Donald Trump’s criminal trial in Manhattan in his hush money case begins in earnest Monday morning with opening statements that mark a momentous day in U.S. history.
Trump is the first former or sitting U.S. president to face a criminal trial and the proceedings also come amid a 2024 presidential race in which Trump is almost certain to be the Republican nominee for take on Joe Biden.
Related: The jurors: who is on the jury in the Trump trial?
A jury of seven men and five women will evaluate whether Trump’s alleged efforts to conceal damaging information about extramarital sex, in order to protect his 2016 election bid, were unlawful. Trump was charged with 34 counts of falsifying business records in the spring of 2023.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s case hinges on a $130,000 payment that former Trump lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen made to Stormy Daniels, an adult film star, to keep his story secret. Bragg contends that Trump obscured the true nature of the payment in the business filings by describing them as legal legal fees.
Cohen, who pleaded guilty in 2018, is expected to be one of the prosecution’s key witnesses. Trump has denied having a sexual relationship with Daniels and insists the payments to Cohen were honest legal fees.
The New York case is just one of several criminal proceedings Trump faces. He faces federal charges related to the Jan. 6 insurrection, as well as his handling of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago home. In Georgia, he faces state-level charges for allegedly trying to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
Trump is nevertheless poised to win the Republican presidential nomination this summer after easily defeating many of his rivals. In polls against Biden, Trump often leads narrowly and is currently performing well in most of the key states that either candidate needs to win the White House.
The first week of Trump’s trial was characterized by comedy and, at one point, tragic chaos. During four days of jury selection, Trump had to listen to his fellow New Yorkers explain why they couldn’t be fair jurors at his trial.
But Friday afternoon, while the six alternate jurors were being chosen, a man set himself on fire in front of the courthouse at 100 Center Street. The man who succumbed to his injuriesleft behind pamphlets and an online post in which he outlined numerous conspiracy theories that appeared to have little to do specifically with Trump but were more broadly anti-government and anti-tech industry, among other targets .
