Donald Trump Has Finally Been Indicted

Photo-Illustration: Intelligencer; Photo: Brandon Bell/Getty Images

Donald Trump has been indicted in Manhattan, making him the first former president in history to be charged with a crime. Trump is charged over his role in hush money payments made to Stormy Daniels during his 2016 presidential campaign in order to suppress her story of their alleged affair. The indictment is sealed, and the specific charges have not been unveiled, but prosecutors had been investigating whether he falsified business records to cover up the payment and violated campaign-finance law because the money was allegedly used to boost his White House run.

The case, brought by District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office, has been expected for some time as part of a yearslong investigation into Trump that started when he was president. Trump, 76, is expected to appear next week in a lower Manhattan courthouse, where he will be treated like any other defendant: Taken into custody, fingerprinted, photographed, and appear before a judge, where he will enter a plea and the conditions of his release will be set pending trial. Below are the latest updates on this still developing story.

When the grand jury voted to indict Trump, the indictment itself was placed under seal, meaning its contents are secret. Typically, the indictment is unsealed when a defendant makes an initial appearance in court to face the charges, which is expected to happen on Tuesday. To be sure, the fact that Trump was involved in paying hush money to Stormy Daniels has been known for years, though it is not yet clear how that translated into the criminal case brought against him. In the meantime, the only available clues are bits and pieces of reporting that appear to be sourced mainly from the side of prosecutors.

One such tidbit from CNN’s John Miller, who reports that Trump “faces more than 30 counts related to business fraud.” Another, from CBS News, is that Bragg’s office obtained documents during its investigation, including financial records and communications, which are not yet known to the public.

There is no word, so far, on the campaign-finance law violations Trump allegedly committed that would elevate misdemeanor business fraud to a felony.

Intelligencer’s Ed Kilgore explains how the indictment might impact Trump’s chances in the next presidential election:

Beyond that, it’s important to acknowledge from the get-go that there are two very different audiences whose reaction to these and related legal proceedings may matter down the road. Likely Republican primary voters are not expected to be shocked by this and future indictments and may actually rally around the 45th president, who has branded all the indictments in advance as “the witch-hunt” (the Trump fans in the main camera frame during his March 25 rally in Waco were holding “Witch Hunt” signs). A recent Marist poll found four of five self-identified Republicans accepting that very description for the “investigations” into Trump’s conduct that have been swirling around him lately. And even Trump critics and rivals among Republican elected officials have almost universally attacked such investigations as politically motivated and basically meritless.

The indictments could have a more corrosive effect, however, among the general electorate that will eventually determine Trump’s ultimate political fate, assuming he does win the nomination. Even in this broader universe, voter cynicism may help protect Trump from too much damage. A recent Quinnipiac poll about the very indictment we learned about today showed that pretty clearly

Read the rest of Ed’s analysis here.

Putting aside Trump’s characterization of a “witch hunt,” the hush money case brought against him appears to rest on an untested legal theory. The indictment is under seal, but it is well known that prosecutors were eyeing two laws that Trump allegedly violated. The first concerns falsifying business records, a misdemeanor. The second involves limits on how campaigns are financed, specifically limiting the value of contributions. In order to convict him of a felony by falsifying business records, it would have to be proven that he did so in order to conceal a violation of campaign-finance law. According to the New York Times, no such case has ever been brought and similar ones typically end in plea deals, instead of being tested in court. And the case could be subject to attacks by Trump’s team before trial that it is not valid under the law.

Notably, the federal prosecutors who charged Michael Cohen with breaking the law by making the payment to Stormy Daniels — the same conduct that is at issue in the state case — did not accuse Trump of breaking the law. There is also the matter of building a case around Cohen, who has issues with his credibility (not the least of which is previously pleading guilty to lying), as former federal prosecutor Ankush Khardori wrote a day before the indictment.

Bragg’s office said in a statement that it is negotiating with Trump’s attorneys to coordinate his surrender to authorities so may be arraigned in New York. (At that point, the indictment would have to be unsealed so he can enter a plea.) Trump defense attorney Susan Necheles later said that the former president is expected to turn himself in for arraignment on Tuesday.

Joe Tacopina, another Trump lawyer, told Bloomberg News that “Obviously we’re disappointed, but we will swiftly and aggressively fight these charges and pursue justice in this case.”

As is typical for defendants accused of non-violent crimes, Trump has not been subject to an arrest warrant and is being allowed to turn himself in.

Longtime legal pundit Alan Dershowitz, responding to the news of the indictment on former Trump White House press secretary Sean Spicer’s Newsmax show, speculated that Trump’s campaign might end up turning his inevitable mug shot into a poster. In the meantime, they’ve already sent out a fundraising appeal leveraging the indictment news:

Though a spokesperson for the city said there are “no credible threats” at this time, a full mobilization of the police department is under way. Earlier this month, Trump called for his supporters to protest and “take back our country,” in an echo of his rhetoric that inspired a mob to attack the U.S. Capitol.

