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All 34 felony charges against Trump are identical, with each carrying the possibility of up to four years in prison, although judges rarely sentence defendants to jail for such offenses.

The indictment is a bare-bones document that simply recites the alleged offenses in boiler-plate language. However, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Braggs office also released a 14-page statement of facts laying out the case in greater detail.

Here are details from the groundbreaking court filings that could make or break the case of People v. Donald J. Trump.

Going into Tuesdays historic and much-previewed arraignment, a key mystery was exactly how Bragg planned to bring the charges as felonies. The charge at the heart of the case falsifying business records can amount to only a misdemeanor, but it becomes a felony if the defendant falsified the records to obscure a separate crime.

The most obvious candidate for that aggravating element is the admission from Trumps former lawyer, Michael Cohen, that he arranged a $130,000 payment to porn star Stormy Daniels in consultation with Trump and to aid Trumps 2016 presidential campaign.

The defendant Donald J. Trump repeatedly and fraudulently falsified New York business records to conceal criminal conduct that hid damaging information from the voting public during the 2016 presidential election, the statement of facts says.

The participants [in the scheme] violated election laws, the statement continues, though it does not explicitly cite which ones. The statement also mentions Cohens guilty plea in 2018 to two federal campaign finance crimes. And in a press release, Bragg said Trump and others sought to conceal attempts to violate state and federal election laws.

The references to federal election violations are virtually certain to be the focus of pre-trial motions from Trumps attorneys, who have contended publicly that this state-law offense cannot be piggybacked on a federal-law crime.

If defense attorneys prevail on such motions, it would not necessarily wipe out the criminal case against Trump. Instead, the case could remain as 34 misdemeanor charges. That would amount to a legal, public relations and political victory for Trump.

Such a result would further diminish the chances of Trump being jailed if found guilty. The maximum sentence on a second-degree falsifying business records charge is up to one year in prison on each count. A downgrading of the case to a misdemeanor might also aid Trumps efforts to delay a trial.

The charges against Trump do not include any tax fraud offenses that some legal experts said they hoped to see to buttress the seriousness of the case. However, the statement of facts Bragg filed along with the indictment makes a surprising claim: that Trump and his associates engaged in deception by paying New York state more in taxes than it was owed.

The participants also took steps that mischaracterized, for tax purposes, the true nature of the payments made in furtherance of the scheme, the statement says.

It alleges that Trump paid an increased reimbursement to Cohen a procedure known as grossing up the payment in order to compensate him for the taxes he would owe by booking the money as legal fees.

These alleged contortions resulted in Cohen paying about $180,000 in state and federal income taxes, when he may have not owed anything if Trump had simply reimbursed him for the $130,000 and the payment had been properly recorded. Thats because the reimbursement of money Cohen already paid to Daniels wouldnt have represented income for Cohen.

But recording the money, falsely, as legal fees subjected Cohen to significant income-tax liability meaning that any trickery the men engaged in may actually have benefitted state and federal coffers. That may be why Braggs team doesnt deem the practice fraud, and why no tax fraud or evasion charge was included in the indictment.

For Trump to be convicted of falsifying business records, the records at issue have to be, well, business records.

The New York law at issue requires that the falsification involve the records of an enterprise, and each count of the indictment claims that Trump falsified records kept and maintained by the Trump Organization.

The facts are more complicated. Its true that the checks sent to Cohen, which labeled the payments as legal expenses, were issued by employees working for Trumps business empire. But they were not charged to Trumps businesses. Instead, the payments were made from one of Trumps personal accounts or from a Trump family trust.

The key question, and one that is sure to feature in efforts by Trumps lawyers to derail the case, is whether documents that happened to pass through the Trump Organization or handled by Trump Organization personnel are automatically classified as business records, even if the source of the funds was Trumps personal accounts.

Braggs statement of facts declares that each check was processed by the Trump Organization and gives further details about how Cohen arranged payment from bookkeepers at the Trump companies. Prosecutors say at least two of the payments were approved by longtime Trump Organization chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg, who pleaded guilty to unrelated tax evasion charges in 2021.

The TO CFO approved the payment, and, in turn, the TO Controller sent the invoice to the Trump Organization Accounts Payable Supervisor (the TO Accounts Payable Supervisor) with the following instructions: Post to legal expenses. Put retainer for the months of January and February 2017 in the description, the prosecutors filing says.

Legal experts said they expect Trumps lawyers to argue to the judge and, if necessary, a jury that wholly personal expenses that are simply handled by an accountant or other clerical personnel dont become the records of an enterprise just by virtue of that process.

