Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s 34-count indictment against Donald Trump proved even more pathetic than anticipated — so pathetic, in fact, that the “get Trump” crowd will likely soon turn on the Democrat prosecutor.
Yesterday afternoon, the former president and leading 2024 Republican presidential candidate appeared in a New York state courtroom and pleaded not guilty to the criminal charges leveled against him by the Manhattan D.A. The public had to wait longer, however, to learn the specifics of the 34 criminal counts contained in the indictment.
When finally unsealed, the indictment prompted a figurative flipping of the pages, with Americans looking front to back for something real there. But there was none to find.
Rather, for 16 pages, the grand jury indictment merely regurgitated the same statutory buzzwords, alleging Trump violated §175.10 of the New York Penal Law: “in the County of New York and elsewhere,” Trump, “on or about” a specific date, “with intent to defraud and intent to commit another crime and aid and conceal the commission thereof, made and caused a false entry in the business records.”
The template was then repeated in each count, specifying a different date or business record — sometimes an invoice from Michael Cohen, sometimes an entry in the general ledger of the Donald Trump Trust, and sometimes the issuance of a check. There were three or four criminal counts alleged against Trump for each payment made to Cohen from February through December of 2017, which together stacked up to 34
