Category Archives: Donald Trump

Who is Stormy Daniels – the adult film star who got Trump indicted?

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Daniels has claimed she had sex with ex-president and that she received $130,000 payment in 2016 to hush up about it

Donald Trump for years has faced criminal investigations on multiple fronts, ranging from alleged presidential election interference to purported financial crimes and recent scrutiny over his storage of government secrets.

In the end, though, what got a grand jury to vote to indict him Thursday wasn’t election interference, spurious bookkeeping, unsecured federal documents, or even that his supporters staged the deadly January 6 Capitol attack after he was voted out of office and told them to “fight like hell”. It was the porn star and director known to fans as Stormy Daniels.

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Potential Republican candidate Chris Christie vows to never support Trump again – live

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Former New Jersey governor, who pledged his allegiance to Trump during 2016 election, says: ‘I can’t help him. No way’

Donald Trump’s expected indictment over his hush money payment to the adult film maker and actor Stormy Daniels may be delayed for a month, Politico reports, because of a scheduled hiatus for the grand jury in the case in Manhattan.

The site’s report is based on an anonymous source “familiar with the proceedings”.

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Republicans accused of hypocrisy over gun safety after Nashville shooting – as it happened

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School shooting that left three children and three adults dead brought condolences from conservatives who oppose gun control

Joe Biden has commented on his ability to get gun control passed following Monday’s massacre at a Nashville elementary school, noting that he can only “plead with Congress” for action.

Biden spoke to reporters while on his way to Durham, North Carolina.

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Mike Pence must testify before grand jury investigating January 6 – reports

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A federal judge ruled the former vice-president must appear in the inquiry into Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election

Former US vice-president Mike Pence must testify in front of a grand jury investigating Donald Trump’s election subversion and incitement of the January 6 attack on Congress, a federal judge reportedly ruled on Tuesday.

Multiple news outlets reported the ruling, which remained under seal.

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Trump’s verbal assaults pose risks to prosecutors and could fuel violence

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Trump has resorted to ‘incendiary rhetoric’ to deter investigations and to rile up his base, experts say, and shows no sign of letting up

Donald Trump’s demagogic attacks on prosecutors investigating criminal charges against him are aimed at riling up his base and could spark violence, but show no signs of letting up as a potential indictment in at least one case looms, say legal experts.

At campaign rallies, speeches and on social media Trump has lambasted state and federal prosecutors as “thugs” and claimed that two of them – who are Black – are “racist”, language designed to inflame racial tension.

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Grand jury reconvenes in Trump hush money case – live

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Steven van Zandt, the musician and actor who starred as Silvio Dante in The Sopranos and plays guitar as Little Steven in Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band, called Jamie Raskin his “brother from another mother” today, in a message of support for the Maryland Democrat’s fight against cancer.

Raskin, 60, is undergoing chemotherapy for large B-cell lymphoma, a process which causes hair loss, and has taken to wearing bandannas. Van Zandt is known for wearing such headgear on stage.

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Trump lawyer says ex-president based remarks about arrest last week on ‘rumors’

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Trump’s prediction last week was a bust, but Manhattan grand jury could reconvene on Monday with an arraignment by end of day

Donald Trump’s lawyer has admitted that the former president based his incendiary and unfounded remarks about his imminent arrest last week on mere speculation prompted by “rumours”.

Trump ignited a week of political, media and law enforcement frenzy when he announced on his social media platform Truth Social that he expected to be arrested on Tuesday in the New York criminal investigation relating to hush money payments to the adult film star Stormy Daniels. Security was stepped up at the Manhattan courthouse and around the district attorney leading the case, Alvin Bragg, amid fears of renewed protests by Trump supporters, some of whom staged the deadly attack at the US Capitol on 6 January 2021.

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Trump says he’s not upset over possible indictment while attacking ‘fake’ case

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Ex-president insisted he wasn’t afraid of the investigation into hush money payments even as he lashed out at the case

Donald Trump repeatedly insisted on Saturday night he was not upset by expected criminal charges that might arise from the Manhattan district attorney’s investigation into his role in paying hush money to adult film star Stormy Daniels as he returned from a campaign rally in Waco, Texas.

But the manner of Trump’s responses to questions suggested worries about potential damage to his image, and he came across as someone angry that his good vibrations with his “Make American great again” base in Texas could be interrupted by the reality of a possible indictment as soon as this week.

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Trump describes 2024 election as ‘the final battle’ from podium in Waco

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Former president honours January 6 rioters and delivers violent rhetoric in rally at Texas city during anniversary of Branch Davidian massacre

Donald Trump, the former US president, continued to invoke retribution and violence on Saturday when he used the first rally of his 2024 election campaign to rail against prosecutors weighing a criminal charge against him.

Efforts by Trump’s team to steer a more conventional, disciplined candidacy have wilted in recent days as the 76-year-old unleashed words and images that – even by his provocative standards – are unusually dehumanising, menacing and dangerous.

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‘Reckless’ Trump rhetoric could get someone killed, top Democrat warns

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House leader Hakeem Jeffries condemns former president over behavior related to expected indictment in New York

Donald Trump’s incendiary rhetoric over his expected indictment in New York could “get someone killed”, the Democratic leader in the US House warned.

“The twice-impeached former president’s rhetoric is reckless, reprehensible and irresponsible,” Hakeem Jeffries, from New York, told reporters at the Capitol in Washington.

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Manhattan prosecutor says Trump created ‘false expectation’ of imminent arrest – as it happened

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In an excerpt from her forthcoming book, CNN supreme court analyst Joan Biskupic reveals a body where the conservative majority fortified by Donald Trump is driving forward with decisions to change America – even as some of its members try to appear conciliatory in public.

