NEW YORK — Former President Donald Trump claimed he is “completely innocent” and a victim of “political persecution” Thursday after becoming the first former president in American history to face a criminal indictment.
The ex-president, who’s holed up at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, declared his innocence in a lengthy statement issued minutes after word emerged that a Manhattan grand jury investigating hush money payments to porn star Stormy Daniels had voted to indict him on criminal charges.
“The Democrats have lied, cheated and stolen in their obsession with trying to ‘Get Trump,’ but now they’ve done the unthinkable — indicting a completely innocent person in an act of blatant election Interference,” said Trump, who’s the leading candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in the 2024 election.
