Donald Trump appears on Tuesday (4) at a hearing with a judge in Manhattan to hear the charges he will be sued in the case of a payment to buy the silence of a porn actress, in the first criminal indictment against a former US president. U.S.
The 76-year-old Republican arrived in New York on Monday aboard his private plane. He left his mansion in Mar-a-Lago, Florida, where he repeated that he is the victim of a “witch hunt” in the middle of the campaign to try to return to the White House in the 2024 elections, in which this indictment appears with unpredictable consequences.
The target of two attempts to impeach the US Congress when he was president (2017-2021), Trump was summoned to appear in the Superior Court of Manhattan at 2:15 pm (3:15 pm Brasília time), where, like any indicted citizen, he will be photographed and leave fingerprints registered.
Judge Juan Merchán – who was also the instructor of another case against the Trump Organization, for tax fraud, at the end of last year – will read the accusations in the lawsuit, which remain confidential.
The judge is expected to allow the press to photograph Trump for a few minutes in court before the hearing begins.
– Innocent –
According to the lawyers, Trump will plead not guilty and the case should proceed to trial, on a date that has yet to be determined and which will undoubtedly be one of the most heavily covered cases in the history of the country.
Trump is accused of paying porn star Stormy Daniels $130,000 before the 2016 election to buy her silence for an alleged extramarital affair that took place 10 years earlier, which the businessman has always denied.
“Biden and his ‘people’ knew” of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s intentions to “go after Trump,” the Republican wrote on his Truth Social network on Monday. He also called the prosecutor a “racist”.
The former president says it’s impossible to get a fair trial in his hometown, which is governed by the Democratic Party, after Bragg’s decision to impeach him last Thursday when he confirmed a grand jury’s decision.
The attorney is expected to hold a news conference after Trump’s hearing.
– More journalists than followers –
Faced with fears of disturbances, such as those that occurred on January 6, 2021, when thousands of Trump supporters invaded the Capitol in Washington, New York police are on high alert and have isolated the vicinity of Trump Tower and the Superior Court of south of Manhattan, where for the first time a former American president will sit in the dock.
While there are no “credible threats” to New York, Mayor Eric Adams, backed by law enforcement commanders, has urged potential “agitators” to control themselves, in particular radical congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has called for a show of support for the tycoon to the vicinity of the court.
Journalists far outnumber the few Trump supporters who have turned up so far to express support.
On 5th Avenue, a group of supporters of the former president displayed a banner with the phrase: “Finish the Wall, Trump 24”, in reference to the wall on the border with Mexico to prevent immigration.
Among the protesters was Vito Dichiara, 71, a pensioner who accused the attorney general of conspiring to prevent Trump’s return to the White House and repeated Trump’s false claims that Democrats stole the 2020 election.
“I’m here to support Donald Trump, former president and future president of the United States,” he told AFP.
The Stormy Daniels case is just one of the cases threatening the former president, who is also being investigated for pressuring public officials to annul Joe Biden’s victory in 2020, with a recorded phone call in which he asked the Secretary of State of Georgia to ” found” enough votes to overturn the result.
Trump is also under investigation for his possible role in the January 6, 2021 insurrection on Capitol Hill, as well as his custody of classified documents after leaving the White House.
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