On March 18, Donald Trump announced on the Truth social network his imminent indictment in the Stormy Daniels case. Yesterday, Thursday, March 30, the Manhattan District Attorney in New York, Alvin Bragg, did indeed notify Donald Trump’s lawyer of his client’s next “indictment”. The terms of his arrest will however be specified later, in April.
This is a first in American history: an ex-president will be charged. Donald Trump has always denied a paid meeting with the pornographic actress Stormy Daniels (alias Stephanie Clifford), evoking according to him a “extortion attempt”.
Legal reasoning
But a contact non-disclosure agreement was reportedly agreed shortly before the 2016 presidential election, between Stephanie Clifford and Michael Cohen, Trump’s former attorney, for $130,000.
This sum would have been reimbursed to the lawyer by a company, the Trump Organization. Counted as “legal fees”, its payment would constitute, only, an offense. But through sophisticated legal reasoning, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg secured a criminal “indictment” from Trump, the details of which are still under seal.
It is likely that Bragg managed to convince the closed-door grand jury that this “false accounting” was carried out in order to hide another crime: an illegal donation to Trump’s electoral campaign. Which is criminal.
What’s going to happen ? The Manhattan prosecutor asked Trump’s lawyer that his client “if it returns” (to surrender) to the administration. His fingerprints will be registered. The media coverage of this arrest, with a possibly handcuffed former president, remains unknown.
— Alvin Bragg (@ManhattanDA) March 30, 2023
Trump, who had already anticipated this eventuality, declares himself “completely innocent”. He denounces in a press release the instrumentalization of this accusation, in the middle of the primary campaign for the American presidential election of 2024: “This is political persecution and election interference at the highest level in history.” In unison, the Republican camp screams identically to a politicization of justice.
PRESIDENT DONALD J. TRUMP:
“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…” pic.twitter.com/tvWv5oJpFS
— Liz Harrington (@realLizUSA) March 30, 2023
Trump’s rival candidate in the primaries, Ron DeSantis, Governor of Florida, referred to this in connection with the links between the prosecutor Bragg and the billionaire George Soros, implying financing in order to influence the holding of investigations and the appointment of “targets”.
The weaponization of the legal system to advance a political agenda turns the rule of law on its head.
It is un-American.
The Soros-backed Manhattan District Attorney has consistently bent the law to downgrade felonies and to excuse criminal misconduct. Yet, now he is…
— Ron DeSantis (@GovRonDeSantis) March 30, 2023
And recent Ipsos poll indicates that more than 54% of Americans regard the indictment of Donald Trump as “politically motivated”.
Lawyers for the former president, Susan Necheles, Jospeh Tacopina and Alina Habba said they “would beat vigorously” against the indictment. Habba predicts that Trump “I’ll be sorry.”
If the Democratic camp repeats that Trump “is not above the law”, the White House declined to comment. Security around the New York courthouse has been tightened, according to local authorities.