Former President Donald Trump’s criminal trial in Manhattan ended Thursday with a historical beliefand in comments in New York On Friday morning, Trump continued to repeat false or misleading claims that framed the legal ruling as a partisan political attack.
CBS News checked four of Trump’s claims about his trial Friday morning.
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Claim 1: “This is all being done by Biden and his people.”
Former President Donald Trump has repeatedly claimed that President Biden was behind the criminal trial in Manhattan: “They are in full cooperation with the White House and the DOJ, so you understand,” Trump said Friday morning a day after his conviction. “This is all being done by Biden and his people.”
What we know
This claim is incorrect. Mr. Biden had no direct influence or power over the lawyers or judge involved in the case. Furthermore, the case has not been brought by the US Department of Justice. It was brought by the The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office. The trial did not take place in federal court, but within the New York legal system.
Claim 2: “Now I’m under a gag order that no one has ever been under. No presidential candidate has ever been under a gag order before.”
On Friday, Trump said he still has a silence order from Judge Juan Merchan, echoing what his lawyer, Todd Blanche, said on Fox News on Thursday.
What we know:
CBS News legal assistant Jessica Levinson said Merchan had not yet lifted the gag order as of Friday, the day after Trump’s conviction. Separately, Reuters reported that he is “likely to revoke” the order.
Merchandise gag order Originally only banning Trump from speaking about witnesses and court personnel, it was expanded on April 1 to ban Trump from speaking about Bragg’s family and Merchan’s family after Trump repeatedly invoked Judge Merchan’s daughter on social media. Merchan said the order was necessary because some of Trump’s rhetoric could prevent jurors, attorneys and court staff from carrying out their duties in court.
Trump may criticize Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and Merchan. The former president can also talk about the details of the case where he finds fault, or claim that the entire process is political if he so chooses.
So far, Trump has done that has violated his gag order 10 timesand was fined a total of $10,000.
Claim 3: “We just went through one of many experiences where we had a conflicted judge, very conflicted. There has never been a more conflicted judge.”
Trump attacked the impartiality of Judge Merchan, who oversaw the case, calling him “conflicted” at least seven times on Friday. He also previously claimed that Merchan’s daughter worked with top Democrats.
What we know:
This is an exaggeration from Trump.
Judge Merchan, who was randomly assigned to this case, made $35 in political contributions to Democrats through ActBlue in 2020, including $15 to Mr. Biden’s campaign. Loren Merchan, the judge’s daughter, has worked with a number of top Democrats through her role at a marketing company called Authentic campaigns.
In 2023, Merchan asked the New York Advisory Committee on Judicial Ethics to decide whether this amounted to a conflict. The panel warned Merchan because political contributions of any kind are prohibited under state ethics rules. But they ruled that Merchan’s ability to do his job was not affected.
Merchan therefore denied Trump’s request to recuse himself — a decision that a separate panel of New York Appellate Division judges recently upheld.
Claim 4: “When Bragg came in, he said ‘this is the most ridiculous case I’ve ever seen…’ When I announced a long time later that I was running for president, they decided to revive this case .”
Trump has repeatedly attacked Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who brought the “hush money” case to trial. During his remarks Friday, Trump claimed that Bragg only planned to file a case against him after he announced his election.
What we know:
This claim is incorrect.
Alvin Bragg took office in January 2022, inheriting the case from a former prosecutor, Cyrus Vance Jr.. The New York Times reported that in the summer of 2022, Bragg felt confident he was making progress on an indictment and could reach a court convince that the charges for falsifying company records in this case were justified. It lasted until the fall of 2022 that Trump announced he walked again.
Bragg has been a repeated target of Trump before and during the trial. CBS News found that Trump made or amplified this claim that billionaire investor George Soros donated to Alvin Bragg at least 54 times on Truth Social, including the day the verdict came down when Trump called Bragg “Soros-backed” in a post.
While it is true that Soros donated $1 million to a progressive racial justice group called Color of Change in May 2021, and the group’s political arm later endorsed Bragg, a spokesperson for Soros told the New York Times that the two men never met had met. – nor had Soros given money directly to Bragg’s campaign.
Alan He and Paulina Smolinksi contributed reporting.
