The first of four criminal trials involving former President Donald Trump is scheduled to start on Monday as New York prosecutors have accused him of falsifying business records related to a hush money payment to adult actress Stormy Daniels in the lead-up to the 2016 presidential election.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg brought the 34-count indictment roughly a year before the trial, charging Trump with felony counts of falsifying records “to conceal criminal activity, including attempts to violate state and federal election laws.”
Trump has denied all wrongdoing, as well as the alleged affair with Daniels. He also maintained that contrary to Bragg’s accusations, his payments were part of a legitimate retainer agreement with his former attorney Michael Cohen.
The trial comes as Trump’s legal team is pressing the Supreme Court to rule he’s immune from prosecution in his federal election trial, wherein the Justice Department accused him of attempting to defraud the United States on Jan. 6, 2021. Trump attempted to halt the New York trial pending the Supreme Court’s decision but was rejected by Judge Manuel Merchan.
Merchan and the former president clashed in recent weeks as the latter highlighted work by the judge’s daughter at a political consulting firm that’s helped Democrats. An updated gag order by Merchan prevented Trump from speaking about his daughter.
It’s just the latest gag order Trump has encountered, raising questions about his free expression as a leading candidate for president.
Former Assistant U.S. Attorney Kevin O’Brien told The Epoch Times that “judges have been issuing gag orders for months. I haven’t seen too much of an impact on [Trump’s] conduct.” He added that Merchan “may have to hold him in contempt, and fine him substantially.”
The Trump campaign has raised multiple concerns about bias by Merchan, who donated to President Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign and other left-leaning groups. Merchan refused to recuse himself from the case despite requests from the former president.
Will Chamberlain, an attorney with the Article III Project was skeptical about a jury convicting Trump. Chamberlain said that “New York isn’t D.C. in the same way. There are there are still plenty of Republicans who live in New York. So, I don’t think it'll be as straightforward to convict him as it would be in a jurisdiction like D.C.”
He could request that the jury receive the option to convict him of the lesser-included misdemeanor, instead of felony, offenses. In New York, Class A misdemeanors like this carry a maximum penalty of one year in prison.
Former federal prosecutor Neama Rahamani told The Epoch Times: “It’s certainly possible that Trump successfully reduces the charges to misdemeanors. The tax and campaign finance violations are a legal stretch, and juries could easily reject those arguments.”
Trump said yesterday that he would testify in this case. Constitutional law expert John Shu told The Epoch Times that he would be better off not testifying since Bragg could use it as an opportunity to pick him apart and charge him with perjury.
“The entire country will be watching the trial and if he doesn’t take the stand, people will think he is guilty,” Rahmani told The Epoch Times.
An acquittal, though perceived as unlikely, would mark a victory for Trump heading into the rest of his trials and the November elections.