She also describes chief justice John Robert’s decision to quickly move Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s papers from her office after she died in 2020, which offended some of her aides used to more relaxed transitions between justices.

Within days of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s memorial service in late September 2020, boxes of her files and other office possessions were moved down to a dark, windowless theater on the Supreme Court’s ground floor, where – before the ongoing pandemic – tourists could watch a film about court operations.

Grieving aides to the justice who’d served 27 years and become a cultural icon known as the “Notorious RBG” sorted through the chambers’ contents there.

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Trump lawyer ordered to hand over notes in Mar-a-Lago documents inquiry

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Major blow to ex-president as Evan Corcoran loses legal bid to avoid giving notes and audio transcripts to investigators

Donald Trump’s main lawyer – who was involved in turning over classified-marked documents at the Mar-a-Lago resort to the justice department last year – must provide his notes and audio transcripts to the criminal investigation after a federal appeals court rejected twin efforts to block the order.

The US appeals court for the DC circuit on Wednesday rejected two separate appeals from the former president and his lawyer Evan Corcoran to stop a sealed order, piercing attorney-client privilege and work-product doctrine protections issued in a court decision last week.

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DeSantis hits Republican poll low as Trump tightens grip on primary

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Florida governor repeats criticism of Trump in Fox Nation interview as he attempts delicate balancing act

Donald Trump may be in legal trouble over his alleged weakness for vice, but his predicament is increasingly placing Ron DeSantis – his chief rival for the Republican presidential nomination – in a political vise.

The Florida governor must join Republican attacks on Alvin Bragg, the Democratic Manhattan district attorney whose indictment of Trump over a hush money payment to a porn star is reportedly imminent, while trying not to lose ground in a primary he has not formally entered.

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‘Significant increase’ in online threats as potential Trump indictment looms – as it happened

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Most threats are directed at law enforcement and government officials, report says, after ex-president urged supporters to protest

Lindsey Graham is one of Donald Trump’s allies in the Senate, so it was little surprise that he predicted dire consequences if the former president is indicted, CNN reports:

He also criticized Florida governor and Trump’s chief rival for the Republican presidential nomination next year Ron DeSantis for his comments yesterday about the potential charges. “I don’t know what goes into paying hush money to a porn star to secure silence over some type of alleged affair. I just, I can’t speak to that,” DeSantis said.

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Four Oath Keepers members convicted of obstruction in January 6 trial

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The four were also convicted of conspiracy stemming from an insurrection at the Capitol in failed effort to keep Trump in office

Four people associated with the far-right Oath Keepers militia were convicted on Monday of conspiracy and obstruction charges stemming from the insurrection at the US Capitol in 2021 by extremist supporters of Donald Trump in a failed attempt to keep him in office, in the latest trial involving members of the antigovernment group.

A Washington DC jury found Sandra Parker, of Morrow, Ohio, Laura Steele, of Thomasville, North Carolina, William Isaacs, of Kissimmee, Florida, and Connie Meggs, of Dunnellon, Florida, guilty of conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding and other felony charges.

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House Republicans rally to Trump’s defense with call for DA Alvin Bragg to testify – as it happened

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Chairs of three committees demand testimony from district attorney, who is overseeing Stormy Daniels hush money case

In messages viewed by the Guardian, a Trump campaign insider predicts that the former president will not attempt to avoid appearing for arraignment in New York City, if or when an expected indictment over his hush money payment to Stormy Daniels is handed down.

“He will go to NYC for sure,” the insider wrote, adding: “No video arraignments.”

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Trump hails prospect of testimony from ex-Cohen adviser in hush money case

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Robert J Costello, scheduled to appear before New York grand jury on Monday, likely to question Trump accuser’s credibility

• Trump calls on supporters to protest as potential indictment looms

Donald Trump has cheered the news that a former adviser to Michael Cohen will testify before a Manhattan grand jury investigating the ex-president’s alleged role in hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels.

Robert J Costello, a one-time legal adviser to former Trump attorney Cohen, is scheduled to appear before the grand jury on Monday, where he is expected to give testimony “attacking the credibility of Cohen’s statements”, Associated Press reported.

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Trump in panic mode as he braces for likely charges in Stormy Daniels case

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Manhattan district attorney expected to file criminal charges against ex-president for payment to adult film star in 2016

Donald Trump is bracing for his most legally perilous week since he left the White House, with the Manhattan district attorney likely to bring criminal charges against him over his role in paying hush money to adult film star Stormy Daniels, as he huddled this weekend to strategize his legal and political responses.

The former US president has posted in all-caps on his Truth Social platform that he expected to be “ARRESTED ON TUESDAY OF NEXT WEEK” and called for his supporters to engage in protests – an ominous echo of his tweets urging protests in the lead-up to the January 6 US Capitol attack.

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Manhattan DA warns of ‘attempts to intimidate’ after Trump calls for protest

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Alvin Bragg is expected to bring an indictment against Trump this week over hush payments to adult actor Stormy Daniels in 2016

The Manhattan district attorney widely expected to bring an indictment against Donald Trump this week has vowed that his staff will not be intimidated after the former US president called for his supporters to protest any action against him.

Trump triggered a flurry of frantic headlines and statements from his political allies on Saturday when he posted a message on social media claiming he was set to be arrested this Tuesday on charges of hush payments to adult actor Stormy Daniels.

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Trump allies and rivals rally to his defence after he claims arrest is imminent

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Former president says he expects to be arrested on Tuesday but there has been no official confirmation of the likelihood or timing of charges being brought

Top Republicans, including some of Donald Trump’s potential rivals for the party’s 2024 presidential nomination, rushed to his defence after the former president said he expected to be arrested next week.

On Saturday, Trump announced he would be arrested on Tuesday in a criminal case involving hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels, but there has been no official confirmation on the likelihood that charges will be brought.

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