Trump Declares Manhattan DA Has ‘No Case’ in First Statement After Pleading Not Guilty

Former President Donald Trump has declared the New York County district attorney has “no case” against him in his first public statement after pleading not guilty to a 34-count indictment in a Manhattan court. He declared his legal team was right all along.

Trump wrote on Truth Social at around 5:30 p.m. Tuesday that he’ll be delivering remarks from his Mar-a-Lago estate at 8:15 p.m. local time as he departed for Palm Beach, Florida.

According to Trump, the hearing presented no surprises and no illegality was committed. He added that virtually every legal pundit has said that there is no case against him.

The indictment was brought by the Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, a Democrat elected in a deep blue county who has a history of prosecuting Trump cases. Bragg charged Trump with 34 counts of falsifying business records in connection to a 2016 payment for a non-disclosure agreement with adult entertainment actress Stormy Daniels facilitated by Michael Cohen, who was then Trump’s attorney.

Each of the 34 counts is related to the record trail for payments that a Trump entity made to Cohen, including business ledger entries, invoices, and checks, under the New York State Statute 175.10, which relates to falsifying business records in the first degree.

The Unprecedented Case

Trump’s attorneys have already indicated that they’ll file a motion to dismiss the case. They argued that the case is unprecedented for several reasons, including the fact it concerns a former president and the allegation violates a federal election law that doesn’t exist according to federal election law officials, said Joe Tacopina, one of three Trump attorneys who attended the hearing.

Meanwhile, Bragg said in a statement following the arraignment hearing that Trump falsified business records with an intent to cover up state and federal crime.