law, which prohibits conspiring to promote a candidacy by unlawful means. He also alluded to Cohen’s 2018 guilty plead to federal campaign finance violations.
(Sources: AP.com, NYT.com, TheEpochTimes.com)
