Law enforcement officials in New York are preparing security for the possibility that former President Donald Trump could be indicted in the coming weeks and appear in a Manhattan courtroom in an investigation into the secret money he paid to women. who allegedly had sex with him, four law enforcement officials said Friday.
There has been no public announcement of any timeframe for the grand jury’s secretive work, including any possible vote to indict the former president.
The law enforcement official, who was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, said authorities were only preparing a case for indictment. He described the talks as preliminary and is considering the security, planning, and practicalities of a possible court appearance by the former president.
Trump’s lawyer, Joseph Tacopina, told The Associated Press that if Trump is indicted, “we will follow the normal procedures.”
The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office had no comment. A message was left for court administrators.
The grand jury is hearing witnesses including Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen, who says he paid two women in 2016 to keep quiet about sexual encounters they said they had with Trump a decade earlier.
Trump denies the encounters, says he did nothing wrong, and calls the investigation a “witch hunt” by a Democratic prosecutor bent on sabotaging the Republican 2024 presidential campaign.
“Democrats have investigated and attacked President Trump before he was elected — and they have failed every time,” campaign spokesman Steven Cheung said in a statement Thursday about the investigation.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office is apparently investigating whether any state laws were broken in connection with the payments or the way Trump’s company compensated Cohen for his work in keeping the women’s allegations quiet. Compensation was given.
Daniels and at least two former Trump aides – one-time political adviser Kellyanne Conway and former spokeswoman Hope Hicks – are among witnesses who have met with prosecutors in recent weeks.
Cohen has said that at Trump’s direction, he arranged payments totaling $280,000 to porn actor Stormy Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal. According to Cohen, the payment was to buy her silence regarding Trump, who was in his first presidential campaign at the time.
Cohen and federal prosecutors said the company paid them $420,000 to reimburse Daniels for paying $130,000 and to cover bonuses and other estimated expenses. The company classified those payments internally as legal expenses.
McDougall was paid $150,000 by the then-publisher of the supermarket tabloid National Enquirer to prevent her story from being published.
Federal prosecutors agreed not to prosecute the Enquirer’s corporate parent in exchange for cooperation in a campaign finance investigation that led to charges against Cohen in 2018. Prosecutors said the payments to Daniels and McDougall amounted to impermissible, unrecorded gifts to Trump’s election efforts.
Cohen pleaded guilty, served a prison sentence, and was fired. Federal prosecutors never charged Trump with a crime.