As per authorities, Donald Trump bribed a doorman $30,000 to bury a report about a secret child he claimed the former president fathered out of wedlock.
Trump, 76, made history on Tuesday when he appeared in a New York court as the first US president to be charged with a crime.
He sat stony-faced and mute before resolutely responding “not guilty” to 34 counts of felony business record-falsification.
Subsequently, Todd Blanche, his attorney, told the press, “We’re going to fight it.
We’ll battle valiantly against it.
The judge set the next court hearing for December 4 and declined to impose a gag order, meaning both parties are free to discuss the case in the media.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said afterwards the charges relate to a ‘conspiracy to undermine the integrity of the 2016 election’ – which Trump eventually won.
He is said to have ‘orchestrated a scheme’ to ‘purchase negative information’ – known as ‘catch and kill’ – in violation of election laws and then covered it up with fake business entries.
The indictment was finally unsealed and reveal the charges centre on alleged payoffs to two women – porn star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal – and a Trump Tower doorman.
Prosecutors claim the employee was paid $30,000 after trying to sell information about an alleged child fathered by Trump outside of his marriage.
The investigation also concerns alleged payments of $130,000 and $150,000 to Daniels and McDougall respectively.
Both say they had affairs with the married Trump years before he entered politics.
Trump denies the claims as well as any wrongdoing involving payments and has called the prosecution a ‘witch hunt’.
On the way to court he described the experience as ‘surreal’, writing on his Truth Social page: ‘WOW, they are going to ARREST ME. Can’t believe this is happening in America. MAGA!’
Wearing his signature dark suit and red tie, Trump cut a more sombre figure as he was pictured filing past police through a hallway into the courtroom to be arraigned.
He was fingerprinted and processed but no mugshot is believed to have been taken.
That did not stop his presidential campaign team seeking to cash in on the proceedings by selling t-shirts emblazoned with fake ones along with the words ‘not guilty’.
They are up for sale on the official Trump 2024 website for around $36 each.
Trump earlier used his social media page to renew his attacks on Juan Merchan, the acting New York Supreme Court judge overseeing the case, branding him ‘highly partisan’.
New York City was braced for protests in response to the prosecution, and pro-Trump and anti-Trump demonstrators were split into separate pens outside the courthouse to keep the peace.
People crowded around along a gate at a park outside the courthouse where hundreds of media members camped out waiting.
Protesters waved flags occasionally and blew horns but were largely calm as they waited for the indictment to be unsealed and for Trump’s arraignment and processing.
What is Trump charged with and what’s next?
WHAT’S THIS CASE ABOUT?
The grand jury spent weeks investigating money paid during Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign to two women who alleged that they had extramarital sexual encounters with him.
Trump has denied the allegations.
His former lawyer Michael Cohen, who testified as a key prosecution witness, paid Daniels $130,000 through a shell company he set up and was then reimbursed by Trump, whose company logged the repayments as legal expenses.
Earlier in 2016, Cohen also arranged for former Playboy model Karen McDougal to be paid $150,000 by the publisher of the supermarket tabloid the National Enquirer, which squelched her story in a journalistically dubious practice known as ‘catch and kill’.
WHAT’S AN INDICTMENT?
An indictment is the formal charge brought against someone after a grand jury — which is made up of members of the community — votes and enough members agree there’s sufficient evidence to charge someone with a crime.
The indictment against Trump remains sealed, as is standard in New York before an arraignment. But once the document is made public, it will lay out the crime or crimes that Trump is accused of committing.
Sometimes indictments include a lengthy narrative with lots of details about the allegations, while others are more basic and just outline the charges a defendant is facing.
WHAT ARE THE CHARGES?
Trump is facing multiple charges of falsifying business records, including at least one felony offense, according to two people who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss information that isn’t yet public.
Under the law, prosecutors must prove there was an ‘intent to defraud’.
The felony falsifying business records offense requires prosecutors to prove that the records were falsified with the intention of committing, aiding or concealing a second crime.
It’s not clear yet what prosecutors allege the second crime to be, but experts have said it is probably some kind of campaign finance violation.
WHAT’S AN ARRAIGNMENT?
An arraignment is generally the first time a defendant appears in court after being charged.
The judge will tell Trump the charges against him and advise him of his right to go to trial and other things.
Trump will enter a plea of not guilty — as is standard for defendants to do at arraignment. The indictment is expected to be unsealed upon his arraignment.
Trump is expected to walk out of the courtroom because the charges against him don’t require that bail be set in New York.
It’s possible — but unlikely — that Judge Juan Merchan could decide that Trump is a flight risk and order him held, with or without bail, though Trump’s lawyers would vigorously fight that.
WHAT WILL TRUMP’S DEFENSE BE?
Trump’s lawyers have vowed to ‘vigorously fight this political prosecution in court’.
Defense attorney Joe Tacopina has described Trump as a victim of extortion who had to pay the money because the allegations were going to be embarrassing to him. But he says it had nothing to do with the campaign.
Trump will no doubt try to fight the case on multiple fronts. He may try to have the case moved out of Manhattan or New York City entirely — arguing he can’t get a fair trial there — though it’s rare for judges to agree to do that.
Trump may also argue that the statute of limitations has passed.
He has complained that the statute of limitations ‘long ago expired’ because the hush money payments and Cohen’s reimbursements happened more than six years ago.
New York’s statute of limitations for most felonies is five years. For misdemeanors, it’s just two years. But in New York, the clock can stop on the statute of limitations when a potential defendant is continuously outside the state.
Trump visited New York rarely over the four years of his presidency and now lives mostly in Florida and New Jersey.
WHAT ARE THE POLITICAL RAMIFICATIONS FOR TRUMP?
Neither the indictment itself nor a conviction would prevent Trump from running for or winning the presidency in 2024.
Already, the charges have been a boon to his fundraising. The campaign announced Friday evening that it had raised over $4 million in the 24 hours after the indictment became public, far smashing its previous record after the FBI search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club.
Trump’s team over the weekend blasted out emails full of supportive comments from dozens of top Republicans, many of whom had already been supportive of him leading up to the indictment.
Those likely to be facing off with Trump in next year’s GOP primary contests have also slammed the prosecution.
Former Vice President Mike Pence called the indictment ‘an outrage’ and ‘nothing more than a political prosecution’.
Former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley said on Twitter that the indictment ‘is more about revenge than it is about justice’.
Biotech investor Vivek Ramaswamy, who is also seeking the GOP presidential nomination, called the indictment ‘a dark moment in American history’.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis on Saturday accused District Attorney Alvin Bragg of weaponizing the law ‘for political purposes’ to bring a case against a former president, never mentioning Trump by name.
Georgia Republican Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, one of Trump’s staunchest supporters in Congress, organised a rally at the park, but it was tough to hear her over the throng of people gathered.
Trump is scheduled to return to Mar-a-Lago to hold a rally in which he is set to be joined by supporters as he seeks to use the criminal charges as a boost in his bid to return to the White House.
A conviction in the case would not prevent him from running for or winning the presidency in 2024.
He has denied any wrongdoing and has blasted the investigation as part of a years-long ‘witch hunt’ aimed at damaging his candidacy.