Donald Trump is expected to submit to processing after his new indictment early next week, according to new details. (UPDATE: Available information reveals Trump’s first court appearance is scheduled for 2:15 p.m. local time on Tuesday.)
The indictment, approved by a grand jury on Thursday, includes what are reportedly nearly three dozen charges related to falsifying business records, an alleged offense in turn related to hush money that was given to Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 presidential election. The funds were in connection to an affair she purportedly had with Trump, and the money already helped lead to a criminal case at the federal level against Michael Cohen, a former ally to the ex-president who has since provided prosecutors with what were clearly copious amounts of information, considering the many times he was interviewed. Trump could face time in jail if he is eventually found guilty, and other witnesses who’ve provided testimony include Kellyanne Conway and David Pecker, formerly of the National Enquirer.
The New York Times was among the sources with details on what would be Trump’s expected surrender to authorities. “Former President Trump is expected to turn himself in on Tuesday for arraignment on the indictment in State Supreme Court in Manhattan, according to one of his lawyers, Susan R. Necheles,” the outlet’s William Rashbaum said in a live blog. Further details about the contents of the charges against Trump will be made available in tandem with his arraignment taking place what this information indicates will be early next week.
Trump predictably took to raging online, saying basically nothing he hadn’t already pushed someplace else. Prior to news of the indictment, online comments of his seemed to suggest he was taking the lack of action as indication the case was at least potentially falling apart, something for which it didn’t seem the ex-president ever had any evidence — just conjecture. Amid these developments, he’s still facing the civil trial next month on rape allegations from writer E. Jean Carroll and a trial set for later this year on the civil case brought by New York state Attorney General Letitia James over allegedly expansive fraud at the Trump business involving false claims about the values of dozens of company assets. And that doesn’t even include the several other criminal investigations into Trump that also remain active elsewhere.