Kyle Cheney contributed to this report.

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The new revelations and key questions in the Trump indictment - POLITICO

At a glance, it was a fairly representative docket at Manhattans Criminal Courthouse, on Centre Street. DefendantD., male, thirty-four, charged with menacing and aggravated harassment. DefendantB., female, thirty-four, criminal obstruction of breathing or blood circulation. DefendantH., female, twenty-two, assault in the second degree. DefendantP., male, forty, sexual abuse in the first. D.W.I. Petit larceny. Criminal mischief. Theft of services. A grocery deliveryman alleged to have kicked someone in the back, for unknown reasons: released on his own recognizance. Tara Sukhu, the arraignment supervisor with the Legal Aid Society, said, over the phone, Its been pretty quiet. So far, so good.

Outside the seventeen-story building, it was anything but quiet. Helicopters hovered. Whistles and clanging persisted amid sign-waving and costume-flaunting behind police barricades: a parade with nowhere to go. Representative George Santos, no stranger to masquerades, fled the scene quickly, declaring it unbearable. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene brought a megaphone but soon retreated to her S.U.V., where she invoked the famous scofflaws Jesus and Mandela. The unsealing of an unprecedented indictment was imminent: From approximately June 2015 to November 2016, the Defendant was a candidate for the office of President of the United States. On January20, 2017, he became President. That would be DefendantT., male, seventy-six, charged with falsifying business records in the first degree.

Setting aside the politics (good or bad for 24?) and the optics (observers likened the Palm Beach airport stakeout to the pursuit of O.J.s white Bronco), the nature of Donald Trumps alleged crimes was old, if tawdry, news. Hush money, improperly classified. Or, in legalese, The purpose of the payment was to avoid negative attention to the defendants campaign by suppressing information about an allegedly sexual encounter between defendant and an adult-film actress. That was an Assistant District Attorney speaking, up in the rarefied air of the fifteenth floor, which had been reserved for the days most prominently accused, as a safety precaution. Unlike the other defendants, who stood, often cuffed, before a judge in Room 130, down near the metal detectors, the man from Mar-a-Lago was free to sit, fidget, and admire the starched cuffs of his lawyers shirts.

Tempting as it may have been to imagine a kind of upstairs-downstairs dichotomy, an eavesdropper with his eyes closed could have identified a fair amount of thematic convergence in the proceedings of Trumps arraignment and that of, say, a man with an outstanding warrant in Suffolk County who was said to have erupted in violence when a woman refused to show him the contents of her phone. A lot boils down to logistics.

Upstairs: I am just stating the obvious that having President Trump in this courtroom today is extraordinarily burdensome.

Downstairs: He simply could not get to Long Island. He would be eager for supervised release.

Upstairs: I expect all other defendants to appear in court, even high-profile defendants.

Downstairs: There are trains and buses in Suffolk County, counsel. There is a bus that goes directly to the courthouse.

Upstairs: I was not suggesting President Trump does not want to be here.

Downstairs: Defendant has clear disregard of court orders.

Upstairs: This defendant has made... irresponsible social-media posts that target various individuals involved in this matter, and even their families.

Downstairs: You are to have no contact by phone, by text message, through social media, do you understand?

Upstairs: I never met Stormy Daniels. I never spoke to Stormy Daniels. Oops. Not Trump there, believe it or not, but Joseph Tacopina, a.k.a. Joey Taco, seated at Trumps left, and sounding less like a lawyer than like a guilty husband. He was denying that he had a prior association with the adult-film actress that could pose a conflict. The courthouse has a way of visiting indignities on all but the robed.

Trump, released on his own unmistakable recognizance, isnt due back at Centre Street until December. In the meantime, he faces looming investigations in Georgia and in Washington, involving more substantive concerns, like election interference and insurrection. Trial handicappers, left to pore over the D.A.s narrative account in the Statement of Facts, would do well to consider that, even with the briefest of arraignments, narratives can diverge. Take the case of a Defendant R., who arrived in handcuffs an hour after Trumps departure, with hair similarly aloft. According to the prosecutor, who asked that bail be set at ten thousand dollars, he was an incorrigible thief, a thirteen-time recidivist. He had even robbed one victim on three separate occasions! Enter the public defender: The amount of bail is extortionate for a client who is homeless and stealing paper towels. The repeat victim was a Target. Stay out of that store! the judge admonished, while declining to set bail. Uncuffed and releaseduntil next time.

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On the Docket with Donald Trump - The New Yorker

Saturday Night Live mocks conservatives comparing Donald Trump to Jesus.

