Trump was charged with 34 felony counts in the hush money scheme

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NEW YORK (AP) — A stone-faced Donald Trump made an important courtroom appearance Tuesday as he faced a 34-count felony indictment accusing him of a scheme to bury allegations of extramarital affairs that have surfaced. in his first White House campaign.

The arraignment in a Manhattan courtroom was a stunning — and humbling — spectacle for the first former president to face criminal charges. As Trump watched silently, prosecutors accused him bluntly of criminal behavior and set the stage for a possible criminal trial in the city where he became a celebrity decades ago.

The indictment centers on allegations that Trump falsified internal business records at his private company while trying to cover up an effort to illegally influence the 2016 election by arranging payments that silenced claims of possible harm his candidacy. It includes 34 counts of fudging records related to checks Trump sent to his personal attorney and problem solver to reimburse him for his duty to pay a porn actor who said he had extramarital sex. encounter with Trump a few years ago.

“The defendant, Donald J. Trump, falsified New York business records to conceal an illegal conspiracy to undermine the integrity of the 2016 presidential election and other violations of election laws,” said Assistant District Attorney Christopher Conroy.

Trump, somber and silent as he entered and exited the Manhattan courtroom, said “not guilty” in a steady voice as he faced a judge who warned him to refrain from rhetoric that could inflame or cause trouble. in civil. All told, an unhinged Trump, who weeks before Tuesday’s arraignment attacked the case against him as political persecution, uttered just 10 words in the courtroom. He appeared to be glaring for a time at Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, the prosecutor who brought the case.

On his return to his Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, where he delivered a primetime address to hundreds of supporters, Trump again protested his innocence and insisted on his Truth Social platform that the “hearing shocked many because they have no ‘surprises,’ and therefore, no case.”

In his speech, Trump again criticized the prosecution and attacked in bitter terms the prosecutor and the judge presiding over the case despite being warned hours earlier about incendiary rhetoric. In a sign that other investigations are weighing on him, Trump also directed his speech on a broadside against a separate Justice Department investigation into the mishandling of classified documents.

“I never thought anything like this could happen in America,” Trump said of the indictment in New York. “This fake case was brought only to interfere with the upcoming 2024 elections and it should be dropped immediately.”

The crowd at Mar-a-Lago included supporters like failed Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake and longtime ally Roger Stone. Trump’s wife Melania was not by his side and was not seen with him in New York either.

Still, the indictment amounts to a stunning reckoning for Trump after years of scrutiny over his personal, business and political dealings. It shows how even as Trump seeks to reclaim the White House in 2024, he is being overshadowed by investigations related to his conduct in the two previous elections, with prosecutors in Atlanta and Washington scrutinizing the efforts of Trump and his allies to undo the 2020 presidential election. — probes that may cause more charges.

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 unclear whether a judge would impose any prison time if Trump is convicted. . The next court date is Dec. 4 — two months before Republicans begin their nominating process in earnest — and Trump is expected to appear again.

A conviction will not prevent Trump from running for or winning the presidency in 2024.

The arraignment also delved into Trump’s rhetoric in the case, with prosecutors at one point giving printouts of his social media posts to the judge and defense attorneys as Trump looked on. Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan did not impose a gag order but told Trump’s lawyers to urge him to refrain from posts that could incite trouble.

The broad outline of the case, which focuses on a scheme prosecutors say began months into his 2015 candidacy, has long been known, as his celebrity past clashed with his presidential ambitions.

Although prosecutors have expressed confidence in the case, a conviction is uncertain due to the legal complexities of the allegations, the application of state election laws to a federal election and the likely reliance on prosecutors on a key witness, Trump’s former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen, who pleaded guilty in 2018 to making false statements.

It centers on payments to two women, porn star Stormy Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal, who said they had extramarital sexual encounters with Trump years ago, as well as to a Trump Tower doorman who claim that there is a story about a child that he claims is the former president is single.

“Not just a fee. It is 34 false statements and business records that were concealing criminal conduct,” Bragg told reporters, when asked how the three separate cases were connected.

All 34 counts against Trump relate to a series of checks written to Cohen to reimburse him for his role in paying Daniels. Those payments, made over a 12-month period, were recorded in various internal company documents as being for a legal retainer that prosecutors say did not exist. Cohen testified before the grand jury and is expected to be a star prosecution witness.

Nine of those monthly checks were paid from Trump’s personal accounts, but records related to them are kept in the Trump Organization’s data system.

Prosecutors say Trump’s first instance of directing hush money payments came in the fall of 2015, when a former Trump Tower doorman tried to sell information about an alleged illegitimate child. of Trump’s married father.

David Pecker, a friend of Trump and the publisher of the National Enquirer, made a $30,000 payment to the doorman to obtain exclusive rights to the story, pursuant to an agreement to protect Trump during his presidential campaign, according to accusation. Pecker’s company later determined that the doorman’s story was false, but allegedly enforced the doorman’s confidentiality at Cohen’s request until after Election Day.

Trump has denied having sexual relations with Daniels and McDougal and has denied any wrongdoing related to the payments.

Tuesday’s schedule, with its striking mix of legal and political items on the calendar, represents a new split-screen reality for Trump as he submits to the tough demands of the American criminal justice system while displaying aura of defiance and victimhood in celebrations of campaign events.

Wearing his signature dark suit and red tie, Trump turned and waved to the crowd outside the building before going inside to be fingerprinted and processed. He arrived at the courthouse in an eight-car motorcade from Trump Tower, communicating his anger at the process in real time.

“To Lower Manhattan, the Courthouse,” he posted on his Truth Social platform. “It was SURREAL — WOW, THEY ARRESTED ME. I can’t believe this is happening in America. Swollen!”

Afterwards, Trump’s lawyer Todd Blanche told reporters it was a “sad day for the country.”

“You don’t expect this to happen to someone who has been president of the United States,” he said.

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Tucker and Weissert reported from Washington. Associated Press journalists Jill Colvin, Bobby Caina Calvan, Larry Neumeister, Karen Matthews, Larry Fleisher, Deepti Hajela, Julie Walker, Ted Shaffrey, David R. Martin, Joe Frederick and Robert Bumsted in New York; Colleen Long and Michael Balsamo in Washington; Adriana Gomez Licon in Palm Beach, Florida; and Terry Spencer in Palm Beach, Florida, contributed to this report.

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Follow AP’s coverage of former President Donald Trump at https://apnews.com/hub/donald-trump.

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