Earlier reports indicated that law enforcement agencies were preparing for a potential indictment of President Trump.
The various agencies include the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force, the Secret Service, NYPD, New York State’s court liaisons, and the office of the District Attorney.
Reports suggested Trump would be arrested in New York City as early as next week.
BREAKING: Donald Trump will be ARRESTED in NYC, as early as next week, per reports that Manhattan DA has meeting next week with law enforcement (including Secret Service) on logistics of the arrest.
Trump will be "fingerprinted and processed just like any other defendant."
— Tristan Snell (@TristanSnell) March 17, 2023
On Saturday, Trump himself said he would be arrested on Tuesday.
HERE WE GO: President Trump Claims He Will Be Arrested Tuesday!
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However, new reports indicate that Tuesday's arrest of Donald Trump is far from certain.
According a Business Insider report late Saturday, it appears an indictment is on hold until a final witness testifies before a Manhattan grand jury Monday afternoon.
“There is one more witness,” an inside source reportedly told Insider.
A potential indictment of former President Donald Trump is currently on hold, awaiting the testimony of a final witness before a Manhattan grand jury on Monday afternoon.https://t.co/IrnofSkVBp
— Officer🌟Sharon (@officersharon) March 19, 2023
Via Business Insider:
The source spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to divulge details of the grand jury proceedings.
The source declined to identify the witness, whose testimony will cap a two-month grand jury presentation by prosecutors under District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
A separate source, who also spoke on condition of anonymity, told Insider that the witness is not Allen Weisselberg, Trump’s former CFO, who is serving a five-month sentence for admittedly masterminding a payroll tax-dodge scheme at the Trump Organization.
PJ Media added:
Meanwhile, Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen, whose betrayal of his former client started this whole business about Trump having paid hush money to a porn star (which is what he might be arrested for, not any of the literally dozens of other crimes that Democrats have claimed he has committed over the last few years, up to and including trying to overthrow the government of the United States), “has told reporters he expected to be the grand jury’s final witness when he testified last Monday and Wednesday.” So whoever is slated to appear on Monday is a surprise witness.
Insider notes that the grand jury “could conceivably reach a vote” on whether or not actually to indict Trump for trying to buy a hooker’s silence “by the end of Monday’s three-hour session,” but that’s not likely to happen, as “experts” say that “there are several steps between the final testimony and the vote.”
Now, if we have learned anything over the last few years, it’s not to trust the confident assertions of “experts,” but this could well mean that Trump will not be indicted on Tuesday, as there simply won’t be time after the surprise witness testimony on Monday to go through all the necessary steps to issue the indictment. “Once testimony concludes, prosecutors will ‘charge’ the jury, meaning go through the potential counts on a charge sheet one by one, explaining each count in the potential indictment.” Several other steps follow that before there can be any indictment.
According to reports Sunday afternoon, the 'surprise witness' to testify Monday is Rudy Giuliani lawyer Robert Costello.
Costello is the ex-attorney for prosecution witness Michael Cohen.
After Costello's testimony, Cohen may be called by the prosecution for a rebuttal.
"Just reported that the most important witness to go before the New York City grand jury, a highly respected lawyer who once represented convicted felon, jailbird, and serial fake storyteller and liar, Michael Cohen, will be doing so tomorrow afternoon. The information he will present will supposedly be conclusive and irrefutable! Witch hunt!!!" Trump posted to Truth Social.
Business Insider reported:
Monday's surprise grand jury witness in the New York "hush-money" investigation into Donald Trump is Giuliani lawyer Robert Costello, a source familiar with the investigation confirmed to Insider.
Star prosecution witness Michael Cohen is also making himself available Monday, in case Manhattan prosecutors decide to call him before the grand jury to give rebuttal testimony, Cohen told Insider.
cont.
News that as many as two witnesses — Costello and Cohen — may now need to testify before the grand jury can vote provides new clues to the timing for any indictment.
RedState added:
Trump claims that Costello, who he calls a “highly-respected lawyer,” has “conclusive and irrefutable” proof that should put him in the clear. What that actually amounts to is anyone’s guess. Trump is obviously going to say that regardless, and the nature of Costello’s relationship with Trump’s orbit is going to complicate his credibility. But if he has documentation or something otherwise concrete, perhaps he could turn the entire grand jury on its head.
Besides, Michael Cohen is not without his own credibility issues, being a convicted felon and someone with an obvious ax to grind. The cornerstone of his claim will rest on the audio recording of Trump he provided showing the former president ordering the hush money payment to Stormy Daniels.
But that doesn’t prove that Trump ordered the payment to be misclassified (which is the “crime” here). If the grand jury hearing turns into a he said, she said between Costello and Cohen, things might come to standstill. That would be a very good thing for the former president.
The other thing being revealed here is the timeline. The grand jury meets on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. The testimony alone on Monday will probably eat up all their time. Then they have to come back and begin deliberations (much like a regular jury) before voting on how to proceed. In other words, Tuesday probably won’t be the day all this gets settled, and we could see it drag out well into the end of the week, if not further.
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