This ends our live coverage of the criminal indictment of Donald Trump but the coverage will continue on this masthead across the evening and the weekend.
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5.20pm on Mar 31, 2023
Indictment another test for a divided Republican Party
By Farrah Tomazin
Here’s the thing about Donald Trump: don’t take a punch if you’re likely to miss.
The incendiary Republican has once again made history, becoming the first US president to face criminal charges after a Manhattan grand jury voted to indict him over an alleged hush money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels, who claims she slept with him in 2006.
Former US president Donald Trump.AP
Even in a country where norms have been shattered for years, the significance of this moment is truly something.
Never has a former or current president been indicted – let alone one who is the frontrunner for the Republican nomination to run for the White House.
If Trump were ultimately found guilty, he could potentially face time in prison. And even if he isn’t, the very fact that he now faces charges – or a trial in the heat of an election campaign – will test a party already divided over whether to support a twice-impeached president, who is also under investigation for other potential crimes.
Long-time Trump adversary and former speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi has tweeted saying no one is above the law and urged Trump to respect the legal system.
Democrats have, however, on the whole, been less vocal since Trump’s indictment.
President Joe Biden, who is expected to announce he’s running for reelection next year, has not commented.
The Democratic National Committee did not comment on the specifics of the case but sought to tie the entire Republican Party to Trump.
“No matter what happens in Trump’s upcoming legal proceedings, it’s obvious the Republican Party remains firmly in the hold of Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans,” DNC National Press Secretary Ammar Moussa said in a statement.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said: “Mr Trump is subject to the same laws as every American. He will be able to avail himself of the legal system and a jury, not politics, to determine his fate according to the facts and the law.”
with AP
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4.21pm on Mar 31, 2023
The other Trump investigations continue
By
Beyond the Manhattan case, Donald Trump is facing an array of other investigations.
On the federal level, the Justice Department is investigating the retention of top-secret government documents at his Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, and efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
A small group have shown their support for former president Donald Trump after the news broke that Trump has been indicted by a Manhattan grand jury,AP
The efforts by many of the same players in the latter case were also the subject of a special grand jury investigation in Georgia.
The panel’s foreperson said the special grand jury recommended multiple criminal indictments, leaving it up to Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, a Democrat, to decide whether to convene a regular grand jury and pursue criminal charges.
With many serious cases looming around the other investigations, some legal experts have questioned the wisdom of the Manhattan case becoming the first to result in charges.
AP
3.29pm on Mar 31, 2023
Who is Stormy Daniels?
By
So who is Stormy Daniels and what did she say happened with the former president?
Daniels has said she had a sexual encounter with Trump in 2006, the year after he married third wife Melania and more than a decade before the businessman-turned-politician – at the time known for a popular reality TV show – became president.
Donald Trump and Stormy Daniels were photographed together at the booth for her porn studio in 2006.
Daniels, 44, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, is from Baton Rouge, Louisiana. She has been a well-known personality in the adult film business for more than two decades, appearing in and directing numerous videos.
Daniels has said she was introduced to Trump in July 2006 at a celebrity golf tournament at Lake Tahoe. She said he invited her to dinner, and they dined at his hotel suite, where he showed her a copy of a golf magazine with his picture on the cover.
They went on to have consensual sex.
In October 2016, the days before the presidential election that Trump won, Daniels signed a non-disclosure agreement in which she pledged not to publicly discuss her relationship with him in exchange for a $US130,000 payment, according to documents filed in Los Angeles Federal Court.
Trump, the first US president to face criminal charges
By Farrah Tomazin
Former US president Donald Trump says he is a victim of “political interference at the highest level” after a Manhattan grand jury voted to indict him over a probe into hush money paid to porn star Stormy Daniels.
Former US president Donald Trump has built a following stoking division.AP
The 76-year-old Republican becomes the first former US president to face criminal charges, even as he makes another run for the White House.
Trump, who has denied any wrongdoing and has repeatedly attacked the investigation, called the indictment “political persecution” and predicted it would damage the Democrats at the 2024 presidential election.
“The Democrats have lied, cheated, and stolen in their obsession with trying to ‘Get Trump’ but now they’ve done the unthinkable – indicting a completely innocent person in an act of blatant election interference,” he said in a statement.
The indictment could reshape the presidential race, further divide America, and test the Republicans’ loyalty towards Trump, who previously said he would continue campaigning for the party’s nomination even if he is charged with a crime.
Small crowd of Trump fans gather outside Mar-a-Lago
By
A small crowd of supporters have gathered outside Mar-a-Lago, the Florida residence of former president Donald Trump and where he is staying.
Holding Trump 2024 flags and with The Star-Spangled Banner playing from a speaker, they started to arrive just before 8pm (local time) and were still there some hours later.
The sun sets as two women show their support for former president Donald Trump near his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida. AP
Meanwhile, news of the indictment lit up message boards, websites and social media platforms popular with Trump supporters.
Some discounted the news as fake, while others noted the indictment came just before the start of Holy Week and compared Trump with a persecuted Christ.
Scattered among the comments were calls for Trump supporters to rise up in protest.
Still others speculated that Trump’s indictment would galvanise Republicans ahead of the 2024 election and serve as a precedent allowing for future prosecutions of Democrats.
With AP
1.56pm on Mar 31, 2023
A video mash-up of the indictment news on TV
By
No legal case surrounding Donald Trump would be complete without the sights, sounds and language of the former president, his fans and critics on TV.
The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age have compiled a video of the historic moment.
Check it out.
1.32pm on Mar 31, 2023
More police on the street
By
The New York Police Department said it planned to place more uniformed officers on the city’s streets after the indictment was revealed.
“All uniformed members of the New York City Police Department are to show up in uniform as of 0700 hours on 03-31-2023 as a precautionary measure,” a spokesperson said on Thursday night, The Hill reported.
The police said, however, there were no credible threats related to the announcement.
Police officers behind security fences outside the office of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.Bloomberg
Steel barricades have been placed outside Manhattan Criminal Court and the Manhattan district attorney’s offices since last week, the US political website and newspaper reported.
Since the indictment was revealed, Fox News host Tucker Carlson claimed the indictment was part of a plan to push Trump supporters to violence.
“At what point do we conclude that they’re doing this in order to produce a reaction?” he asked.
Last week, intelligence sources interviewed by CBS News said that there had been a “significant increase” in threats and violent rhetoric online ahead of the indictment.
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12.53pm on Mar 31, 2023
Republicans lean in to support Trump
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Since the indictment of Donald Trump was reported, many Republicans have expressed support for the ex-president, or at least criticism of the district attorney.
Trump’s former vice president Mike Pence said on CNN: “This will only serve to divide our country.”
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, the No.2 House Republican, called the indictment a “sham” that is “one of the clearest examples of extremist Democrats weaponising government to attack their political opponents”.
However, Arkansas Republican Governor Asa Hutchinson released a much more measured statement of support for the legal process that stressed the need to keep courts and politics separate.
“Donald Trump should not be the next president, but that should be decided by the voters,” Hutchinson wrote.
About 44 per cent of Republicans said he should drop out of the race if he is indicted, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll released last week.