Last week, Donald Trump pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records and conspiracy for his alleged role in hush money payments to two women toward the end of his 2016 presidential campaign. This historic moment was the first time a former president was indicted for his alleged crimes. Of course, Republicans couldnt wait to defend Trump with any justification for his behavior that they deemed viable.

This included his lawyer, Alina Habba, claiming Trumps New York City indictment puts him in the leagues of Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G. Habba. Donald Trump is Tupac. Donald Trumps Biggie Smalls, hes better than Tupac. Im east coast, so I love Biggie, Habba said. Donald Trump is his own brand. He is everything. This is just gonna boost him, weve seen it in the polls. Its not a question, its a fact.

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Shockingly, this would be the least incendiary statement the right would say about Trumps indictment. Resident Republican bigot Marjorie Taylor Greene compared Trumps prosecution to the persecution of Jesus Christ during an interview. Greene traveled to Manhattan to protest Trumps arraignment, discussed the timing of the arraignment before invoking the name of Christ.

Nelson Mandela was arrested, served time in prison. Jesus! Jesus was arrested and murdered by the Roman government, she pathetically commented. There have been many people throughout history that have been arrested and persecuted by radical corrupt governments, and its beginning today in New York City.

Trump supporter and attorney Joseph McBride said on social media last month that President Trump will be arrested during Lenta time of suffering and purification for the followers of Jesus Christ. As Christ was crucified, and then rose again on the 3rd day, so too will @realDonaldTrump. Violence is never the answer. Winning the election is. Vote for Trump!

Story continues

Nothing is beneath the right to cling to power and propping up Trump as a political sacrifice was perhaps a predictable move. Even though its obviously outrageous and ridiculously tone-deaf, its how conservatives have always movedand its proven alarmingly effective. Saturday Night Live even mocked the analogy last night. During the Easter-themed opening skit, actor Mikey Day starred as Christ sitting with his disciples during The Last Supper.

However, the gathering was crashed by Trump (portrayed by James Austin Johnson) who challenged Christs assertions of persecution. Sound familiar? A famous, wonderful man arrested for no reason at all, Johnson said as the former president. As we speak, I am being persecuted on a level the likes of which the world has never seen, even worse than the late, great Jesus.

Johnson also called Florida Governor Ron DeSantis his own version of judas. Ron DeSantis came to me, tears in his eyes, he said, Help me, Mr. Trump, Im going to lose my election. So I very generously pretended to like him, and then he did a Judas, and now he cant even get the gays out of Disney World. Johnson continued:

Mr. Jesus, quite a guy, but now people are saying perhaps Im even better than Jesus because Im a self-made billionaire and Christ was, lets call it what it is, a nepo baby. I mean, his dad was God: Its pretty easy to start a religion when your dad is God. Though the number was comical, sadly it wasnt far-fetched. The country has seenand suffered because ofthe fanaticism of the right.

The irreparable damage conservatives have done to Americans in the name of religion continues to harm marginalized and vulnerabilities groups. Whether its laws that attempt to eradicate trans people, abolish womens rights, employ deadly police forces or emphatically uphold the right to bear arms, Christianity has become the go-to excuse for Republicans to act however they like.

In other words, Trumps martyrdom is just a symptom of a much largerand much more dangerousproblem.

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The Danger of Comparing Donald Trump to Jesus - Yahoo Life

The Republican presidential primary was always expected to revolve around Trump. But post-indictment, as Republicans rally to his defense including, crucially, conservative talkers on Fox News Trumps opponents are confronting an even more damaging dynamic in race: their inability to break through at all. | Alex Wong/Getty Images

With the volume blaring on The Donald Trump Show, other Republican presidential hopefuls are struggling to make any noise of their own.

In the span of a week, Nikki Haley, former United Nations ambassador, campaigning at the U.S.-Mexico border, complained that no one is talking about immigration because of the focus on Trumps political drama. Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeos trip to Ukraine was reduced to a blip on the media landscape, while Ron DeSantis avoided the spectacle and instead revived his war with Disney.

On the same day Trump was indicted in an alleged hush money scheme, the Florida governor was posing with puppies at a pet adoption event as his aides instructed reporters to leave.

This is deja vu all over again, said Terry Sullivan, who ran Marco Rubios 2016 campaign for president. Trump dominates media coverage, making it impossible for his competitors to get any coverage or forward traction.

The Republican presidential primary was always expected to revolve around Trump. But post-indictment, as Republicans rally to his defense including, crucially, conservative talkers on Fox News Trumps opponents are confronting an even more damaging dynamic in race: Their inability to break through at all.

