Former U.S. President Donald Trump has said that he expects to be arrested in connection with the yearslong investigation into an allegation that he allegedly orchestrated payments to silence women who claimed sexual encounters with him.
TheNewsGuru.com (TNG) reports that the hush money scheme involves adult film actress, Stephanie Clifford, popularly known as Stormy Daniels, as Trump called on his supporters to protest any such move.
In a social media post, Trump, referring to himself, said the “leading Republican candidate and former president of the United States will be arrested on Tuesday of next week” – though he did not say why he expects to be arrested. His team said after Trump’s post that it had not received any notifications from prosecutors.
TheNewsGuru.com (TNG) learned on Friday that meetings have been going on throughout the week among city, state and federal law enforcement agencies in New York City about security preparations for a possible indictment of Trump.
In an echo of Trump’s appeals to supporters in the wake of the 2020 presidential election, he called Saturday for action, writing: “Protest, take our nation back.”
The former president has been said to have been agitating for his team to get his base riled up and believes that an indictment would help him politically.
Any indictment of the former president, who is running for reelection in 2024, would mark a historic first and quickly change the political conversation around an already divisive figure.
While Trump has an extensive history of civil litigation both before and after taking office, a criminal charge would represent a dramatic escalation of his legal woes as he works to recapture the White House.
Another witness is expected to testify Monday before the grand jury investigating the hush money payments, according to a source familiar with the investigation. It is not clear whether this would be the final witness before it votes on a possible indictment.
Trump’s legal team has been anticipating that an indictment will happen soon and has been preparing behind the scenes for the next steps.
Joe Tacopina, an attorney for Trump, later said the former president had based his claims on press reports.
“No one tells us anything which is very frustrating. President Trump is basing his response on press reports,” Tacopina said in a statement.
A spokesperson for Trump said earlier Saturday that the former president has not received a notification from the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office regarding any potential indictment, but was “rightfully highlighting his innocence” in his post.
Previewing a potential line of defense from Republicans on Capitol Hill, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, a California Republican, tweeted Saturday that any potential indictment of the former president would represent “an outrageous abuse of power” from the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office.
Mike Pence, who served as vice president under Trump, echoed McCarthy’s message on Saturday. “Well, like many Americans, I’m just – I’m taken aback”.
The former vice president claimed the Manhattan district attorney’s investigation “reeks” of “political prosecution.”
The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office declined to comment on Saturday.
How the Stormy Daniels Scandal Could Bring Down Trump
The problem is not that he allegedly had an affair with a porn star- it is that the $130,000 payoff could have violated campaign finance law.
Recall that the porn star (Stormy Daniels) had earlier said that she was threatened in 2011 over an interview in which she claimed to have had unprotected s3x with President Trump- and that their relationship was like “a business deal”.
In a widely anticipated sit-down with CBS’ “60 Minutes,” Daniels also said she was never physically attracted to Trump, but confirmed a report that she spanked him with a magazine that had his face on the cover.
Daniels told interviewer Anderson Cooper that she sold her account of having sex with Trump to In Touch Weekly magazine for $15,000, but two former In Touch employees told “60 Minutes” that the story never ran because Trump’s longtime lawyer, Michael Cohen, threatened to sue.
Daniels — whose film credits include “Busty Beauties 2” and “Hot Showers 6” — claims she never got paid, but was threatened a few weeks later by a mystery man who approached her in Las Vegas.
“I was in a parking lot, going to a fitness class with my infant daughter. Taking, you know, the seats facing backwards in the back seat, diaper bag, you know, gettin’ all the stuff out,” she said.
“And a guy walked up on me and said to me, ‘Leave Trump alone. Forget the story. And then he leaned around and looked at my daughter and said, ‘That’s a beautiful little girl. It’d be a shame if something happened to her mom.’ And then he was gone,” she added.
Daniels said the incident left her so rattled that she feared she might drop her daughter because her hands were shaking so much.
And while she said she would “instantly” recognize the thug if she saw him again, Daniels said she was so scared, she never reported the incident to the cops.
