2024-04-26 21:20:19
The criminal trial against Donald Trump, the first former president in the history of the United States to sit in the dock, began this Monday in a New York court, in the midst of the 2024 presidential campaign.
Investigating judge Juan M. Merchan, of Colombian origin, opened the trial and, once again, rejected the 77-year-old magnate’s request to withdraw from the case.
For the Republican, almost certainly his party’s candidate for the November presidential election, the trial is a “political persecution” orchestrated by the Democrats to prevent him from achieving his long-cherished dream of returning to the White House.
«This is an assault on the United States. Nothing like this had ever happened,” said the Republican upon his arrival at the court where he will be tried for hiding a payment of $130,000 to former porn actress Stormy Daniels to buy her silence about an alleged extramarital relationship and thus protect his 2016 campaign, which finally He won against Democrat Hillary Clinton.
The billionaire is not accused of the payment itself to hide a sexual relationship that he has always denied, but for disguising it as legal expenses of the Trump Organization, the family business, which can lead to a sentence of up to four years in prison.
However, the sentence would not be an obstacle for him to run in the presidential elections on November 5, in which he will face Democrat Joe Biden for the second time, who defeated him in the elections four years ago.
He could also become president, although it would be an unprecedented situation.
– Jury selection –
After a debate between the judge and the prosecution about what evidence to include, the trial was to proceed to the selection of the twelve jurors and six alternates who will have the responsibility of unanimously declaring the tycoon “guilty” or “not guilty”, a process that It may take several days.
The lottery candidates have to respond to a detailed questionnaire about their political sympathies in a city with a majority Democratic heart and, above all, about their impartiality and ability to define the fate of one of the most influential politicians of recent times, both in the United States as in the world.
The millionaire is accused of 34 falsifications of accounting documents of the Trump Organization to camouflage as “legal expenses” the payments made to Stormy Daniels, which were advanced out of his pocket by Trump’s then lawyer and trusted man, Michael Cohen, currently a sworn enemy and who will be one of the key witnesses for the prosecution.
The trial will have to demonstrate what Trump knew about these payments, for which Cohen has already been convicted.
– “A lot at stake” –
This is one of the many open fronts of the New York magnate who amassed his fortune in the real estate sector and the construction of golf courses that he denounces as being the victim of “a witch hunt.”
It will probably be the only trial to be held before the November elections.
The Republican candidate is also accused of trying to reverse the results of the 2020 presidential election and his management of classified documents that he took home when he left the White House.
“The stakes are high, because Trump and his lawyers have so far managed to delay the (other) trials,” Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond, tells AFP.
But far from impacting his brilliant career for the presidency, each problem with the law seems to reinforce his popularity among his followers.
On Saturday night, at a rally in Pennsylvania, Trump again declared himself a victim of judicial and political persecution by Democrats.
“Our enemies want to take away my freedom because I will never let them take away theirs,” he told his followers.
Trump plans to testify at the trial, which could last six to eight weeks.
On maximum alert, a handful of the magnate’s followers and detractors demonstrated in front of the Manhattan courthouse, in southern New York, cordoned off by the police.
Unlike other states, television cameras are not authorized in New York courts, so only the written press will report on the development of this trial, which arouses great interest.
© Agence France-Presse