Former President Donald Trump entered pleas of not guilty Thursday at an arraignment in Washington, D.C., giving his formal response to the four-count indictment over his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, including his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Trump, the frontrunner in polls for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, has denied wrongdoing, and after his arraignment he continued to criticize the legal proceedings as largely about helping President Joe Biden in next year’s election.
“This is the persecution of the person that’s leading by very, very substantial numbers in the Republican primary and leading Biden by a lot. So if you can’t beat him, you persecute him or you prosecute him,” Trump told reporters at the Washington area’s Reagan National Airport.
A RealClearPolitics moving average of polls actually shows Biden slightly ahead of Trump in a head-to-head matchup, even as the Democratic incumbent suffers from low approval ratings.
In Tuesday’s 45-page indictment, Trump was hit with charges that included conspiracy to defraud the U.S. and conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding.
Related: Bill Barr says Jan. 6 indictment is ‘legitimate’ and that Trump knew he lost the election
The former president’s latest appearance in Washington was just one step in a legal battle that likely will take months to play out.
The next hearing in the case was reportedly scheduled for Aug. 28, which would be five days after the first GOP presidential primary debate.
Special counsel Jack Smith on Tuesday said his office “will seek a speedy trial” in the Jan. 6 case, but Trump defense attorney John Lauro has pushed back repeatedly on Smith’s statement, telling NPR on Wednesday that his side wants “a just trial, not simply a speedy trial,” and that the trial itself “could last six months or nine months or even a year.”
Trump’s legal team looks likely to make change-of-venue requests, with the former president talking up West Virginia in a Truth Social post late Wednesday. He said the Jan. 6 case “will hopefully be moved to an impartial Venue, such as the politically unbiased nearby State of West Virginia! IMPOSSIBLE to get a fair trial in Washington, D.C., which is over 95% anti-Trump.”
Trump also entered pleas of not guilty earlier this year in a Manhattan case over hush-money payments and in a Miami case over classified documents. Another investigation, in Georgia’s Fulton County, centers on efforts by Trump and his allies to undo that state’s 2020 election result. The county prosecutor said over the weekend that she will announce charging decisions by Sept. 1 in that probe.
Biden told CNN Thursday that he was not planning to follow Trump’s arraignment, responding with an emphatic “no” when asked about it during a bike ride in Rehoboth Beach, Del., where he is vacationing this week.
Now read: ‘You’re too honest’: Donald Trump’s alleged Jan. 6 conspiracies, explained
And see: Trump indictment: What does arraignment mean, and what happens next?
Plus: How DeSantis is leading Trump in cash on hand, even as the former president dominates in polls
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