Trump Says He Will Be Arrested Tuesday As Impeachment Comes

[ad_1]

With an indictment by a Manhattan grand jury likely but its timing unclear, Donald J. Trump sought to rally supporters to his side, declaring he would be arrested on Tuesday and calling for protests.

Made by Mr. Trump made the declaration on his site, Truth Social, at 7:26 am on Saturday in a post that ended with, THE LEADING REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE AND FORMER PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, WILL BE ARRESTED ON TUESDAY OF NEXT WEEK. PROTEST, TAKE BACK OUR COUNTRY!

Two hours later, a spokesman issued a statement saying Mr. Trump did not write his post with direct knowledge of the timing of any arrests, adding that President Trump has the right to highlight his innocence. and the weaponization of our system of injustice.

But the post of Mr. Trump on social media: Within hours, Speaker Kevin McCarthy, one of the most powerful people in the federal government and who owes his position in part to Mr. Trump, posted on Twitter that he was calling for federal investigations. funds are being used for politically motivated prosecutions, a threat partially veiled by the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin L. Bragg.

A spokeswoman for the district attorney’s office declined to comment.

Prosecutors working for Mr. Bragg have signaled that an indictment of Mr. Trump may be imminent. But they did not tell the lawyers of Mr. Trump when charges expected to stem from a hush money payment to a porn star in 2016 will be sought or an arrest made, people with knowledge of the matter said. At least one other witness is expected to testify before the grand jury, which could delay an indictment, the people said.

One of the people said that even if the grand jury voted to indict the former president on Monday, a Tuesday surrender was unlikely, given the need to arrange timing, travel and other logistics.

The statement from the spokesperson of Mr. Trumps did not explain how he arrived on Tuesday as the date of the arrest. A person with knowledge of the matter said that Mr. Trumps guessed that it might happen around then, and that someone might have relayed that to the former president.

A lawyer for Mr. Trump, Susan R. Necheles, said his post was based on news reports, and accused the Manhattan district attorneys office of conducting a political prosecution.

Mr. Trump, who declared his third presidential campaign in November and is leading his Republican opponents in most polls, faced his first criminal investigation in the late 1970s. He was very anxious about the prospect of an arrest, which was expected to include being fingerprinted, one of the people said.

When the former chief financial officer of the Trump Organizations, Allen H. Weisselberg, was arrested in 2021, Mr. Trump was horrified while watching television news Mr. Weisselberg was flanked by officials in the courthouse, and the former president said he couldn’t believe what was happening. .

Mr. posted. Trumps on Saturday urging his supporters to protest and take back the country carried unmistakable echoes of the inflammatory messages he posted online in the weeks before the attack on the US Capitol. In the most prominent of those messages, posted on December 19, 2020, he announced on Twitter that he would hold a rally in Washington on January 6. There, he told his millions of followers. It’s gonna be wild.

At that rally, on the Ellipse near the White House, Mr. Trump told supporters to march to the Capitol, where the certification of the 2020 presidential election is taking place. He is under investigation by federal prosecutors for his activities before the attack.

Investigators later determined that far-right extremist groups as well as ordinary Trump supporters read his tweet as an implicit invitation. They sprang into action almost immediately, acquiring protective equipment, setting up encrypted communication channels and, in one case, preparing armed rapid reaction forces to be deployed outside Washington for the event.

Leaders of groups such as the Proud Boys and the Three Percenter militia movement also began urging members with defiant language, and their private messaging channels were increasingly filled with plans to rush to Mr. Trump.

On Friday night, the campaign of Mr. Trumps what could be his first rally after an indictment: an event in Waco, Texas, where the deadly clash between federal officials and an extremist religious sect took place 30 years ago this time.

How Times reporters cover politics. We rely on our journalists to be independent observers. So while Times staff can vote, they are not allowed to endorse or campaign for political candidates or causes. This includes participating in marches or rallies in support of a movement or donating money to, or raising money for, any political candidate or election cause.

Early Saturday evening, Mr. Trump at the NCAA wrestling championships in Tulsa, Okla., where he was greeted by USA cheers and chants! America! Inside the arena, Mr. Trump among supporters, took selfies with audience members and met with some of the wrestlers.