It feels like fucking 2016, said a Republican strategist who supports DeSantis and was granted anonymity to speak freely about the dynamics of the race. Is there anything that can suck up as much political oxygen in the American political landscape as Trump? I dont think so.

Far from cable TVs focus on Trumps indictment, DeSantis has been plowing ahead with a political operation that resembles the early stages of a presidential campaign. But during the final weeks of Floridas jam-packed legislation session the backdrop against which DeSantis is preparing his case for taking his local conservative agenda nationwide the governor hasnt gotten a fraction of the attention Trump has. Visiting Long Island recently to promote his record and his book, he was greeted by a number of New Yorkers in MAGA hats and a sign that read DeSantis 2028, suggesting he get out of Trumps way in 2024.

One man in the DeSantis-friendly audience repeatedly shouted Trump! before being escorted out of the museum where DeSantis spoke. Nearly all of the attendees POLITICO interviewed spoke favorably about DeSantis, but said they are already committed to supporting the ex-presidents comeback bid.

To Republicans who saw Trump steamroll through the primary in 2016, its all beginning to look like a rerun. And largely helpless to do anything about Trump on their own, they have been venting frustrations increasingly at the media.

Whats frustrating to me is we didnt learn a damn thing from 2015 and 2016 when it comes to just giving him absolute, roadblock media coverage, said David Kochel, a veteran of six Republican presidential campaigns. I get it, its a big story. But this was getting covered like the opening of the war in Iraq or the O.J. chase. You couldnt escape it.

He said upcoming debates, cattle calls and other events during the campaign will give everybody an equal footing, an opportunity to drive their own coverage. But for now, he said, there isnt much any Trump rival can do.

I dont know that theres a strategy anybody could employ, he said. Maybe try shooting somebody on Fifth Avenue.

Left unsaid was that many of the GOP contenders owe their careers to the man they are now wishcasting away. Mike Pence was Trumps vice president, Pompeo served as his CIA director and secretary of state and Haley, who had been governor of South Carolina, was elevated as his United Nations ambassador. Trump often laments DeSantis disloyalty, saying he was trailing his opponent before Trump endorsed him in 2018.

One GOP Congressional staffer, granted anonymity to describe sensitive discussions about the campaign, said that in the current climate, everybody is worried about DeSantis chances.

Most people are quietly watching from the sidelines, praying that he puts it together, the person said.

While hoping for the Trump saturation to ease, his opponents are putting on a brave face and working at the edges to draw attention to themselves. Without yet announcing his candidacy something expected shortly after the legislative session ends in the coming weeks DeSantis is putting together endorsements. And in pleas to donors, he has been pitching himself as a low-drama version of Trump. Meanwhile a PAC formed to bolster his candidacy has reportedly raised $30 million so far.

DeSantis traversed the Northeast in recent days to tout his book, then delivered an hour-long speech to a Republican group in Michigan and addressed the Christian liberal arts Hillsdale College about his record in Florida. Later this month he is planning to visit Israel a significant overseas trip for any presidential contender.

An adviser to Haleys campaign, granted anonymity to talk candidly about the situation, acknowledged that theres no question this week Trump was getting the bulk of the coverage.

But Haley plowed ahead with her previously planned trip to the border last Monday. Her event received conservative media coverage, despite many mainstream news outlets remaining squarely focused on Trumps looming arraignment. Haleys border visit and Fox News interview about it appeared on the networks shows nine times that day, and then five more times on Tuesday.

Her campaign last week was conscious of timing, the adviser said, noting that it would have been foolish to announce Haleys $11 million first-quarter fundraising haul on Tuesday when Trumps arraignment was receiving wall to wall coverage. So they waited until Wednesday to drop the news and were pleased with the level of national media coverage they received, the adviser said.

Ken Farnaso, spokesperson for Haleys campaign, said her strategy has not changed at all given the Trump indictment, and her focus continues to be on holding frequent events in the early primary states.

Perhaps of all the other Republicans in the field, biotech entrepreneur and Woke Inc. author Vivek Ramaswamy has leaned most into the Trump campaigns messaging on the prosecution. While some candidates, including DeSantis, hesitated to weigh in after news broke of a forthcoming indictment, Ramaswamy jumped to decry the case and hasnt stopped since.

But he is still trying to capture his own audience, too. Last week, he launched a new daily podcast from a high-end, newly built studio in his Columbus campaign headquarters. This week, he will set out across New Hampshire on a 10-county tour, traveling in a decaled bus emblazoned with his headshot.

