Perhaps you’ve heard that Donald Trump is facing four separate criminal trials as he runs for President this year? Of course while most may know this, few are familiar with all the details, and admittedly it can be quite difficult to keep it all straight for these four distinct and complex cases.
So with his first trial starting next week, now is the perfect time to break down the basics of every case, and look ahead to how we expect each of them to develop over the coming weeks and months.
Before we begin, however, it’s worth addressing whether this all even matters. Well, polls consistently show that should Donald Trump be convicted of a crime in one or more of these trials, some of his supporters will desert him. Whether or not that actually occurs remains to be seen, obviously, but for now we should prepare for such a reality.
New York City Hush Money Trial
On March 30, 2023, a grand jury in New York City kicked this all off with Donald Trump’s first criminal indictment, and now it seems set to soon be his first criminal trial.
This particular prosecution concerns the payments Trump made to adult film actress Stormy Daniels. In October 2016, the National Enquirer bought the rights to Daniels’ story of a 2006 affair with Trump for $130,000. Trump’s then-personal attorney Michael Cohen paid this money in order to prevent the story from coming out before the 2016 election.
Trump subsequently paid Cohen $420,000 for this work, but used funds from his business rather than his own personal funds. As a result, the District Attorney is charging Trump on 34 counts of falsifying business records.
This trial was originally set to start on March 25th, but was unexpectedly delayed. Now, though, the proceeding is back on track, with jury selection beginning on April 15th.
District of Columbia January 6th Trial
The first of two federal prosecutions of Donald Trump, this one refers to his involvement in the January 6th attack on the Capitol and the larger effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
On August 1, 2023 a D.C. grand jury voted to indict Trump on four counts: conspiracy to defraud the United States, obstructing an official proceeding, conspiring to obstruct an official proceeding and conspiracy to violate civil rights.
This particular trial has been stuck in a bit of a holding pattern since last December, as the Trump team is arguing that his actions are protected under Presidential immunity.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit took about a month to decide against Trump in a unanimous decision issued on February 6th. Contrary to expectations, however, the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear an appeal on April 25th.
Considering that Special Counsel Jack Smith originally asked the Supreme Court to expedite a ruling on Trump’s immunity back in December, only to be rejected, critics fear that the conservative majority is deliberately dragging its feet so that the Republican nominee won’t face this trial before Election Day.
Since this is a federal prosecution, a future Trump Attorney General could very well drop the case should the former President reacquire the office next January.
Thus the April 25th Supreme Court hearing will be the second major courtroom date for Trump in as many weeks. The three Democratic Justices (Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown-Jackson) seem to be safe votes against Trump, while the ex-President likely has conservatives Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito in his corner.
Therefore, the swing Justices are Chief Justice John Roberts and the trio appointed by Trump: Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney-Barrett. If Roberts elects to strike down the immunity claim, and can convince one of these three to support him, then the D.C. trial will likely proceed sometime in the summer.
Should Trump win this appeal, or even just a further delay of the case, then it becomes suddenly unlikely that the trial will commence before Election Day.
Florida Classified Documents Trial
Legal experts and political pundits both like to say that the federal prosecution concerning Trump’s handling of classified documents represents his gravest legal threat.
Trump is facing 40 indictments in this case, concerning the 32 classified documents he illegally held onto, as well as another 8 counts related to false statements and conspiracy to obstruct.
Since these documents were taken to Trump’s home in Mar-A-Lago, the trial was given to the Southern District of Florida instead of the District of Columbia. In addition to giving Trump a much more favorable potential jury pool, this shift in venue also led to the case being assigned to Judge Aileen Cannon.
Cannon was appointed to the bench by Trump himself in 2020, and confirmed in November of that year. Judge Cannon had already earned the ire of the liberal legal community for her appointment of a special master to review the classified materials retrieved by the FBI from Mar-A-Lago.
That criticism has only intensified over the past few weeks, and it’s now possible that Jack Smith will seek to have her replaced by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals.
So while there technically is a May 20th trial date still on the books, it appears unlikely that we’ll see the trial begin on that date or any other time in the near future.
Fulton County 2020 Election Interference Trial
The fourth and final criminal case against Trump concerns his efforts to overturn the 2020 election in Georgia.
This case was sparked by the famous phone conversation between Donald Trump and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger on January 2, 2021.
“All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we [need]” Trump declared before going on to threaten Raffensperger for not taking action. “That’s a criminal offense. And you can’t let that happen. That’s a big risk to you.”
On August 14, 2023, yet another grand jury voted to indict Trump; this time alongside 18 alleged co-conspirators. Trump himself is facing 10 indictments (3 counts of solicitation of a public officer where later dropped by the Judge): four counts of making false statements, two counts of forgery, two counts of filing false documents, one count of impersonating a public officer and one RICO count.
Such a sprawling case was always going to be difficult to resolve before November 5th, but an unexpected curveball will only further add to the delay. During the divorce proceedings of lead prosecutor Nathan Wade, allegations emerged that he was having a romantic relationship with Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis.
Eventually, Willis admitted to a past relationship with Wade, while maintaining that it only began after she initially hired Wade and that it had since ended. An appeal hearing by the Trump team turned into a televised spectacle as both Willis and Wade took the stand. The ultimate result was that Judge Scott McAfee ruled that Willis could only stay on the case if Wade resigned, which Wade subsequently did.
Nevertheless, Judge McAfee did allow the Trump defense team to appeal this decision to the Georgia Court of Appeals, and we’re all waiting to see if they decide to take it up. So for now, Willis’ goal of starting the trial on August 5th of this year appears to be in danger.
Conclusion
So, to sum this all up: we’ve got one Trump trial starting on April 15th, another one suspended in animation while the Supreme Court hears immunity arguments on April 25th, and two more trials unlikely to take place before the election on November 5th.
We’ll all just have to wait to see what happens.