Former President Donald Trump listens as he speaks with reporters while in flight on his plane after a campaign rally at Waco Regional Airport, in Waco, Texas, Saturday, March 25, 2023, while en route to West Palm Beach, Fla. President Trump was indicted Thursday, March 30, 2023, by a New York grand jury. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)Credit: ASSOCIATED PRESS
SALT LAKE CITY — Former President Donald Trump was indicted Thursday afternoon by a New York grand jury in connection to an illegal hush money payment in 2016 to Stormy Daniels. It’s the first-ever criminal case against a former U.S. president.
John Huber, a former U.S. Attorney for the District of Utah, joined KSL at Night with hosts Derek Brown and Greg Skordas to discuss what this all means.
Brown asked, “This sort of breaks new legal ground, doesn’t it today?”
“You framed it correctly,” Huber said. “This is unprecedented in our nation’s long and storied and proud history. We’ve never had anything like this that a former president has been indicted in a criminal court in a state of the union.”
“There’s gonna be a lot of pressure on that district attorney to show this wasn’t a political prosecution,” Skordas said.
“And the way he would show that is to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt to a jury of the former president’s peers,” Huber said. “Which in and of itself is a very steep hill to climb.”
Huber goes on to say this case is about as dramatic as it possibly could be.
“This is high drama,” he said. “You know, we as Americans, we watch dramatic illegal proceedings on TV all the time. They’re very popular. And this is about as dramatic as it could be.”
Brown asked, “Does this indictment mean that the president, like any other person indicted, will be fingerprinted and photographed and handcuffed and that whole thing?”
Huber says part of that is accurate.
“I know he will be processed and fingerprinted,” Huber said. “…. I really don’t believe there’s going to be handcuffs involved. And I don’t think that’s favorable treatment just because he’s the former president.”
Huber says this is just the beginning.
“For a prosecutor who has presented evidence and who makes a recommendation to the grand jury, it is a low hurdle to get over. It is just the beginning. The much higher hurdle by design, as I mentioned, is beyond a reasonable doubt in a speedy and public trial.”
Listen to KSL at Night on weeknights from 7 to 9 p.m.