Sen. Tim Scott, whose advisers formally announced his upcoming swing to Iowa and New Hampshire just moments before Trump entered the courthouse on Tuesday, will visit those early states this week. Haley will spend three days in Iowa, and Pence, the former vice president, is set to speak this weekend at both the National Rifle Association annual conference and a closed-door gathering of Republican National Committee donors.

Its possible that attention will shift eventually to those candidates. Campaigning is not yet in full-swing in early primary states, and the candidates are still months away from their first debate.

Several people supportive of or close to DeSantis, who routinely polls as the leading alternative to Trump, said members of his team are privately projecting confidence in their methodical strategy, and not betraying any worries about Trumps consuming presence in the field.

Im not worried at all. I think theres a bunch of hand-wringing from some nervous nellies prematurely, said Jason Roe, a Michigan-based Republican strategist who worked for Rubio.

Roe, who speaks favorably about DeSantis but hasnt decided who to support yet, said time is in the governors favor the Republican Partys first primary caucus in Iowa is still 10 months away.

Right now no one occupies the stage except Trump, Roe said. The dust has to settle.

At some point does all the chaos surrounding him create an opening for a candidate like DeSantis? he said.

Then, mulling over his own question, he added, I want to remain optimistic.

Alex Isenstadt and Gary Fineout contributed to this report.

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As Trump dominates the airwaves, 'it feels like f--king 2016' - POLITICO

Chinese President Xi Jinping and Donald Trump attend a welcoming ceremony November 9, 2017 in Beijing, China.

During the four years that Donald Trump occupied the White House, the state-owned Industrial and Commercial Bank of China paid him an estimated $7 million to rent space in Trump Tower. Despite the extraordinary circumstances of the dealinvolving the government of China, the president of the United States, and millions of dollarsthe Trump family portrayed the agreement as a standard business transaction. Previously unreported documents call that characterization into question.

Lending records show that that the Chinese bank abandoned Trump Tower around the time Trump left the White House. The banks departure seemed to come suddenly, in the first half of 2021 and less than two years after the bank exercised what Eric Trump, the former presidents son, described as a five-year extension. Its hard to consider either of those developmentsthe lease extension or the sudden departurewithout wondering whether China was trying to curry favor.

Theres no evidence that geopolitics played a role in the deal at first. Reports of the arrangement surfaced in September 2008, when Trump was merely a real estate developer, eager to tout some good news amid troubled times. It is a great honor to house one of the worlds finest banking institutions in Trump Tower, he told Real Estate Weekly at the time. We look forward to a long and happy relationship with them.

It was a lucrative deal for Trump. A 2012 debt prospectus noted that ICBC was the second-largest tenant in Trump Tower, leasing 20,000 square feet for about $1.9 million a year, paying a higher price per square foot than other office tenants in the building. Ill show you the Industrial Bank of China, Trump told three Forbes journalists in 2015, when he was leading polls for the Republican presidential nominationand still keeping a close eye on his business. I have the best tenants in the world in this building.

Three years later, ICBC signed a new deal to lease space in a non-Trump building on Sixth Avenue, securing 99,000 square feet, or roughly five times its footprint at Trump Tower. With ICBCs lease set to expire in 2019, according to the prospectus, it would have made sense if the bank departed Trumps building at that point.

But the Trump Tower lease was no longer a typical business deal. Trump was in the White House, waging a massive trade war with China. The roughly $2 million of annual Trump Tower rent had turned into a constitutional concern, given that the Emoluments Clause prohibits the president from accepting various benefits from foreign governments. The deal had also become a strange example of collaboration between China and the United States, one that Americas adversary had reason to maintain while it continued to negotiate far more consequential matters.

ICBC ended up staying in Trump Tower. Weeks before the banks lease had been set to expire, Eric Trump explained on stage at a conference that the bank was keeping a couple of floors, noting that its lease had come with two five-year options to renew. The younger Trump ignored questions about why the bank would need the space, given that it had just signed a much-bigger lease in the same neighborhood. I dont think there is anybody that has been tougher on China in the world than my father, he said.

In 2021, when Joe Biden took office, the Chinese bank apparently came to the conclusion that it was no longer the smartest idea to be renting space from Donald Trump. Representatives of ICBC and the Trump Organization did not respond to requests for comment for this story. Forbes did manage to connect with someone answering the phones at ICBCs branch in Queens. That person confirmed that ICBC no longer has any space in Trump Tower.

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China Paid Trump Millions In Rent. Then He Left The White House - Forbes