Despite the unpredictable nature of Mr. Trump, several members of his legal team said they expected him to surrender.

New York officials are discussing security arrangements at Manhattan Criminal Court in the event of an indictment, according to people with knowledge of the planning, first reported by NBC News. Mr. is expected to be charged. Trump in connection with hush payments by his former fixer and lawyer, Michael D. Cohen, to porn star Stormy Daniels, who claimed to have had an affair with Mr. Trump.

Mr. Cohen made the $130,000 payment to Ms. Daniels to bury his story of the incident.

The payment came in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election, and then Mr. Trump paid Mr. Cohen. Prosecutors are expected to charge Mr. Trump overseeing the false recording of reimbursements in his company’s internal records. The records falsely stated that the payments to Mr. Cohen were for legal expenses.

There are several signs that charges may be imminent: Prosecutors have given Mr. Trump denied the opportunity to testify, a right given to people facing indictment, and questioned nearly all the key players in the hush money saga before a grand jury.

Mr. denied Trump has denied all wrongdoing and has denied having an affair with Ms. Daniels.

Any arrest and processing of Mr. Trump is likely to combine the routine steps that every defendant experiences with fingerprinting, taking photos with the luxury afforded to a former president, whose every move is attended by the US Secret Service.

It is unclear what types of relief Mr. Trump will receive. It is standard for defendants arrested on felony charges to be handcuffed, but exceptions can be made. While he awaits his court appearance, possibly for security reasons, he will be held in an interview room or other confined area, rather than in a holding cell. And after being arraigned Mr. Trump, he will almost certainly be released without spending any time behind bars, as the indictment will likely contain only non-violent felony charges.

Early Saturday morning, there was little evidence that Mr. Trump for the protests were accepted by extremist groups.

But Ali Alexander, a prominent organizer of Stop the Steal rallies following the 2020 election, reposted a message on his Telegram channel on Saturday suggesting he supported a mass demonstration to protect Mr. Trump.

In the past, I said if Trump was arrested or under threat of a perp walk, 100,000 patriots should close all routes to Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Alexander wrote. Now I am retired. I will still pray for him!

Without the platform provided by the White House or the machinery of a major political campaign, it is unclear how many people Mr. Trump could reach, let alone mobilize, through Truth Social.

And it remained unclear whether he would repeat his call for action or raise the stakes with more aggressive language. But his political allies made it clear this week that they were preparing for a political war with Mr. Bragg.

Representative Elise Stefanik of New York, the third-ranking House Republican and another close ally of Mr. Trumps, on Saturday morning that the investigation is an attempt to silence and suppress the will of voters who support President Trump and the America First Movement.

But two of the more bombastic Republican allies of Mr. Trump, Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Matt Gaetz of Florida, declined to repeat his call for protests. Mr. offered Gaetz of a dismissive analysis of the case on Twitter, and Ms. Greene followed by saying, We don’t need to protest about Communists Democrats planning to arrest Mr. Trump.

Attacked by Mr. Trump is Mr. Bragg, who is Black, as a racist for months. Mr. won Bragg of a conviction for tax fraud against the Trump Organization last year, though he did not personally charge Mr. Trump.

Some of the supporters of Mr. The Trumps responded with their own approval of violence after FBI agents, acting on a search warrant, descended on Mar-a-Lago, his private club and residence in Florida, in August and took box of documents in an investigation into former presidents handling classified material.

Days after the manhunt, a gunman in Ohio who had posted online about his anger at what happened at Mar-a-Lago tried to break into an FBI field office outside Cincinnati. He was later killed in a standoff with local officials.

The unexpected Saturday morning salvo from the former president provided a preview of the kind of turmoil Mr. Bragg if he proceeds with an indictment.

Mr. Bragg, a former federal prosecutor and deputy New York attorney general, has some history of prosecuting public officials. But he is unaccustomed to dealing with a figure as high-profile, erratic and pugilistic as the former president, and it is unclear how his office will deal with future outbursts from Mr. Trump.

Ben Fenwick contributed reporting.

[ad_2]