CONVICTED FELON DONALD TRUMP
Former president found guilty on all charges
In a stunning and historic moment, the jury in the first criminal trial of a former US president has found Donald Trump guilty of all 34 felony counts against him.
The jury returned its verdict in the same New York courtroom where Trump has been standing trial for weeks.
Jurors returned unanimous verdicts late Thursday afternoon. The jury was polled to confirm the verdicts were unanimous and Judge Juan Merchan thanked the seven men and five women and dismissed them.
Trump now awaits sentencing from Merchan, on crimes that the Republican now making his third run for the White House falsified business records to hide a payment to keep quiet a porn star who alleged an extramarital affair with Trump, just prior to Trump’s first election in 2016.
The 45th president is now the first former president of the United States to be found a convicted felon.
Anchors on the various news networks were stunned by the quick verdict, which came after just nine hours of deliberations.
“This is a definitive and this is an irreversible verdict. He can appeal. I’m sure he will appeal. But this is everything that the prosecution asked for, from a jury that by all counts took this thing very, very seriously,” announced MSNBC host Rachel Maddow. “We counted the deliberation hours down here. The test here for us, as a country, is not about what happens on appeal. And is not about what happens on sentencing.
“The test for us now as a country is whether or not this former president and his allies will have succeeded in trying to undermine the rule of law so that people reject this as a legitimate function of the rule of law in our country. They have tried to delegitimize this judge. They have tried to delegitimize the court and delegitimize the laws that he’s charged under,” she added. “The people involved in bringing this case have been threatened and intimidated and have everything brought to bear against them in a way that was designed to delegitimize the process of the American people.”
This trial likely will be the only trial Trump sees before the November election. He is indicted on dozens of other charges in federal and Georgia state courts.
What will remain unknown in the days, weeks and months ahead is what — if any — effect that this historic verdict will have on a presidential election which public opinion polling has found to have been tight for some time.
Please support our work…
Please subscribe…