Former President Donald Trump was charged in a Manhattan criminal court in April with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records related to his role in a hush money payment scheme involving adult film actress Stormy Daniels late in the 2016 presidential campaign.
The former president surrendered and was placed under arrest on April 4, before he was arraigned in a historic and unprecedented court appearance, at which he pleaded not guilty.
Prosecutors, led by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, accuse Trump of falsifying business records with the intent to conceal illegal conduct connected to his 2016 presidential campaign.
The indictment has sent shockwaves across the country, pushing the American political system – which has never seen one of its ex-leaders confronted with criminal charges, let alone while running again for president – into uncharted waters.
The $130,000 payment was paid by former Trump attorney and fixer Michael Cohen to Daniels to remain quiet about an alleged affair between Daniels and Trump years earlier.Trump has denied having an affair with Daniels and says the probe by Bragg, a Democrat, is politically motivated. Trump is now seeking to move the case to federal court.
Other legal woes: Also in Manhattan, a federal jury found Trump sexually abused former advice columnist E. Jean Carroll in a luxury department store dressing room in the mid-1990s and awarded her about $5 million in the battery and defamation civil case.
In Atlanta, a select grand jury has investigated the efforts by Trump and allies to overturn his election loss in Georgia in 2020.
Read about additional Trump legal challenges here.
