(New York) Donald Trump assured Saturday that he was going to be “arrested” on Tuesday and called for demonstrations, before a possible indictment concerning a case of payment just before the 2016 presidential election, to buy the silence of a pornographic actress with whom he allegedly had an affair.
“The Republican Party candidate” in the 2024 presidential primary “and former President of the United States of America will be arrested on Tuesday of next week”, launched Donald Trump on his social network Truth Social in capital letters, as is customary.
“Protest, take back our nation!” Mr. Trump added, in a message whose tone recalls those published before the January 6, 2021 assault on the United States Capitol, which he is accused of inciting.
The indictment of a former US president would be unprecedented in the United States.
Even if it would not prevent Donald Trump from remaining a candidate for president, the explosive nature of such a judicial decision could have uncertain consequences for the campaign – by putting him in difficulty against his Republican rivals, or on the contrary by stimulating its basis.
Asked by AFP, one of Donald Trump’s lawyers, Susan Necheles, replied that her client had decided to speak “on the basis of press information” published for a few days on a possible indictment this week.
“Because this is a political prosecution, the District Attorney’s Office [de Manhattan] resorts to leaks to the press rather than communicating with President Trump’s lawyers as normally should be the case, “denounced Mr.me Necheles.
Rumors of a possible criminal indictment have multiplied since Mr. Trump was asked to testify before a grand jury – a panel of citizens with broad investigative powers and responsible for confirming an indictment. A possible sign of the desire of the prosecution to prosecute the former president in the so-called “Stormy Daniels” case.
“Protest! »
In question, 130,000 $US paid to this actress and director of pornographic films, Stephanie Clifford of her real name, for – accuses the New York justice – to buy her silence and thus not to harm the candidate Trump during the presidential election of November 2016, finally won by the Republican billionaire against Hillary Clinton.
The payment of this sum, in itself legal, poses a problem, because the New York prosecutor’s office considers that it is a hidden donation to the president’s campaign, in violation of the laws of electoral financing.
A few hours after his first publication on Saturday, Donald Trump renewed his call: “We must save America, demonstrate, demonstrate, demonstrate!!! »
These messages echo those he had launched at the end of 2020, convinced that he had been “robbed” of the election against Joe Biden, so that his supporters demonstrated in Washington on January 6, 2021, a prelude to their assault on the US Capitol, seat of legislative power, which had shocked America and the world.
Banned from Twitter and other major social networks in the wake of what had been perceived as incitement to violence, he was recently reinstated to the blue bird network, as well as YouTube and Facebook.
“The former president’s announcement this morning is dangerous,” said Democrat Nancy Pelosi, who was president of the House of Representatives at the time of the attack on the Capitol. She accused him of wanting to “continue to make headlines and provoke his supporters”.
‘Corrupt’ Democratic prosecutor
Donald Trump, who will hold a rally next Saturday in Waco, Texas, called on Truth Social the office of Manhattan district attorney, Democrat Alvin Bragg, “corrupt and very political.”
And Republican Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy denounced on Twitter an “outrageous abuse of power by an extremist district attorney who lets violent criminals run while seeking political revenge against President Trump”.
Targeted in several court cases, the former Republican president (2017-2021) has never been charged.
It was his former personal lawyer Michael Cohen, who had become one of his worst enemies, who was responsible for making the payment of $ 130,000 to Mr.me Clifford to keep her alleged 2006 relationship with Donald Trump quiet. Already convicted in this case, Mr. Cohen has testified at least twice before the grand jury since the beginning of the month.
Billionaire Elon Musk, who allowed the reinstatement of the former president on Twitter, for his part estimated on Saturday that in the event of arrest, “Trump will be re-elected in a landslide victory” in November 2024.
