--:-- Shamita Basu: Good morning. It's Friday, March 31st. I'm Shamita Basu. This is Apple News Today.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Former President Donald Trump has been indicted by a New York grand jury. He's been under investigation in connection with hush money payments to the adult film actor Stormy Daniels during the 2016 presidential campaign. This is the first time in American history that a former president is facing criminal charges.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Joining me to talk about what we know and what we don't know at this point is Apple News editor Gideon Resnick.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Hey, Shamita. How's it going?
--:-- Shamita Basu: Good. So there's a lot this morning that we still don't know because judges in New York typically keep indictments sealed until defendants appear in court.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Hush money payments can be legal, but it can be illegal to cover them up by falsifying business records. And a hush money payment in an election might be an illegal violation of campaign finance law.
--:-- Shamita Basu: But let's start with a question that's probably on a lot of people's minds, Gideon. What happens next?
--:-- Gideon Resnick: So in the immediate future, you know, we know one of Trump's lawyers says that he is likely to surrender and appear for an arraignment on Tuesday.
--:-- Shamita Basu: We don't expect Trump to be placed in handcuffs or publicly arrested or anything like that, though he will have to go through the process anyone charged with a crime would.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: He'll be fingerprinted. He'll have a mugshot taken. And during the arraignment, Trump will also have a chance to enter a plea and a judge will decide whether he needs to pay bail.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Now, assuming that Trump pleads not guilty and there's no plea deal arranged, he will then go on to face a trial.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Right, which would then end up meaning finding a jury, which will have its own challenges.
--:-- Shamita Basu: So what has Trump said so far reacting to this news?
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Yeah, nothing too surprising. You know, Trump's attorneys said, quote, he did not commit any crime. We will vigorously fight this political prosecution in court.
--:-- Shamita Basu: That has been their position throughout this entire process. Trump separately said that Democrats have, quote, done the unthinkable, indicting a completely innocent person in an act of blatant election interference.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: So let's talk for a bit about the prosecutor in this case, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
--:-- Shamita Basu: He is a Democrat. What should we know about him?
--:-- Gideon Resnick: So Bragg was elected in November 2021. He's overseen the indictment of Trump confidant Steve Bannon on charges including fraud and money laundering.
--:-- Shamita Basu: That case is still ongoing. Bragg won a tax evasion conviction of Allen Weisselberg who is the Trump organization chief financial officer.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: So he was sentenced to five months in jail. And Bragg also won a conviction of the Trump family businesses on tax fraud. The company's paid $1.6 million in fines.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Okay. So what is Bragg up against in this case?
--:-- Gideon Resnick: You know, it's a really interesting question. The Wall Street Journal says, despite Bragg's past successes going after Trump associates and the Trump organization, this case is really far from a sure bet.
--:-- Shamita Basu: That is in part because a key character in all of this is Michael Cohen.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: As a lot of our listeners will remember, Cohen is Trump's former lawyer.
--:-- Shamita Basu: He's the man who paid $130,000 to Stormy Daniels to not go public about an affair she says she had with Trump years earlier, which Trump denies.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Cohen is almost certain to testify, but he has had his own legal troubles and has pleaded guilty to several crimes, including a campaign finance violation for that payment to Daniels.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Now, Cohen says that Trump knew about how Cohen had structured the payments to Daniels.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Trump's lawyers say he was just following Cohen's legal advice. But if a trial does happen, it could indeed turn on whether a jury thinks that Cohen is a credible witness.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And meanwhile, the backdrop to all of this, of course, is that Trump is still running for president.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: So how is this going to impact 2024?
--:-- Shamita Basu: I guess I mean both. But let's start with legally.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Yeah, I mean, legally, we really don't have much precedent for this. I think that's fair to say a major candidate running under indictment.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Trump is also facing other investigations involving efforts to overturn the 2020 election results, the handling of classified documents that were found at his Florida home, Mar-a-Lago.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: But legal experts seem to think there is nothing that would keep him from continuing to run.
--:-- Shamita Basu: There's kind of nothing in the Constitution on that.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: So you're going to have this split screen here, like kind of nothing we've seen in history, where a former president twice impeached is asking the American public to vote him in as president again while he fights these ongoing legal battles.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Right, which I guess brings us to the political question here. How does Trump base see all of this and how are other Republicans reacting? Are they going to stick by him?
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Yeah, I mean I think we have to just sort of wait and see.
