No American is above the law — not even former presidents. After a monthslong investigation, a New York grand jury indicted former president Donald J. Trump on charges related to hush-money payments made to adult film star Stormy Daniels in the lead-up to the 2016 election.
The grand jury, consisting of typical Americans across race, background and political party, weighed the evidence and decided to bring charges. Other indictments of the former president may be forthcoming for his mishandling of classified documents and for his role in attempting to overturn the results of the 2020 election, including the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
The charges out of New York stem from a January 2018 Wall Street Journal story breaking the news of the hush-money payments made to Daniels to keep her from going public in 2016 about an affair with Trump. Recognizing a series of apparent campaign finance violations, Common Cause quickly drafted and filed complaints with the Department of Justice and the Federal Election Commission. Trump’s former lawyer and “fixer,” Michael Cohen, pleaded guilty and served jail time for his role in the violations. Still, until now, the former president was only an unindicted co-conspirator.