How Stormy Daniels met Trump
In Touch eventually published Daniels’ entire interview in January, and she repeated many of her claims to “60 Minutes,” describing how she met Trump at a celebrity golf tournament in July 2006, accepted his invitation to dinner and went to his hotel suite.
Daniels — who wore a fuchsia shirt, black, mid-thigh skirt and black, peep-toe pumps with stiletto heels — laughed while recalling how Trump was “just talking about himself” and showed her a copy of Fortune with his photo on the cover.
“And I was like, ‘Someone should take that magazine and spank you with it,’” she said.
After initially being taken aback, Trump “turned around and pulled his pants down a little — you know, had underwear on and stuff, and I just gave him a couple swats.”
She added that “from that moment on, he was a completely different person,” telling her: “You remind me of my daughter. … You’re smart and beautiful, and a woman to be reckoned with, and I like you.”
Daniels said Trump floated the idea of her appearing on his NBC TV show, “The Apprentice,” and said she thought he was both serious about the offer and using it to get involved with her.
She also said she asked about his 2005 marriage to his third wife, first lady Melania Trump, and the recent birth of their child, his youngest son, Barron.
“And he brushed it aside, said, ‘Oh yeah, yeah, you know, don’t worry about that. We don’t even — we have separate rooms and stuff,’” she said.
The two of them had dinner in the hotel room, after which she used the bathroom, which was off the bedroom, and emerged to find Trump perched on the edge of the bed.
“I realized exactly what I had gotten myself into. And I was like, ‘Ugh, here we go,’” she said.
Daniels, who was 27 at the time, told Cooper she was not at all attracted to Trump, then 60, and didn’t want to have sex with him, but that their ensuing romp- during which he didn’t wear a condom-“was entirely consensual.”
“This is not a ‘Me Too.’ I was not a victim. I’ve never said I was a victim,” she said.
They never had s3x again, Daniels said, although Trump phoned her several times, inviting her to “get together” to discuss her appearing on “The Apprentice,” about which she said, “that part I never believed.”
“I mean, I’m not blind. But at the same time, maybe it’ll work out, you know? … I thought of it as a business deal,” she said.
Daniels said they finally met in July 2007 in his bungalow at the Beverly Hills Hotel in Los Angeles, where Trump “made me watch an entire documentary about shark attacks” that was part of the Discovery Channel’s annual “Shark Week.”
After about four hours, she said, Trump made his move and sat next to her, touched her hair and “referenced back to how great it was the last time.”
But when Daniels asked about “The Apprentice,” she said, Trump told her, “I’m almost there. I’ll have an answer for you next week.”
“And I was like, ‘OK, cool. Well — I guess call me next week.’ And I took my purse and left,” she said.
Trump denies Daniels’ claims
At one point in the interview, Cooper confronted Daniels with a previous statement in which she denied having an affair with Trump and said “it never happened.”
She called that statement a lie, and said she made it because she feared legal fallout and was told, “They can make your life hell in many different ways.”
Daniels agreed to appear on “60 Minutes” despite accepting what she claims was $130,000 in hush money from Cohen 11 days before the election.
In court papers, Cohen recently said Daniels was already liable for more than $20 million in damages for violating the non-disclosure agreement.
Her lawyer, Michael Avenatti, told “60 Minutes” that was an attempt to intimidate Daniels, saying: “You threaten someone — with a $20 million lawsuit, it’s a thuggish tactic. It’s no different than what happened in the parking lot in Las Vegas.”
The Daniels segment aired just days after former Playboy centerfold model Karen McDougal was interviewed by Cooper on CNN and detailed her own claims of a 10-month affair with Trump during 2006 and 2007.
McDougal, Playboy’s 1998 Playmate of the Year, alleged that Trump tried to give her money following their first romp, and that they went on to have s3x “many dozens of times” — including in his family’s apartment in Manhattan’s Trump Tower.
Trump, who married third wife Melania Trump in 2005, has denied both women’s claims.