A Manhattan grand jury has indicted Former United States President Donald Trump for paying the silence of the porn actress Stormy Daniels so that she would not tell about her relationship with him, according to American media such as the newspaper The New York Times and the CNN, citing sources familiar with the case. Is about an unprecedented decisionas it makes Trump the first former US president to face criminal charges. And all while the Republican prepares his electoral campaign to re-election in the 2024 presidential election.
The Manhattan district attorney’s office has opened an investigation to determine the former president’s alleged role in a secret and covert payment plan that allegedly violated the election finance rules of the 2016 campaign in which he was elected and involving Daniels. The exact charges are unknown at this time and it will likely take days for the indictment to be finalized, according to the NOW.
Trump will appear next Tuesday afternoon at the New York Court, where they will take your fingerprints and make a police file. Of course, he will not appear handcuffed, as confirmed by his legal team.
In a brief statement, Bragg recalls that this accusation “remains under seal”, so it may take several days until its exact content is known.
Trump: “It is political persecution at the highest level”
Shortly after the news broke, the Republican issued a statement in which pleads “completely innocent” and affirms that his imputation is “political persecution and electoral interference at the highest level in history”.
The former president accuses the Democrats of carrying out a “witch hunt” to “destroy the movement of Make America Great Again” from the moment he defeated Hillary Clinton in 2016. “Democrats have lied, cheated and stolen, all in their obsession with ‘hunting down Trump,’ but now they have done the unthinkable: impeached a completely innocent person.” , assures.
“Americans know full well what the Democrats are doing, the whole world can see it“
“This witch hunt will go very wrong for Joe Biden. The American people know full well what the radical Democrats are doing. Everyone can see it. So our movement and our party will defeat, first Alvin Bragg (the prosecutor in the case ) and then Joe Biden,” the note concludes. Along the same lines, his children have denounced that the judicial decision of the New York court is an effort to prevent him from running for election of the next year.
Trump has spent years describing any accusation or judicial process opened against him as this “witch hunt” that, he says, only seeks to separate him from political life.
The first scandal that can cloud his career to the White House
The case dates back to the year 2006, when the former president allegedly had sexual relations with the well-known porn actress and director Stephanie Clifford (Stormy Daniels). But it wasn’t until ten years later, during Trump’s first presidential campaign, that the Republican allegedly bought his silence, as denounced by Daniels in 2018.
So the diary The Wall Street Journal reported that the former president would have organized payment of $130,000 to the actress in October 2016, weeks before winning the elections, to prevent the case from coming to light.
In January of this year, the jury began to settle the case, whose investigation is led by prosecutor Bragg. Former Republican lawyer Michael Cohen defends that Trump also paid another woman in blackformer Playboy model Karen McDougalwho assures that she also had sexual relations with him for ten months in 2006, something that Trump also denies.
In this case, the ‘Playboy girl’ allegedly struck a deal to publish her story with The National Enquirer in exchange for $150,000, but the newspaper, owned by a friend of Trump, bought his testimony to hide it.
In 2018, federal prosecutors already investigated the alleged payment to Daniels and sentenced Cohen to three years in prison, but not Trump. The ex-lawyer then acknowledged that made the payment to Daniels on the order of the former president.
Donald Trump’s judicial labyrinth for alleged bribery of a porn actress
This case is just one of the several that Trump has pending with Justice. The authorities are investigating him for his alleged attempt to interfere in the electoral count in the state of Georgia in the 2020 elections, the assault on the Capitol, or the discovery of secret official documents at his private residence in Mar-a-Lago (Florida). after he left office.
Trump announced his candidacy for the 2024 presidential elections in November 2022 and defends that he will continue his electoral path despite being prosecuted. The former president has a long way to go to win the nomination of a Republican Party divided around him, but for now he has 44% of the party’s support against his most dangerous rival, the governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, whom the latest Ipsos/Reuters poll gives 30% support.
called for mobilizations
In recent days, Trump had warned that a “potential death and destruction” loomed if he was charged and arrested, he had described the decision as “catastrophic” for the country. In fact, he had called on his followers to mobilize for this case, always peacefully.
This appeal has alerted the New York authorities, who have intensified security measures.
The mayor of the city has assured that they are monitoring the activity of their supporters on social networks to prevent violent protests like the ones that ended with the deaths of five people in the storming of the Capitol during Joe Biden’s victory proclamation in January 2021.
The White House has also announced that it will monitor possible demonstrations if the former president is arrested.
