Former President Donald Trump’s legal issues have recently led to very public appearances in court. The court cases involve the alleged federal election interference in Georgia, the January 6th storming of the Capitol Building, the mishandling of classified documents in Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, and the 2016 hush-money scheme in New York.
Three of the four cases have been moving very slowly and therefore it is likely the hush-money case remains the only one that Trump will be convicted for. Trump’s prosecutor in this case was the Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who accused him of faking commercial documentation to hide illegal activity and harmful information to protect his public image.
According to CNN, many women were coming forward before the 2016 election with allegations regarding Trump involving accusations of sexual assault. His campaign’s desire to silence these allegations was increased by the release of the Access Hollywood tape, a 2005 interview in which Trump spoke about women inappropriately, damaging his reputation due to the high amount of negative news coverage it received. To boost his public image and reputation, Trump paid his alleged former mistresses Karen McDougal and Stormy Daniels to keep quiet about his alleged sexual misconduct.
McDougal was paid $150,000 by American Media Inc., to sell them her story about Trump, preventing her from sharing it. On April 25, 2024, the former CEO of AMI, David Pecker, admitted that the company had been intentionally killing articles involving negative stories about Trump, which would have included McDougal’s story.
Stormy Daniels, real name Stephanie Clifford, was paid $130,000 by Trump’s fixer at the time, Michael Cohen, to agree not to share her story about Trump. Both hush-money payments were illegal because of the damaging information about Trump that was being concealed during the election. Additionally, the payments were falsely classified as business expenses, which is also illegal.
Trump was indicted by a grand jury in April 2023, marking the beginning of the criminal case. This was made possible largely by people such as former AMI CEO David Pecker and Michael Cohen testifying against Trump. He was, therefore, facing 34 counts of faking business records, which is not considered a serious felony in New York. On May 29, he was convicted by a Manhattan jury on all 34 counts, making him the first president in history to be convicted of a felony.
This came as a surprise to many people, as many believed that the case would move so slowly that he would not be convicted before November. “I think there will likely be at least one holdout. So, I don’t think he will be convicted before the election,” Alex Foster ‘27 said, three weeks before Trump was convicted.
As a result, he could be sentenced to probation or a maximum jail time of four years for each count. This case is extremely important as it may be the only legal case out of the four Trump faces before the November 2024 election. However, many believe that it will have little impact on the minds of Republican voters.
“I think that most people already have their mind made up about how they feel about Trump,” Upper School history teacher Mr. Kyle Donahue said. “If convicted I am sure some will just feel it is a political conviction and make their support for him stronger.”
Since no president since Ulysses S. Grant in 1872 has ever been arrested while in office, there is very little precedence to determine what might happen if he does face jail time before or after he is elected. For his part, Grant was arrested for speeding by horse while in office in 1872.
For GA voters, it is important to remember that new details about the trial continue to be released daily as the legal process continues to unfold and that the best way to keep up to date on the latest facts is to be vigilant about misinformation being spread on social media.
“The advice I would give to people voting is to read where candidates stand on issues that matter to you,” Mr. Donahue said. “And to also do research about everything on the ballot.”
Regardless of the implications one way or the other, as of May 30th, Trump is still denying all convictions.
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Sources: https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/13/politics/donald-trump-hush-money-trial-explained/index.html
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/aug/14/georgia-trump-2020-fulton-county-case-explained
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/nine-questions-about-the-trump-trial-answered