Former President Donald Trump Indicted By New York Grand Jury
Former President Donald Trump has been indicted as the long-awaited decision from an New York grand jury has gone public.
NBC News:
A grand jury in New York voted to indict former President Donald Trump, three sources familiar with the matter said Thursday, marking the first time a former president has faced criminal charges.
The case centers on a $130,000 payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels during the closing days of the 2016 presidential campaign. Daniels claimed she slept with the married Trump in 2006, a claim the former president has denied. Trump classified his reimbursement of the payout as legal expenses.
The exact charge or charges is unknown because indictments are typically filed in court under seal after a grand jury’s vote in New York.
The Manhattan district attorney was known to be focusing on a felony charge of falsifying business records. That charge carries a maximum prison sentence of four years.
Trump has denied any wrongdoing and called the investigation by Democratic Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s office a continuation of the partisan “witch hunt” against him. He’s also accused Bragg, who’s Black, of being a “racist.”
Earlier this month, Trump said he’d be arrested on March 21 and issued a call on his social media website Truth Social for his supporters to “PROTEST, PROTEST, PROTEST!!!” In recent days, Trump has ratcheted up his rhetoric, warning on Friday of “potential death and destruction“ if he gets indicted.
Trump has said he has no plans to drop out of the 2024 presidential race even if he gets indicted. “Absolutely not,” he told reporters at an event earlier this month.
Holy cow!
Newsrooms rejoice!Report
Welp.
This room used to have oxygen in it.Report
If I were a corporation/government with some bad news to release, I’d release it tomorrow.Report
I guess we see what happens. My understanding is of the investigations that could lead to charges this will he the hardest to prove. If any actually get him my money is still on Georgia.Report
“The power to ignore him was within you the whole time.”Report
BhahahahaReport
John Cole over at Balloon Juice has a good take, in saying that the funniest part is he didn’t even need to do the payoffs.
80% of the Republican base knows he banged a porn star while married, is perfectly comfortable knowing it, and would happily gather the kids round the tee vee to watch him do it again on pay per view and will crawl over broken glass to vote for him in 2024.
He is definitely going to be the 2024 Republican nominee.Report
Unless he’s convicted by then.Report
Amazingly, there’s nothing that prevents someone from running from inside a jail cell.Report
60 Minutes did a story on this….iirc….Donald invited her up to his hotel room for dinner, and after dinner, he walked into the bedroom. She followed, with a certain amount of apprehension, but still slept with him.
He assumed the sale. She went along. Of all the crappy stuff that he’s done, nailing her is kinda far down the list….but hey, it’s Trump, and we must feed the Trump haters with any red meat we can…Report
Its not the nailing. Its the potentially using campaign funds to pay for her silence about and then perhaps trying to write it off on his business taxes.Report
Talk to me after an audit of every single candidate for president has been done. I’m sure you can find enough “legal shenanigans” to fill an ocean. You can accuse him of being inept, but I doubt there’s much difference between him and all the rest.Report
DeSantis goes all in on the anti-Semitism
https://twitter.com/JakeMGrumbach/status/1641582164595855362?s=20Report
I don’t see the connection to either DeSantis nor anti-Semitism.
Did you post the correct link?Report
Maybe this one? https://twitter.com/IntelDoge/status/1641576739938639872?s=20Report
“The State of Florida will not assist…”
Translation: The State of Florida is not involved, at all, and is not going to get involved. Trump had already said he’s going to “surrender” to the media sh*t show.Report
I expected Florida not to assist even though Trump is apparently going to self-surrender. What was anti-Semitic was this part: “given the questionable circumstances at issue with this Soros-backed Manhattan prosecutor and his political agenda.”
Don’t play daftReport
Daft is claiming that Soros is above criticism, or that the Jewish vote doesn’t matter in Florida.Report
I’m still missing it. Is Soros or the DA Jewish?
Soros is a famous supporter of Left wing causes, he’s the Left’s answer to the Koch brothers.
Looking him up I gather he’s of Jewish decent… which doesn’t change that he’s a famous funder of Leftism. If the DA were Right and bringing up charges on Obama we’d be hearing how it’s a plot from the Koch brothers.Report
I’m still missing it.
The people it is meant for aren’t.Report
The truest statement on OT today.Report
OK, so it’s for all those people who would be fine with Trump’s indictment except for the fact that the AG was financed by a Jewish guy. I’d need to see evidence that they’re more than .1% of the population and capable of reading a whole tweet.Report
I sometimes think the left really does only think about people as categories, so they assume that any criticism of a person is a criticism of the category.Report
Scroll up.Report
Matt Gaetz blames the indictment on the Sorosification of the Criminal Justice System: https://twitter.com/ndrew_lawrence/status/1641634342714720259?s=20Report
I have seen at least one report the indictment might be about business practices, in that he may have tried to write off the payments as a business expense. If so that will be a lot easier to prove and to convict.
Having said that I hope the DoJ and Georgia drop their indictments soon. He will have a tough time campaigning and running three trial defenses simultaneously.Report
RE: business expense
He did this, it wouldn’t be hard to prove it, however it’s a misdemeanor… unless it can be linked to a felony. Illegal campaign donations would be a felony.
The problems with that are extensive and make me wonder if the DA is just trying to get his name in the paper.
1) It’s not clear that a State DA can even charge someone with illegal federal campaign donations.
2) No one at a federal level has been interested in doing this, probably for good reason.
3) We already tried doing this about twenty years ago on a more clear case and it didn’t work then.
4) Claiming Trump wouldn’t have paid the bribe without the campaign is the case that needs to be made. Trump is a serial cheater on his wife and a serial cover it up by throwing money at it.
5) Trump can/will claim (correctly) he’s not an expert in campaign donations and had no idea this was illegal.
6) All of that is before the (likely) political motivations of this and the chances of one member of Trump’s fan club ending up on the jury.
This is an impossible case to make.
With the misdemeanor only, give him a thousand dollar fine and call it a win.Report
There are apparently 64 counts so it is not just about Stormy DanielsReport
Exactly. That was the gateway.Report
Telegram calls for a bloody civil war after Trump indictment: https://www.vice.com/en/article/5d9p9q/trump-indictment-civil-war-the-donaldReport
As is always the case, the question isn’t how many Republicans would take up weapons, but how many Republicans would stop them.
Hint: How many Republicans want to ban the statue of David? Very few.
How many Republicans will stop it from being banned?
It rounds to zero.Report