Trump attacks ‘rigged’ trial in rambling post-verdict speech

NEW YORK — Convicted felon Donald Trump is no different than he was the day before.

In a rambling, 33-minute news conference inside Trump Tower on Friday, the former president relitigated details of the trial, revived old grievances and charged ahead with his presidential campaign. He repeated many of the complaints and accusations that he had throughout the trial — that the case “was very unfair,” that the “devil” judge was conflicted and that the district attorney was ignoring crime in New York.

And, as he has before, he cast himself as the victim of a legal — and political — system bent against him.

“It’s my honor to be doing this, but it’s a really unpleasant thing, to be honest,” Trump said. “But it’s a great honor.”

Trump was back in his element — in the atrium of his own Midtown skyscraper — away from the dingy courtroom where he sat for days on end over the last six weeks. But he was clearly somewhat worn down from the trial, seeming exasperated as he went on and on about the unfairness of the case against him while touting his own polling lead and fundraising numbers.

Before a backdrop of a brown glossy stone wall, gold elevator bays and American flags, and with a gift shop selling Trump-branded merchandise just out of frame, Trump freewheeled his remarks, complaining about President Joe Biden’s policies on gas-powered cars, opining on the definition of a “legal expense” and non-disclosure agreements, bemoaning the effects of illegal immigration and more.

Reporters and camera operators stood behind a barrier of brass and red velvet ropes, an only-in-2024 contrast to the metal barricades that had separated Trump in recent weeks from courthouse hallway scrums in downtown Manhattan.

Trump confirmed that his team would appeal the conviction, and one his lawyers told CNN on Friday that they would try to take the case to the Supreme Court, if needed.

And Trump, without mentioning Michael Cohen’s name, simultaneously ripped into him while complimenting his legal skills — calling him a “sleazebag” but a “highly qualified lawyer” at the time Trump paid Cohen for legal work that prosecutors say were reimbursements for hush money.

“He did work. But he wasn’t a fixer. He was a lawyer,” Trump said. “You know, they like to use the word ‘fixer.’ He wasn’t a fixer. … He was a fully accredited lawyer.”

And Trump, without naming her either, complained that porn star Stormy Daniels was called by the state to testify about having a sexual encounter with Trump in 2006.

“By the way, and nothing ever happened. There was no anything. Nothing ever happened,” Trump said, again denying having sex with Daniels. “And they know it. But they were salacious, salacious as they could be. And it had nothing to do with the case.”

Trump remains under a gag order that bars him from commenting on witnesses in the case, though the former president was previously twice held in contempt for breaking it.

The venue — not his building at 40 Wall Street, where Trump has often addressed the press, but “Trump Tower atrium,” as Trump specified when he announced the news conference on social media — was a throwback to his 2016 campaign launch. And for all that has transpired since then, including this week’s verdict, it remains unclear exactly how the political landscape will shift, even as he now has overwhelming public support from GOP officials across the spectrum, most of whom rushed to slam the verdict moments after it was issued.

Donations to Trump’s campaign poured in after the verdict, his team reported, saying in the morning that $34.8 million of small-dollar donations had come in since Thursday. (Trump repeatedly cited the figure as “$39 million” during the press event.) Just shy of 30 percent of those who gave were “brand new donors to the WinRed platform,” his advisers Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles said in a statement. By Friday night, the campaign said it raised $52.8 million.

Trump and his campaign team responded forcefully following the verdict, and not only slamming the judge and prosecution in the case, as he had done for months. His advisers also went after the few Republicans they felt hadn’t sufficiently defended Trump — as well as those fundraising off the verdict, which LaCivita said amounted to “siphoning money from President Trump’s donors.”

After a six-week trial in Manhattan criminal court, Trump was found guilty by a jury of all 34 felony counts of falsifying business records related to hush money payments made to porn star Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 election.

Polling showed that the case, likely the only of Trump’s four criminal cases to go to trial before the November election, was seen as weaker than the others, which pertain to Trump’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election results and his taking of classified documents upon leaving the White House.