In the weeks leading up to the grand jury’s decision, security was tight around the district attorney’s office with law enforcement putting up barriers in anticipation of potential protests. Bragg, whom Trump has hurled increasingly inflammatory rhetoric at, was seen leaving his office flanked by security on Thursday night after news of the indictment broke.

Columnist Jonathan Chait weighs in on Trump’s long-awaited indictment:

The foundation of any fair legal system is that everybody, even a criminal, has rights. The leaked details of the case against Trump reportedly being brought by Alvin Bragg are underwhelming and bordering on negligent. They seem to stitch together a decent misdemeanor case against Trump for false records (his disguising a payoff to one or potentially two women with whom he had affairs) and charging the payment as a campaign-finance violation. Unless there is more to Bragg’s case than has been reported, it smells of an effort to find a crime.

The indictment’s details matter tremendously. The sanctity of the rule of law hinges upon applying its force equally, without regard to the standing of the accused. This requirement goes both ways — Trump’s decades of using his power to steal and cheat is one form of corruption of the rule of law that cannot be resolved by locking him up over a charge no other person would likely have faced. Turnabout is not fair play.

Read the rest of Jon’s response here.

Benjamin Hart has rounded up some of the reaction from Trump’s allies, including Congresswoman Elise Stefanik, Senator Ted Cruz, and even one Trump rival, Florida governor Ron DeSantis.

About an hour after the news, which reportedly caught Trump aides off guard, the former president released a defiant statement from Mar-a-Lago attacking the indictment. “This is Political Persecution and Election Interference at the highest level in history,” Trump said, before suggesting, as he has in the past, that he is the victim of a “witch hunt” perpetrated by “Radical Left Democrats.”

In one of several posts Trump has made on his Truth Social account, the former president also claimed he won’t be able to get a fair trial in New York: “They only brought this Fake, Corrupt, and Disgraceful Charge against me because I stand with the American People, and they know that I cannot get a fair trial in New York!”

On October 8, 2016, a day after the release of the Access Hollywood tape of Trump bragging about groping women, porn star Stormy Daniels’s agent reached out to the National Enquirer to say that her client was open to sharing her story publicly about having sex with Trump years earlier.

The Enquirer alerted Michael Cohen, who had previously worked with the tabloid to bury Karen McDougal’s own story of an affair with Trump. The Enquirer purchased the rights to McDougal’s story for $150,000 in order to prevent her from discussing it — a process known as a “catch and kill.” This time, Cohen would have to pay himself, but instead of paying Daniels directly, he incorporated a shell company in Delaware called Essential Consultants to wire the money to her attorney before it was given to Daniels, according to federal prosecutors’ later description of the scheme. On a form to complete the transaction, Cohen falsely claimed that it was for a “retainer” for the attorney. Days before the election, The Wall Street Journal broke the story.

In early 2017, Cohen sought reimbursement from the Trump Organization, writing on at least one invoice that it was for a “retainer agreement” (referring to the money wired to Davidson) and other services rendered that January and February. The company obliged and accounted for the money paid to Cohen as “legal expenses.” Trump denies that the affair ever took place, but Cohen said Trump directed the payments to be made and agreed to reimburse him, which he or his trust did via a series of checks totaling $420,000, according to the New York Times.

In 2018, Cohen pleaded guilty to a number of federal crimes, including violating federal campaign-finance law with the hush money. In court papers, federal prosecutors said Cohen performed no legal work for the Trump Organization during the time period for which he was compensated.

In the days after Cohen’s guilty plea in 2018 to federal prosecutors, the district attorney’s office under Cyrus Vance Jr. started looking into the circumstances surrounding the payment made to Daniels. The inquiry quickly expanded to focus on larger aspects of Trump’s business dealings — particularly surrounding the Trump Organization. Vance and commentators had raised expectations that Trump himself would be indicted, but only the company and its CFO, Allen Weisselberg, were charged with tax fraud and convicted.

Bragg, a Democrat who was elected district attorney in 2021, insisted that, despite the departure of two prominent prosecutors over the lack of criminal charges for Trump for alleged financial crimes, his office’s criminal investigation into Trump was ongoing.

Then, in January, it was reported that Cohen was meeting with prosecutors for the first time in more than a year — an indication that the dormant hush-money inquiry was active again. Later that month, the office impaneled a grand jury to begin examining evidence. It heard testimony from David Pecker (former publisher of the National Enquirer), Davidson, and Kellyanne Conway, who once served as Trump’s campaign manager.

Cohen testified for two consecutive days at the end of the grand jury’s investigation and is likely to be the prosecution’s star witness despite his history of lying, including under oath before Congress. Following his testimony, Trump was invited to testify, but his team sent a former attorney of Cohen’s to shred his credibility instead. Though it seemed like the indictment was imminent — with Trump himself predicting his “arrest” two weeks ago and calling for protests — days of virtual silence from the grand jury led to speculation that the case was shriveling or would not even be brought after all.

This post has been updated.