Shortly after the former president received a target letter, a grand jury might be voting as soon as Thursday on whether to indict Donald Trump in the post-2020 election case.
Donald Trump In More Legal Trouble?
Is former President Donald Trump about to be indicted, for the third time this year?
NBC News reported early Thursday that Trump’s attorneys and campaign staff are “preparing for the possibility that the federal grand jury will vote on charges against the former president as early as Thursday.”
Trump received a target letter, about two weeks ago, informing him that he is a target of a federal investigation, this time into his behavior after the 2020 election and his efforts to overturn it.
The target letter mentioned three statutes, related to “the deprivation of rights, conspiracy to defraud the U.S., and tampering with a witness,” NBC News said.
Trump, earlier this year, was already indicted in New York, on state charges that he falsified business records, and then again in federal court in Florida, related to his handling of classified documents after he left the presidency. Trump has pled not guilty to all charges and steadfastly maintained his innocence.
A trial date has been set for May 2024 for the documents case, and a date had already been set for March 2024 in the New York case. That means Trump will likely be going back and forth from the campaign trail to his own trials, during the GOP primary season.
“We’ll have fun on the stand with all of these people that say the Presidential Election wasn’t Rigged and Stollen. THE TRIAL OF THE CENTURY!!!,” the former president said on his Truth Social social network earlier this week.
It would appear highly unlikely that Trump’s attorneys would allow him to take the witness stand in any of his trials, much as the ex-president might want such a spectacle.
A Forbes analysis published on Thursday predicted that, in the event of a trial in the 2020 election case, Trump may seek to push voter fraud claims in court, even if his attorneys wish not to.
Since 2020, and most recently with Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s attorneys have backpedaled from making bogus claims in a court of law, because such things can lead to bar sanctions and other professional consequences.
Most recently, Giuliani had to admit as part of a lawsuit that claims he made about two specific Georgia poll workers manipulating votes was not true, and Trump attorneys Sidney Powell and Jenna Ellis have also faced consequences.
Those lawyers, however, have continued to allege fraud in media appearances and other venues outside of official legal proceedings.
“There is no credible evidence of wid
“Trump’s claims of election fraud come despite numerous reports suggesting he knew those claims were false. Multiple advisors have testified they informed Trump after the election there was no evidence of widespread voter fraud, and his campaign also reportedly commissioned multiple firms to investigate fraud claims, with both probes concluding there was no evidence to support those allegations,” the story said. “Emails turned over in federal court also showed that Trump signed a legal document under oath testifying it was “true and correct” that thousands of votes were fraudulently counted in Georgia, even though attorney John Eastman said Trump had been ‘made aware’ that information was inaccurate.”
There are also indications that Mark Meadows, Trump’s White House chief of staff during the later part of his term in office, may be actively cooperating with prosecutors in the post-2020 elections case. Meadows is known to have testified before Jack Smith’s grand jury, although it has not been announced if he has reached a cooperation agreement with prosecutors.
Author Expertise and Experience
Stephen Silver is a Senior Editor for 19FortyFive. He is an award-winning journalist, essayist and film critic, who is also a contributor to the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Broad Street Review and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenSilver.
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