President Joe Biden repeatedly dodged questions from reporters Friday morning about the indictment of former President Donald Trump on his way to board Marine One.
The questions came in response to Trump’s attorneys and the Manhattan district attorney confirming on Thursday that the former president was indicted by a grand jury in connection to an alleged $130,000 hush money payment to porn actress Stormy Daniels.
“I have no comment on that,” Biden told one reporter.
When asked if he was worried about protests in wake of the indictment, Biden said, “No, I’m not going to talk about Trump’s indictment.”
“I have no comment at all on Trump,” Biden told another reporter.
When asked if he thought the indictment was “politically motivated,” Biden said, “I have no comment on Trump.”
Trump attorney Joe Tacopina Friday morning that he does not expect his client to be placed in handcuffs when he turns himself into New York law enforcement officials next week.
Trump “will not take a plea deal on this case. It’s not gonna happen,” Tacopina said in an interview on NBC News. “There’s no crime. I don’t know if it’s gonna make it to trial because we have substantial legal challenges.”
In an interview on ABC News, Tacopina said that Trump was “shock[ed]” by the news that he was being indicted.
“This is unprecedented in this country’s history. I don’t know what to expect other than an arraignment,” he said. “I understand they’re going to be closing off blocks around the courthouse, shutting down the courthouse. You know, we’ll go in there and we’ll proceed to see a judge at some point, plead not guilty, start talking about filing motions, which we will do immediately and very aggressively regarding the legal viability of this case.”
Tacopina said that he expects prosecutors to “try to get every ounce of publicity they can out of this thing.”
“The president will not be put in handcuffs,” he added. “As far as a mugshot’s concerned, perp walk, I mean, you know, as I said, I’m sure they’ll try to make sure they get some joy out of this by parading him.”
“But, you know, I think this is a different situation,” he continued. “It is a lot of groups involved here and I don’t think they’re going to allow this to become a circus, as much as humanly possible.”
Trump faces additional legal jeopardy in three other criminal investigations into him, including a federal investigation into his efforts to stay in power after the 2020 election, an investigation in Georgia into alleged meddling in the 2020 election, and another federal investigation into his handling of U.S. government records after leaving office.
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