A New York grand jury
voted Thursday to indict Donald Trump for a $130,000 payment
to a porn star before the 2016 election and, for the first time in US history, a former president will be prosecuted for a crime.
Trump had said weeks ago that a New York jury planned to arrest him and denounced that he was wanted for justice.
He even called his followers to a mobilization that was not very successful.
It is difficult for him to be arrested
for the crime for which he is accused, but it will undoubtedly revitalize his supporters in his electoral campaign for the presidency in 2024.
The landmark indictment stems from the Manhattan district attorney's investigation into how the Trump Organization filed a refund to then-Trump lawyer and right-hand man Michal Cohen after Cohen paid Daniels to keep quiet about
an
alleged sexual encounter he claims to have had with Trump in 2006.
Trump was filming his television show, "The Apprentice," at the time of that alleged date, and was married to his current wife, Melania Trump, who had given birth to their son, Barron, a few months earlier.
The prono actress Stormy Daniels, in 2018. Photo AP
The problem
The issue is not whether or not Trump was cheating on his wife, or whether he paid to shut her up.
As it turns out, the Trump Organization described in its business records the reimbursement to Cohen
as a "legal expense"
and apparently that was not true but was a campaign-related expense.
Falsifying business records is normally a misdemeanor under New York law, but can be elevated to a felony if the misstatement was made to cover up another crime.
Trump denies having sex with Daniels or committing crimes of any kind.
Trump's prosecution in Manhattan comes more than four years after Cohen, who served him loyally for years before that, turned on Trump and began cooperating with federal, state and local law enforcement officials
in NY.
The indictment, which will be prosecuted by District Attorney Alvin Bragg's office, is the first of several criminal cases pursuing Trump, the leading contender for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination.
Trump is also under investigation by the United States Department of Justice on two separate offences.
One relates to his moves to nullify President Joe Biden's Electoral College victory in the 2020 election, as he made false claims of
widespread voter fraud
in the popular vote that year.
The other investigation focuses on Trump's disposal of classified White House documents, and whether he obstructed justice by keeping them at his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida, for more than a year while officials of the government sought his return.
A state attorney in Atlanta is also separately investigating Trump and several of his allies for their attempt to get Georgia officials to reverse
their 2020 loss to Biden in the state.
look also
Who is Stormy Daniels, the porn actress who put Donald Trump in check
The trial against Trump that could leave him in prison: a friend of the former president seeks to raise doubts in the case
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