Trump pleads not guilty to 2020 election charges at arraignment after arrest – live

Donald Trump just faced his third arraignment in four months over his most consequential indictment yet. Trump stood in the same DC courthouse where over 1,000 January 6 rioters have appeared. Trump pleaded not guilty to charges alleging he led a multifaceted criminal conspiracy that sought to overturn American democracy. The same Constitution that Trump tried to undermine is now protecting him with due process rights. And now, Trump is shamelessly exploiting this process to bolster his campaign in his desperate re-election bid to keep himself out of prison.

If Donald Trump is the Republican nominee for president, the 2024 election will be a referendum on his criminality. He now faces 78 felony charges between his three indictments and his road to potential re-election is paved with trials. The Trump Organization fraud case is in October 2023, the second E Jean Carroll defamation trial is in January 2024, the hush money trial is in March 2024, and the classified documents trial is in May 2024. And soon, there will be a trial scheduled for this new 2020 election conspiracy. Trump could theoretically face 641 years in prison given his charges.

The legal defenses Trump has attempted are flimsy at best. Trump knows his legal troubles are overwhelming and the chances of conviction are increasing with each indictment. This is too big to ignore, so he’s trying to flip the script and make his indictments a key part of his campaign message. Rather than engaging in a serious legal defense, it appears Trump and his team are prioritizing a political defense.

Read Ahmed Baba’s full column for Independent Voices.

Thursday marked the third time Donald Trump has appeared in court since leaving the White House to face serious criminal or civil charges.

Watch what happened below.

Before departing from Washington DC after being arraigned on four federal charges, ex-president Donald Trump gave quick remarks in which he claimed the capitol had “filth”, “decay” and “broken buildings”.

Kyle Cheney, senior legal affairs reporter for Politico, was in the courtroom and noted that several of the federal judges of the district court filled the back row — including Chief Judge James Boasberg, Amy Berman Jackson, and Randy Moss.

About half of Republicans would not vote for Donald Trump if he were convicted of a felony, a sign of the severe risks his legal problems pose for his 2024 US presidential bid, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll that closed on Thursday.

The two-day Reuters/Ipsos poll asked respondents if they would vote for Trump for president next year if he were “convicted of a felony crime by a jury.” Among Republicans, 45% said they would not vote for him, more than the 35% who said they would. The rest said they didn’t know.

Asked if they would vote for Trump if he were “currently serving time in prison,” 52% of Republicans said they would not, compared to 28% who said they would.

The new poll showed that Republicans broadly sympathize with Trump’s accusations of political persecution. Seventy-five percent of Republican respondents agreed with a statement that the charges against Trump were “politically motivated.” Twenty percent disagreed and the rest said they didn’t know.

About two-thirds of Republicans – 66% – described as “not believable” the accusation in Trump’s latest indictment that he solicited election fraud. Twenty-nine percent said it was believable and the rest were not sure.

Republican respondents also described themselves as more likely to withhold their votes on Election Day from an unnamed convicted felon than one named Donald Trump. When asked how a felony conviction would affect their voting in an abstract sense, 71% of Republicans said they would not vote for the convict, compared to 52% if it were Trump.

Trump has capitalized on his indictments since the first charges were filed in April, increasing his lead in the Republican nomination contest over his closest rival, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.

The new poll showed Trump’s dominance only growing in that contest, holding onto the 47% of Republican support he also had in a July poll, while DeSantis’ share slipped six percentage points to 13%.

The Reuters/Ipsos poll was conducted nationwide, gathering responses online from 1,005 U.S. adults. It had a credibility interval, a measure of precision, of about four percentage points.

Former Sgt Aquilino Gonell, who was injured on January 6, shared a statement after attending today’s arraignment, along with other officers.

“Not prosecuting is far riskier than having no consequences for the alleged power grab attempts,” Mr Gonell says.

In brief remarks to reporters on the tarmac of Reagan Airport, Donald Trump calls his arraignment a “sad day for America”.

He then bashes Washington DC saying driving through the city today he saw “filth and decay” and it is not the city he left. Mr Trump left office with the entire city on lockdown following the January 6 Capitol riot amid the Covid-19 pandemic.

Andrew Restuccia of The Wall Street Journal reports on some of the reaction to the former president as he left the courthouse.

Trump’s motorcade was met with a chorus of derision as he departed the courthouse. “Fuck you, terrorist,” one man shouted. “Get the fuck out of our city,” another said. “Good riddance, you prick,” a third man yelled. A woman posed for a selfie with her middle finger in the air.

Donald Trump’s lawyer John Lauro calls it “absurd” for the government to suggest the case could go to trial within the 100 days required by the Speedy Trial Act.

He wants the case excluded from that.

“For the government to suggest this trial could be tried within the timeframe of the Speedy Trial Act is somewhat absurd, I think, given the scope of the discovery.”

Judge Moxila Upadhyaya orders motions from each side on the matter.