New York’s grand jury investigation of the January 6, 2021, black-hole insurrection by President Trump: Hush money reimbursements to Stormy Daniels
The legal drama surrounding President Trump has never been as intense as it is now, eight years after he rode the escalator in Trump Tower and more than two years after the January 6, 2021, insurrection.
The investigation into the payments of hush money made to Stormy Daniels is being led by the New York District Attorney.
The case could hinge on the way Mr. Trump and his company, the Trump Organization, handled reimbursing Mr. Cohen for the payment of $130,000 to Ms. Daniels. Mr. Cohen said the Internal Trump Organization records lied about the reimbursements being legal expenses. Mr Trump’s lawyers don’t deny that.
CNN’s Kara Scannell reported in January that people close to the investigation told her that prosecutors were looking into insurance fraud, as well as the Trump Organization’s financial statements.
The retention of national defense information at the Trump resort and the January 6, 2021, insurrection are being investigated by special counsel Jack Smith.
The Justice Department is investigating whether the White House documents were mishandled when they were taken to Mar-a-Lago. Potential witnesses to the federal grand jury about how Trump handled documents have been interviewed.
Some classified records were recovered from a collection of 15 boxes of White House records that were recovered from Mar-a-Lago, according to the National Archives.
Any unauthorized retention or destruction of White House documents could violate a criminal law that prohibits the removal or destruction of official government records, legal experts told CNN.
It issued an 845-page report – based on 1,000-plus interviews and documents collected, including emails, texts and phone records – that alleges Trump “oversaw” the legally dubious effort to put forward fake slates of electors in seven states he lost. The report said that Trump worked to transmit false Electoral College ballots to congress and the national archives.
The Trump administration has tried to keep former advisers from testifying about certain conversations, citing executive and attorney-client privileges.
Fulton County, Georgia, District Attorney Fani Lussier oversaw a grand jury that investigated what Trump or his allies may have done to overturn Biden’s victory in Georgia.
The grand jury found there was no widespread voter fraud in the state, and suggested perjury charges be levied against some people who testified.
Dramatic evidence shows that before and on January 6 of this year, Donald Trump tried to use government machinery to reverse the results of the election.
In a symbolic move, the committee referred Trump to the Justice Department on at least four criminal charges before it concluded at the end of 2022, ahead of Republicans taking control of the House.
The Trump Organization was convicted in December of multiple tax fraud charges and was accused of faking business records for over a decade in order to cheat the taxman.
Former Trump Organization Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg pleaded guilty to his role in the tax scheme and was sentenced to five months at Rikers Island. He will be released in the summer.
The Donald Trump-Russia Corrupt Case in New York: A New State Circuit Court Judge Throws Out the Suit Against The Former President and His Allies
Trump has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and has called the investigation politically motivated based on the electoral ambitions of James, a Democrat.
Former magazine writer E. Jean Carroll alleged Trump raped her in a New York department store dressing room in the mid-1990s and defamed her when he denied the rape, said she was not his “type” and alleged she had made the claim to boost sales of her book.
Trump and the Justice Department said he was a federal employee and that his statements denying Carroll’s allegations were made in response to reporters’ questions while he was at the White House. The lawsuit would end if the Justice Department was substituted because the government cannot be sued for defamation.
The trial in the first case was scheduled to start in March, but has been delayed due to the ongoing legal battle.
There are multiple cases accusing Trump of violating the laws in Washington that prevent the promotion of riots and disorderly conduct.
There are no charges against Trump and his top advisers. The former president and others who have been sued have argued they are not responsible for the actions of the people who stormed the Capitol.
Both Strzok and Page were targets of verbal attacks by Trump and his allies as part of the larger ire Trump expressed toward the FBI during the Trump-Russia investigation. Trump continuously called for Strzok to be removed from office until he was fired.
In November 2022, a New York state judge threw out the lawsuit, saying Mary Trump’s claims are barred by an earlier settlement she reached over 20 years ago. Mary Trump has appealed.