--:-- Shamita Basu: But you know the early indications are that Republicans at least are offering supportive statements at the moment.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And Trump has framed this as a Democratic attack against him for quite some time.
--:-- Shamita Basu: He has often, to his political benefit, gotten supporters behind him when he gives the appearance of being undermined or being targeted.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And he still has big leads in many Republican primary polls at this point.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Going back to those Republican lawmakers in leadership at the moment, a lot of them, as I said, are kind of following Trump's lead in bashing the investigation, calling it politically motivated and meant to harm his reelection bid.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Here's Mike Pence on CNN. I think the unprecedented indictment of a former president of the United States on a campaign finance issue is an outrage.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And it appears to millions of Americans to be nothing more than a political prosecution that's driven by a prosecutor who literally ran for office on a pledge to indict the former president.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: And many other key Republicans are still publicly backing Trump, including other potential 2024 candidates.
--:-- Shamita Basu: You know, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has called the indictment, quote, un-American.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: So I guess at this point, I wouldn't count on this indictment being some sort of fatal political blow based on how Trump supporters and the party, frankly, have reacted in the past.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Gideon, we'll keep watching. Thank you so much.
--:-- Gideon Resnick: Yeah, of course. Thank you.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Before we let you go, some other big stories that we're following in the news right now.
--:-- Shamita Basu: More than 65 million people are at risk of powerful thunderstorms today.
--:-- Shamita Basu: More than a dozen states from Texas to Alabama and as far north as Wisconsin and Michigan.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Forecasters say the severe weather system is almost certain to have tornadoes.
--:-- Shamita Basu: It's the latest hit for the South and Midwest, coming after tornadoes killed dozens in Mississippi earlier this month.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Gwyneth Paltrow is not liable in the civil trial involving a ski collision between her and a man named Terry Sanderson.
--:-- Shamita Basu: A Utah jury also ruled in her favor in her counterclaim against Sanderson.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Jurors deliberated for a little over two hours.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Sanderson sued for millions in damages for injuries he claimed Paltrow suit was for plus legal fees which the jury awarded her.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Today, millions of Americans are at risk of losing their health coverage.
--:-- Shamita Basu: A pandemic-era rule that kept states from dropping people from Medicaid is expiring, so tomorrow states can remove people from the rules.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Many low-income families now need to do extensive paperwork to prove they're still eligible.
--:-- Shamita Basu: NPR talked to Stephanie Jorgensen, a single mom of two, about just how hard that can be.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Gathering all of the verifications is like the most stressful part.
--:-- Shamita Basu: I have a master's and it's still like a fight every step of the way.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Health experts estimate that as many as 18 million people could lose Medicaid coverage in the coming months.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And in sports, the women's Final Four is tonight.
--:-- Shamita Basu: In one game, South Carolina takes on Iowa, and in the other, LSU plays Virginia Tech.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Apple News Sports editor Shaker Siman is our resident guide to all things March Madness.
--:-- Shaker Siman: He has his eyes on the South Carolina versus Iowa matchup.
--:-- Shamita Basu: South Carolina are the defending champions, and Iowa has the player who's really been the runaway star of the tournament, Caitlin Clark.
--:-- Shaker Siman: It's really like the closest college basketball equivalent I can think to to LeBron's Cavs against the Warriors with Kevin Durant and Steph Curry and all them.
--:-- Shamita Basu: But I'm so excited to see those two teams show down.
--:-- Shaker Siman: The men's final four games are Saturday.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Many of the strongest teams have been knocked out.
--:-- Shaker Siman: Of the four left, Shocker says UConn seems like the one to beat.
--:-- Shamita Basu: They came into the tournament seeded fourth in their region somehow.
--:-- Shaker Siman: And since then, they've looked like the best team in the country.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Connecticut has the number three offense and the number 11 defense in the country, and they could steamroll teams.
--:-- Shamita Basu: You can find more on March Madness and all of the stories that we talked about today, including in-depth coverage of Trump in the Apple News app.
--:-- Shamita Basu: And if you're already listening in the News app right now, stick around.
--:-- Shamita Basu: We have our next episode of Apple News in conversation queued up for you next.
--:-- Shamita Basu: It's about why there's so much poverty in America and what you can do about it, with Matthew Desmond, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the book Evicted.
--:-- Shamita Basu: That's playing next, and I'll be back with the news on Monday.
