Donald Trump was found guilty by a jury on Thursday on all charges of falsifying business records to hide an alleged affair during the 2016 election campaign, making him the first former U.S. president to be convicted.
The 34-count conviction marks the most stunning legal blow yet for a man who has evaded criminal investigation for decades and now can no longer dodge convictions in the city that cultivated the reputation that landed him the most powerful office in the country.
Trump’s conviction does not prevent him from running for president or returning to the White House if he wins the November election, but it has firmly established him as the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee and plunged the country into uncharted territory.
The verdict will be handed down on July 11, just three days before he is scheduled to officially be announced as a candidate at the Republican National Convention.
While Trump faces possible prison time, first-time offenders for crimes like his often don’t face jail time. The judge overseeing the case, Juan Merchan, endured a barrage of attacks from Trump throughout the trial.
The 12-member jury from New York delivered its verdict after about 11 hours of deliberation, as Trump sat expressionless in the courtroom, barely moving and only occasionally turning to face the jury.
The allegations against Trump stem from his making fake payments to then-operative Michael Cohen, who paid a porn actress $130,000 just days before the 2016 presidential election to keep quiet about an alleged affair with Trump, which Trump denies.
Prosecutors have charged Trump with 11 invoices submitted by Cohen, 12 general ledger entries and 11 checks paid by Trump to his then-fixer that were all false entries in New York business records.
To secure a felony conviction, prosecutors sought to convince jurors beyond a reasonable doubt that the concealment of hush money was intended to cover up or facilitate other crimes, and portrayed the bribes as part of a broader “catch and kill” scheme to silence negative and salacious stories about Trump that violated state and federal election laws.
In nearly four weeks of testimony, prosecutors built their story through testimony from top officials of the 2016 campaign, employees of the Trump Organization and star witnesses at the center of the case: Mr. Cohen and porn actress Stormy Daniels both took the stand to testify against Mr. Trump.
The trial, which was covered by cable news channels every minute despite cameras being banned during the proceedings, drew national attention and forced Trump to spend weeks in a stained, wood-paneled courtroom in lower Manhattan, further cementing the legal battle as a cornerstone of his campaign.
Over the course of several days, Trump was at the courthouse along with other political allies, including House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana), Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio), Sen. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) and Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.).
Trump also faces three additional criminal charges: Special Counsel Jack Smith charged him in Florida with mishandling classified documents and in Washington, DC, with conspiring to overturn the results of the 2020 election. Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis (D) also charged Trump with conspiring to overturn the results of the 2020 election in Georgia.
The verdict could be the only one in Trump’s criminal case to go to trial before the November election. Trump has pleaded not guilty and denies wrongdoing in the other cases.
Updated 5:27 p.m.
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