The former president and his attorneys will be responsible for nearly $1 million in sanctions for bringing the case in the first place.
Middlebrooks said that a lawyer would not have filed it. The counts of the amended complaint were intended for a political purpose, not a legal claim.
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/20/politics/donald-trump-legal-clouds/index.html
Donald Trump sued Michael Cohen, Donald Trump and his sister, Mary Ann, for copyright violations in the U.S. Senate, and a lawsuit by Michael Cohen
Donald Trump and other defendants were sued by Michael Cohen, who said that they put him back in jail to stop him from writing his book while under home confinement.
Cohen was serving the remainder of his sentence for lying to Congress and campaign violations at home, due to Covid-19 concerns, when he started an anti-Trump social media campaign in summer 2020. Cohen spent 16 days in solitary after he was sent back to prison.
A federal judge threw out the lawsuit in November. The Supreme Court precedent bars the District Judge from allowing the case to proceed, but he was sympathetic to Cohen’s position.
Donald Trump and his sister, Maryanne, were sued by Mary Trump in 2020 for swindling funds from her interests.
Trump sued journalist Bob Woodward in January 2023 for alleged copyright violations, claiming Woodward had released audio from their interviews without Trump’s consent.
Woodward conducted several interviews with Trump for “Rage,” published in September 2020. Woodward later released “The Trump Tapes,” an audiobook featuring eight hours of raw interviews with Trump interspersed with the author’s commentary.
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/20/politics/donald-trump-legal-clouds/index.html
The New York Tax Case: A Case of Selective Prosecuting for a Political Evil and the Corrupt Influence of Michael Cohen
“The Times’s coverage of Donald Trump’s taxes helped inform the public through meticulous reporting on a subject of overriding public interest,” the Times said in a statement. “This lawsuit is an attempt to silence independent news organizations and we plan to vigorously defend against it.”
But does that mean the Manhattan criminal case is an example of selective prosecution — in other words, going after a political enemy for a crime that no one else would be charged with? Not by a long shot. To begin with, Mr. Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen, who was instrumental in the scheme, has already pleaded guilty to a federal crime emanating from this conduct and served time for it and other crimes. Federal prosecutors told the court that Mr. Cohen “acted in coordination with and at the direction of” Mr. Trump (identified as “Individual 1”). When a lower-level conspirator is prosecuted, the rule of law does not allow the principal to be free of prosecution for the crime.
Federal prosecutors have not pursued these charges due to the corrupt influence of William Barr, and Mr. Bragg has had to pick up the slack. Barr is reported to have shut down any follow-up investigation of Mr. Trump, but it remains murky as to why a criminal investigation or indictment of Mr. Trump has not been pursued under the current administration (Attorney General Merrick Garland has not explained publicly any reason for not pursuing this investigation).
People with knowledge of the matter say Mr. Bragg’s office is likely to build a case around the charge of faking business records in New York. The false business records charge has been the main focus of prosecutors in the district attorney office since Mr. Bragg took office.
This charge focuses on the means that Mr. Trump and Mr. Cohen apparently devised to carry out the alleged scheme: Mr. Cohen would arrange for the payments to Ms. Daniels; Mr. Trump would reimburse Mr. Cohen; and Mr. Cohen and Mr. Trump would cover up the true nature of the payments by recording the reimbursement as legal fees pursuant to a “retainer agreement” that the Justice Department said never existed. Because such “fees” would need to be reported by Mr. Cohen on his taxes, the Trump Organization paid Mr. Cohen substantial additional sums to pay for these taxes. Neither Mr. Trump nor his campaign would report the Daniels payments to the campaign for any reason.
A New York Times review and interviews with election law experts strongly suggest that New York state prosecutors have never before filed an election law case involving a federal campaign. If a case is brought against a former president it’s at risk of being thrown out or narrowed.
The only way for the district attorney to get a conviction on the election law violation is in the indictment, but that second crime is vulnerable to attack.