\u201cNot guilty,\u201d Trump said after magistrate judge Moxila Upadhyaya read the four criminal counts
\n Virginia
\nFormer president Donald Trump pleaded not guilty on Thursday to criminal charges that he conspired to overturn the results of the 2020 election and defraud the American people.
\nTrump, the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, entered his plea during a nearly 30-minute hearing at the same Washington courthouse where hundreds of his supporters have been convicted for their roles in the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol.
\n\u201cNot guilty,\u201d Trump said after magistrate judge Moxila Upadhyaya read the four criminal counts \u2014 and the potential maximum prison sentences \u2014 in the 45-page indictment brought by special counsel Jack Smith.
\nThe 77-year-old has already been charged in two other criminal cases, and the new conspiracy charges raise the prospect of his being further embroiled in legal proceedings at the height of next year\u2019s election campaign.
\nSpeaking to reporters at Reagan National airport before leaving Washington on his private plane, Trump said the cases brought against him were \u201cpersecution of a political opponent.\u201d
\n\u201cThis is a very sad day for America,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is the persecution of the person that\u2019s leading by very, very substantial numbers in the Republican primary and leading (President Joe) Biden by a lot.
\n\u201cSo if you can\u2019t beat him, you persecute him or you prosecute him,\u201d he said. \u201cWe can\u2019t let this happen in America.\u201d
\nLater on Thursday, Trump quipped on his Truth Social account that considering he had to journey \u201cto a filthy, dirty, falling apart & very unsafe Washington\u201d for his arraignment, \u201cit was a very good day!\u201d
\nThe judge set the next hearing in the high-stakes case for August 28 before US District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan, who will preside over the eventual trial.
\n\u201cI can guarantee to everybody there will be a fair process and a fair trial,\u201d Upadhyaya said.
\n\u2018Fueled by lies\u2019
\nSecurity was tight around the E. Barrett Prettyman federal courthouse where the hearing was held, with metal barricades blocking access and police patrolling the perimeter.
\nSmall groups of demonstrators holding placards milled about outside along with curious tourists.
\n\u201cJail Trump Forever,\u201d read one sign. \u201cTrump 24,\u201d read another.
\n\u201cWe wanted to see it,\u201d said Dave Werner, 52, of Houston, Texas, who was visiting the capital with his son Liam, 12. \u201cIt\u2019s a little bit being part of history.\u201d
\nThe accusations that Trump and six unnamed co-conspirators plotted to upend the 2020 election are the most serious of the cases threatening to derail his White House comeback bid.
\nBiden, for his part, was asked during a bike ride while vacationing in Delaware if he would follow the arraignment. His response was a curt \u201cNo.\u201d
\nSmith, a former war crimes prosecutor at the Hague, has charged Trump with conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy and obstruction of an official proceeding and attempting to disenfranchise voters with his false claims that he won the election.
\n\u201cThe purpose of the conspiracy was to overturn the legitimate results of the 2020 presidential election by using knowingly false claims of election fraud,\u201d the indictment said.
\nSmith linked Trump\u2019s actions following his loss directly to the attack on the Capitol, which he called an \u201cunprecedented assault on the seat of American democracy.\u201d \u201cIt was fueled by lies,\u201d Smith said.
\nMultiple cases
\nThe election plot allegedly included attempts to pressure Mike Pence into throwing out Electoral College votes at the January 6 joint session of Congress called to certify Biden\u2019s win, which the vice president eventually refused to do.
\nTrump is scheduled to go on trial in Florida in May of next year on charges that he took top secret government documents to his Mar-A-Lago estate in Florida and refused to return them.
\nThe twice-impeached former president also faces criminal charges in New York for allegedly paying election-eve hush money to a porn star.
\nHe has pleaded not guilty in both those cases.
\nChutkan, 61, who will preside over Trump\u2019s trial, is an appointee of former Democratic president Barack Obama and she and Trump have a legal history.
\nChutkan ruled against Trump in 2021 when he filed a suit asserting executive privilege to block documents from being handed over to the congressional committee investigating the attack on the Capitol.
\nChutkan has also heard nearly three dozen cases involving participants in the Capitol riot and has handed out stiff sentences.
\nAs president, Trump was impeached by the House of Representatives for seeking political dirt on Biden from Ukraine and over the events of January 6 but was acquitted by the Senate both times.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cNot guilty,\u201d Trump said after magistrate judge Moxila Upadhyaya read the four criminal counts Virginia Former president Donald Trump pleaded not guilty on Thursday to criminal charges that he conspired to overturn the results of the 2020 election and defraud the American people. Trump, the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, entered his plea […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":347228,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-347215","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n