Donald Trump has been indicted following a years-long investigation by Manhattan prosecutors that has led to the primary felony costs towards a former US president within the nation’s historical past.

“President Trump has been indicted. He didn’t commit any crime. We are going to vigorously combat this political prosecution in court docket,” his attorneys Susan Necheles and Joseph Tacopina stated in a press release.

The district lawyer’s workplace confirmed the costs, which stay underneath seal, and stated it had been in contact with Trump’s attorneys to rearrange his give up. A date for his first look earlier than a decide has not but been set.

The case towards Trump, who’s working as a Republican candidate for president in 2024, comes after a grand jury in New York heard proof from witnesses together with Michael Cohen, his erstwhile lawyer. Cohen has claimed he was ordered in 2016 to pay $130,000 to porn actor Stormy Daniels to cowl up an alleged affair.

The precise nature of the costs was not instantly recognized. The New York Occasions first reported the indictment.

“That is political persecution and election interference on the highest degree in historical past,” Trump stated in a press release after his attorneys have been knowledgeable of the costs. “The Democrats have lied, cheated and stolen of their obsession with making an attempt to ‘get Trump’, however now they’ve completed the unthinkable — indicting a totally harmless individual.”

Whether or not the funds to Daniels, whose actual title is Stephanie Clifford, violated marketing campaign finance and accounting legal guidelines has been the topic of a four-year investigation by the Democratic-led Manhattan district lawyer’s workplace. Cohen was sentenced in 2018 to 3 years in jail after pleading responsible to costs together with marketing campaign finance violations linked to the cost.

The unprecedented costs come after two weeks of intense hypothesis concerning the investigation by the Manhattan district lawyer, Alvin Bragg, which began when Trump introduced he anticipated to be arrested final week. Media studies earlier this week indicated the grand jury listening to proof was ready to take an prolonged break from its work, prompting observers to ask whether or not the investigation had run aground.

Trump is anticipated to be arrested and processed like anybody else dealing with felony costs, together with being fingerprinted and photographed earlier than getting into a plea in a Manhattan courthouse, after which launched on bail. He may seem in court docket as quickly as subsequent week, in keeping with some US media studies.

The indictment is all however sure to set off a fierce backlash from Trump’s supporters in Washington and throughout the nation. Many Republicans leapt to his defence on Thursday, together with Kevin McCarthy, the Republican Speaker of the Home, who stated Bragg had “weaponised our sacred system of justice towards president Donald Trump.”

A number of Republican Home committee chairs have already launched an inquiry into Bragg’s investigation, accusing him of bending to leftwing political stress in pursuing his case towards Trump.

Chuck Schumer, the Democratic Senate majority chief, urged Trump and his supporters to let the authorized course of proceed “peacefully”.

“Mr Trump is topic to the identical legal guidelines as each American,” Schumer stated in a press release. “He’ll have the ability to avail himself of the authorized system and a jury, not politics, to find out his destiny in keeping with the information and the regulation.”

Trump had beforehand referred to as for his supporters to protest and “take our nation again” within the occasion that he was indicted and arrested.

Earlier this month, Trump advised reporters on the CPAC convention of conservative activists that he would keep within the race for the White Home if he have been indicted.

“I wouldn’t even take into consideration leaving,” Trump stated on the time. “In all probability it can improve my numbers.”

A Quinnipiac College ballot out on Wednesday confirmed 57 per cent of People assume Trump needs to be disqualified from working for president if he faces felony costs. Fifty-five per cent stated the accusations being investigated by the Manhattan DA have been “critical”.

Trump however stays the favorite among the many Republican grassroots who will choose the social gathering’s nominee for president in 2024.

Trump was the primary Republican to declare his candidacy, shortly after final November’s midterm elections, and solely former UN ambassador Nikki Haley and anti-ESG investor Vivek Ramaswamy have formally launched campaigns to problem him.

Ron DeSantis, the Republican governor of Florida, is taken into account one among Trump’s greatest rivals, despite the fact that he has not formally entered the race. DeSantis in a tweet on Thursday accused Bragg of “stretching the regulation to focus on a political opponent”.

The Manhattan DA’s workplace secured a felony conviction towards the previous president’s companies final yr over a 13-year tax fraud scheme carried out by senior executives at his household enterprise, the Trump Group.

Trump is dealing with a civil case introduced by the New York attorney-general’s workplace, which has accused him of monetary fraud in reference to the Trump Group, and is underneath investigation in Georgia over his alleged makes an attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

A particular counsel on the Division of Justice can be contemplating whether or not to cost Trump over his alleged function in inciting riots on Capitol Hill in January 2021.