A Brief History
We recently asked the question: “Has any U.S. President ever been arrested?” As an update to our recent article about that topic, we can now report that on April 4, 2023, former President of the United States, Donald J. Trump, was arraigned in New York City on charges of falsifying records. Facing 34 felony counts of falsifying business records, Trump as expected entered pleas of “Not Guilty” to each charge.
Digging Deeper
Protestors for and against the former president were outside the courtroom, but no major riot or violence took place as police security had been planned well in advance of the court proceedings. No live television cameras were allowed in the courtroom, although reporters and still photographers were allowed to observe. There was no “perp walk” or handcuffs involved, and reportedly no “mug shot” was taken.
If Trump is found guilty of any of the charges, the maximum sentence he faces is being reported by many outlets as 136 years (4 years per each count) in jail, although there is no minimum sentence and it is highly possible he could be sentenced by the judge to something other than jail time. Trump made a public statement on Tuesday night.
Question for students (and subscribers): This development has left us with many questions. Do you think these charges are valid or do you think Trump is a victim of political persecution? Also, how do you think this arrest will affect the 2024 U.S. presidential election? Finally, are there any other past U.S. presidents that should have been arrested? If so, for what? Please let us know in the comments section below this article.
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Historical Evidence
For more information, please see…
Barak, Greg. Criminology on Trump (Crimes of the Powerful). Routledge, 2022.
Meade, David. The Coup D’état Against President Donald J. Trump. eBookIt.com , 2017.
The featured image in this article, a photograph by Gage Skidmore from Surprise, AZ, United States of America of Former President of the United States Donald Trump speaking with attendees at the 2022 Student Action Summit at the Tampa Convention Center in Tampa, Florida, is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.
You can also watch video versions of this article on YouTube.
