In a dramatic hearing in New York hours earlier, the 76-year-old former US president entered a not-guilty
Trump, the current front-runner in the GOP primary for 2024, claimed that “radical left” prosecutors were out to get him “at any cost” from a stage draped in American flags within a sumptuous gold-and-cream ballroom.
Trump repeated applause lines that his fans hear frequently at his rallies and was met with the same raucous cheering and clapping in an oddly joyous atmosphere that looked at odds with the seriousness of the day’s events in Manhattan.
In order to cover up payments he allegedly made to adult film actress Stormy Daniels days before the 2016 election in order to cover up an alleged sexual encounter a decade earlier, Trump is being sued by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg for falsifying his company’s financial records.
For the same charge of fabricating company documents, Allen Weisselberg, Trump’s former top financial officer, is currently serving a five-month prison sentence.
The “darkest hours”
“Repeated and fraudulently falsifying New York company documents to conceal criminal behavior that concealed damaging facts from the voting public throughout the 2016 presidential election,” according to Manhattan prosecutors, is what Trump is accused of doing.
Details of hush money payments to Daniels, Playboy model Karen McDougal, and a former Trump Tower doorman who claimed to have information about a kid Trump had outside of marriage were contained in a “statement of facts” that was made public alongside the indictment.
Former Trump attorney Michael Cohen gave Daniels $130,000, while McDougal and the doorman each received $150,000 and $30,000 from AMI, the company that publishes the supermarket tabloid the National Enquirer.
plea to 34 felony counts, captivating the nation and starting the countdown to the first-ever criminal trial of an American president.
After returning to Mar-a-Lago, his beachside house in southern Florida, Trump addressed an audience of several hundred fundraisers, political allies, and other supporters. “I never believed anything like this could happen in America — never dreamed it could happen,” he said.
“The only crime I’ve ever committed was standing up for our country against those who want to do it harm,” It is a disgrace to our nation.
Trump and his supporters “also took efforts that mischaracterized, for tax purposes, the true nature of the funds,” according to Bragg.
Trump and his attorneys have charged Bragg with exaggerating the alleged wrongdoing in his description of it.
Even before taking out for his return to Florida, the former reality TV star wrote a fundraising email in which he claimed that since the news of his indictment surfaced, his campaign had raised over $10 million.
I can say that at least for this moment right now, I am in fantastic spirits, despite the fact that we are going through the darkest period in Our history, Trump added.
The first serving or former American president to face a criminal charge is the Republican who was twice impeached.
He had earlier pleaded not guilty to all charges in the Manhattan courthouse, speaking clearly while stooping over, occasionally seeming irritated but mostly cooperating.
“Election meddling”
A trial may begin as early as January, a month before the start of the presidential primaries, according to Judge Juan Merchan, though Trump’s attorneys have suggested they would prefer to delay it until next spring.
The hearing was a turning point for the US criminal and political systems, with a spectacle that was broadcast live on television and rival protesters gathering outside.
There was a large crowd there, with pro-Trump demonstrators shouting epithets at their rivals while wearing “MAGA” hats and clothing with the American flag on them.