The first-ever indictment of a president — sitting or former — reportedly may be imminent. The New York Times on Thursday afternoon reported that a Manhattan grand jury had voted to indict former President Donald Trump for his role in a five-year-old scandal: the $130,000 hush money payment to Stormy Daniels.
The Times report, based on five sources familiar with the case, said that an indictment would “likely be announced in the coming days.” Prosecutors working for Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg will reportedly soon ask Trump “to surrender and to face arraignment on charges that remain unknown for now.”
Bragg’s case reportedly alleges that the Trump Organization falsely logged the payment to Daniels as legal expenses so it wouldn’t have to be disclosed as money benefiting Trump’s presidential campaign. One specific charge would likely be falsification of business records, a misdemeanor offense in New York. But, per the Times, Bragg’s team has considered arguing that these business records were falsified to cover up another crime — which could mean Trump would be charged with a felony.
You may be thinking: “Stormy Daniels … That’s a name I’ve not heard in a long time.” Indeed.
The world first learned of Daniels in 2018, when the Wall Street Journal broke news that Trump Organization lawyer Michael Cohen had arranged the payment, made shortly before the 2016 election so the adult film actress wouldn’t go public with her claim to have had an affair with Trump. Cohen, already under investigators’ scrutiny, eventually pleaded guilty in August 2018 to violating federal campaign finance laws with that payment and others, in charging documents that famously identified Trump as “Individual-1.”
Cohen claimed he’d made the illegal payment at Trump’s direction, so there was much speculation about whether Trump was on the hook for violating campaign finance law too. But instead, the case fizzled out. A federal…
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