Former US President, Donald Trump has become the first to undergo criminal trial, facing 34 felony counts of falsifying business records.
The case centers around hush money paid to adult film actress, Stormy Daniels during his 2016 presidential bid, in order to stop Daniels from going public about what she claimed was an affair with him, which he denies.
Prosecutors claim that Trump had his attorney, Michael Cohen, pay $130,000 to a Daniels attorney in order to buy her silence.
He allegedly repaid Cohen for the payments but listed them as legal fees.
This would, prosecutors say, violate campaign finance law because the payments were intended to keep valuable information away from US voters right before the 2016 election.
Similarly, prosecutors say that Trump participated in a “catch and kill” scheme with the National Enquirer to buy another affair story – this one from the Playboy model Karen McDougall – in order to not publish it.
The case is one of four indictments that Trump faces and is the first to go to trial, putting his legal problems directly before jurors and the public.
He has pleaded not guilty in each case.
Trump walked into the courtroom for jury selection in his criminal trial with his legal team including Todd Blanche, Emil Bove, Susan Necheles and Gedalia Stern.
Also in his entourage is senior Trump campaign adviser, Steven Cheung.
Protests were taking place outside the Manhattan courthouse both in support of and against Donald Trump.
One group of demonstrators is carrying a banner that reads “No one is above the law”, and another group is calling on the judge, Juan Merchan, to recuse himself from the case.
Meanwhile, Judge Juan Merchan denied the defense motion to recuse himself from the case.
In a one-page court filing dated 1 April, Trump’s lawyers called on Merchan to remove himself from the case, arguing the judge’s daughter’s work for a political consultancy with Democratic clients poses a conflict of interest.
Last year, Trump made a similar request for Merchan to recuse himself, but the judge denied the bid after an ethics panel found that his daughter’s work did not pose reasonable questions about his impartiality.
Trump’s lawyers also requested that the trial not be held on May 17, 2024, so that the former President may attend his son Barron’s high school graduation.
A Trump lawyer also requested the trial not be held June 3, 2024, so that he could attend his own son’s graduation.
Merchan said that he was not prepared to rule on either request, but that if the trial proceeds as planned he is willing to adjourn for one or both days.
“It really depends on how we’re doing on time and where we are in the trial,” Merchan said.
Assault On America
Before he walked into the courtroom, Trump attacked the case as he addressed reporters briefly.
He said, “This is an assault on America, nothing like this has ever happened before, there’s never been anything like it.”
“Every legal scholar said this case is nonsense, it should have never been brought, it doesn’t deserve anything like this,” Trump insisted, though as many legal scholars have noted, the Manhattan district attorney regularly prosecutes falsification of business records.
“There is no case and I’ve said it people that don’t necessarily follow or like Donald Trump said this is an outrage that this case was brought,” he stressed.
“This is political persecution this is a persecution like never before, nobody has ever seen anything like it and again it’s a case that should have never been brought, it’s an assault on America and that’s why I am very proud to be here.
“This is an assault on our country and it’s a country that’s failing, it’s a country that’s run by an incompetent man and is very much involved in this case.”
Donald Trump
“This is really an attack on a political opponent, that is all it is, so I’m very honored to be here, thank you very much,” he added.
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