Former President Trump said he would “don’t care” if he was sentenced to either house arrest or prison after being convicted of 34 felony counts in New York last week.
Asked on Fox News’ “Fox and Friends” how he would handle the possibility of house arrest or even prison, Trump said: “I’m OK with that.”
“I don’t know if the public can live with that,” Trump said of his potential sentence in an interview with Fox News’ Will Cain, Pete Hegseth and Rachel Campos Duffy on Sunday. “It’s going to be hard for the public to live with. There’s going to be a breaking point at some point.”
The former president was convicted in New York last week of 34 counts of falsifying business records, becoming the first former US president to be convicted of a crime related to paying back Michael Cohen, Trump’s former fixer and lawyer, in hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels.
The verdict is scheduled to be handed down on July 11, just four days before the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee. Trump’s legal team has vowed to appeal, but the process is currently expected to go ahead as scheduled.
Because this is Trump’s first offense of falsifying business records, he is unlikely to face any prison time, especially since he has no prior criminal history. He is more likely to receive a lighter penalty, such as a fine.
Trump told “Fox & Friends” that he had advised his lawyers “not to beg for anything,” adding, “That’s the reality.”
He also spoke about the impact his conviction has had on his family and those around him.
“I think in a lot of ways it’s harder for them than it is for me. They’re all good people, all of them,” he said.
“I have a wonderful wife and she hears this all the time. These are the reasons they do it. They’re putting all these nasty names out there for these people. And I’m not even allowed to defend myself because of a gag order. Think about it,” Trump said, without specifying who “they” were. “But they’re putting all this out there to cause mayhem. They’re bad people. I know everything they’re doing. I know every action they’re taking. I understand.”
Trump later noted that former first lady Melania Trump was “doing fine” amid ongoing coverage of the trial and guilty verdict, but that “this is very difficult for her.”
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