Trump To Appear In Court, Accused Of Endangering US Democracy

Donald Trump will appear in court on Thursday to answer charges of conspiring to overturn the 2020 election, a case set to cast a dark and volatile cloud over the 2024 White House race for which he remains the presumptive Republican nominee

Washington, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 3rd Aug, 2023 ) :Donald Trump will appear in court on Thursday to answer charges of conspiring to overturn the 2020 election, a case set to cast a dark and volatile cloud over the 2024 White House race for which he remains the presumptive Republican nominee.

"I am now going to Washington, D.C. to be arrested for having challenged a corrupt, rigged and stolen election," the billionaire posted on his Truth Social site, defiantly repeating what special counsel Jack Smith has called the "lies" about the 2020 vote that are at the heart of the indictment against him.

"It is a great honor, because I am being arrested for you," Trump told his social media followers.

Metal barricades and municipal trucks formed a security ring around the E. Barrett Prettyman courthouse in Washington, where the arrest and arraignment of the former president will take place within sight of the US Capitol that was stormed by his supporters on January 6, 2021.

Police and sniffer dogs gathered outside the court, where scores of reporters from the world's media had camped overnight to seek a spot inside.

The 77-year-old Trump is expected to enter a plea of not guilty at a hearing at 4:00 pm (2000 GMT) before magistrate judge Moxila Upadhyaya. He is likely to be fingerprinted but not have a mugshot taken.

The accusations that Trump and six unnamed co-conspirators plotted to upend the 2020 election result is the former president's third criminal indictment since March, and the most serious of the cases threatening to derail his comeback bid.

Earlier, he slammed the alleged "unprecedented weaponization" of the Justice Department in a post on Truth Social, accusing President Joe Biden of seeking to charge him with "as many crimes as can be concocted." "But soon, in 2024, it will be our turn," he wrote.

Biden, for his part, kept up his reticence over his rival's legal peril.

When asked during a morning bike ride while vacationing in Delaware if he would be following the arraignment, his response was a curt "No."