new york as a criminal defendant facing 34 felony charges in connection with an alleged scheme to cover up extra marital encounters, one with a porn star , one with a former playboy playmate of the year. we ran the comments from district attorney alvin bragg earlier, so too, will we bring trump to you and jake, whichever donald trump shows up whether he s angry to find defensive, mocking or all of the above, it will be a far different donald trump. from the one earlier today on the 15th floor, the manhattan criminal court building with no one holding the door for him on the way into his arraignment, or the donald trump, who sat stone faced at the defense table for the first what could be many such appearances to come. we don t yet know what the former president makes of this. we could learn shortly, and as we wait for him to speak, we have, as only cnn can a team of correspondents. legal and political analysts help make sense of what happened today and what happens next. let
, the venue for an american 1st 100 Center Street in Downtown Manhattan, playing host to a new chapter in u. S history. Today the arrest and arraignment of donald trump. Former President Trump is back in the city that made him famous. But this time to face a new reality, the first ever former president to Face Criminal Charges. Good afternoon to our viewers around the world. Im Anderson Cooper, new york and im jake tapper in washington, d c. Were just hours away from the opening gavel. Of the people of the state of new york versus donald j. Trump this is the scene, the Manhattan Criminal Courts complex for mr trump. Will surrender. Were told and then where prosecutors will drop and indictment spelling out multiple charges against him at this very moment, we still do not know exactly what those charges are and how many there are connected to mr trumps alleged scheme to buy the silence of adult film actress and director stormy, daniels said a pivotal 2016 campaign moment. As we come on a
new york statute and john, do you think um there s any case. to be made here. that what district attorney brag, assuming there isn t some rabbit that he s going to pull out of the hand that the critics of his who say he is now just severely lowered the threshold for the kinds of charges that a local district attorney even in the places largest manhattan can bring against a major political figure. for what, at least as of now, all we know are misdemeanor business fraud. um that that is something that that s a lie that he has now crossed that will be used against democrats and others. i think that is a huge risk in the long term again to andrew s point to give him the benefit of the doubt he gets to make his case in court. but he says he had no legal requirement to explain the underpinnings that make it a felony. he may not have a legal requirement. did he have a public
kinds of charges that a local district attorney even in the places largest manhattan can bring against a major political figure for one, at least as of now, all we know are misdemeanor business fraud. um that that is something that that s a lie that he has now crossed that will be used against democrats and others. i think that is a huge risk in the long term again to andrew s point to give him the benefit of the doubt he gets to make his case in court. but he says he had no legal requirement to explain the underpinnings that make it a felony. he may not have a legal requirement. did he have a public requirement? did you have a public good requirement? where you going to bring 34 felony counts against the former president, knighted states. if you re a democrat, if you re under attack, if you do have past statements on the record about going after trump. yes i believe he did. i believe he did have more of a public requirement at this moment not to lay out his entire case. he doesn t hav
the things that you know we re wondering because what? there are substantial risks. there are risks that people will get hurt if there is some sort of altercation. following all of this, there are risks. if it s just misdemeanors that that harms the credibility of the justice system that all of this was due to just something small, so we ll have to see. the theory being obviously, as you know that that misdemeanor business fraud committed in the name of concealing a different crime can be a jumped up to make it a felony, but we ll see. we don t know what s in there yet, as mr trump is about to leave trump tower, tensions are running high as kerry was just alluding to the challenge of securing such a historic arraignment. that s next. you re doing businesess in an app driven multlti cloud wor. that s why you chohoose vm ware wiwith flexible multi cloud services that enable digital innovation and enterprise control helps you keep your cloud options open. wha do you