UNIONDALE, NY — With former President Donald Trump indicted in connection with a hush money payment, he is expected to surrender Tuesday in Lower Manhattan.
Trump alerted his followers of the impending indictment more than a week ago. As Patch reported earlier this week, dozens rallied to support the former president Tuesday in Bellmore, assembling at a usual gathering point on Sunrise Highway, along the eastern portion of the parking lot.
It was the day that Trump had previously announced he would be arrested and urged his followers to protest.
Find out what's happening in Garden Citywith free, real-time updates from Patch.
“This is a day that has been long coming and yet a day that was never guaranteed to come,” Hofstra University constitutional law professor James Sample told Patch.
But Sample thinks there’s an element of surprise for the 45th president, who now will face the judicial process.
Find out what's happening in Garden Citywith free, real-time updates from Patch.
“[Here’s] an individual for his entire life, much less his political career, managed to avoid accountability.”
Trump, reportedly, will face 34 charges when the indictment is unsealed. Trump won’t be able to fall back on his “bombastic spin” in the courtroom, Sample said.
Related:
His legal team lost every case after the 2020 election.
“That’s not to say the same result will occur, but the same dynamic will occur. We have a process in the United States, and it’s one of the things that makes America, excuse the pun, great,” Sample said.
As for Trump, who said this will embolden him for the 2024 nomination, Sample thinks it can actually prove beneficial short term with fundraising.
“But in the long term, while anything is possible, it is rarely a positive development for someone to face criminal charges,” Sample said.
Trump has a long history of speaking for himself, but Sample said “he’s going to be skating on extremely thin ice,” with regard to making threats of any kind related to the case.
“He deserves due process, but what he does not deserve is to incite violence,” he said.
While it’s not out of the realm of possibility that the Manhattan district attorney’s office could accept a plea deal, Sample expects this case to go the distance.
“I find it hard to believe that it’s in Donald Trump’s DNA to plead this down,” he said. “I have a hard time envisioning a guy who pathologically feels he can [do] and has done no wrong pleading guilty.”
The indictment itself remained under seal Friday morning, and many details remained unclear. Trump’s attorney Joe Tacopina told Fox News on Thursday night he believes the former president will face dozens of counts of business fraud.
“We now heard 34 counts, and I guarantee you it’s going to be 34 counts when we find out next week,” he said, according to the New York Post.
The unprecedented criminal charges against a former president stem from a grand jury convened by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and tasked with delving into a 2016 hush-money payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels, who said she had sex with Trump.
Trump has denied the affair with Daniels and spent the last weeks railing against Bragg, often in terms that raised fears he’d stir up violence akin to the Jan. 6 insurrection.
Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.
Click Here: cheap nike air jordan shoes