Donald Trump is unlikely to be charged or “arrested” in New York this week, as he announced on Saturday. The public prosecutor’s office investigating the former President of the United States accused him on Thursday of having “roused false expectations” in the media in a case with unforeseeable political consequences.
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The 76-year-old Republican billionaire, who dreams of “taking back” the White House in 2024, faces trial before the New York State Justice and his Manhattan attorney, Alvin Bragg, in a $130,000 case against porn actress Stormy Daniels in 2016 , with whom he reportedly had an affair.
Donald Trump made a bang by assuring on his network Truth Social on Saturday that he would be “arrested” on Tuesday following a criminal complaint filed by District Attorney Bragg.
But nothing happened.
This did not prevent New York – its police, its judiciary and the press – from being suspended all week over the hypothetical appearance, indictment and even brief “arrest” of the 45th American President.
Which would be unprecedented in the United States.
lightning
Prosecutor Bragg, an elected Democrat who has served as the Manhattan Attorney’s Office since 2022 and heir to the Stormy Daniels case, remained silent.
But in a letter Thursday addressed to three Republican lawmakers, his services denounced the media and political thunderclap caused by Mr Trump on Saturday.
In this letter, consulted by AFP, the Manhattan Attorney’s Office is responding to those three House elected members who, in a letter dated March 20, subpoenaed Prosecutor Bragg to testify before Congress.
They accused the left-wing judge of having carried out “politically motivated prosecutions”.
“Your letter,” replies Mr Bragg’s secretary-general, Leslie Dubeck, “is an unprecedented interference in an ongoing local investigation.”
And it “came only after Donald Trump created a false expectation that he would be arrested the next day and after his lawyers appeared to urge you to intervene.”
“No fact provides a legitimate basis for a congressional investigation,” she sweeps.
charge dismissed
According to several media outlets such as the Washington Post, the New York judiciary has again postponed possible charges against Donald Trump until next week.
That decision must be voted on by a grand jury, a body of citizens with broad investigative powers that works with the prosecutor, who must comply and formally indict him.
This grand jury apparently did not meet on this case on Thursday, the last day of court week.
Self accused Mr Trump wouldn’t be “arrested” immediately anyway.
It would be several days before he showed up in Manhattan, which would no doubt be an unspeakable mess.
Throughout the week, authorities in New York had cordons set up in front of the courthouse and Trump Tower in Manhattan. To avoid any risk of clashes in a city with a history of violence, the Metropolitan Police Department (NYPD) has increased the “presence of uniformed officers.”
January 6, 2021
Mr Trump had called his supporters to “protest” on Saturday, recalling what he did in December 2020 and on January 6, 2021, the day his supporters attacked the Capitol in Washington, to run a presidential election without evidence “stolen,” according to him, from Democrat Joe Biden.
But there were only a few dozen protesters this week outside the courthouse and Trump Tower in New York, and outside Donald Trump’s home in Palm Beach, Florida.
In a recent post on Truth Social on Thursday, the former president reiterated that he was “100% innocent” and was being pursued by “the madmen of the far left,” warning: “Our country is being destroyed and they’re telling us to be peaceful.” remain “.
In fact, the Stormy Daniels case is complex.
The judiciary is trying to determine whether Mr. Trump is guilty of misrepresentation, a felony, or a violation of campaign finance laws, a felony, by paying money to this pornographic actress, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, just before her presidential election has victory in November 2016.
What sense? So that, according to the prosecutor, she had concealed an alleged extramarital relationship ten years earlier.
The key man in the case is Michael Cohen: a former attorney and now an enemy of Mr. Trump who paid off Stormy Daniels. He testified before the grand jury, and the actress also cooperated with the law.