Trump will not refuse to surrender if indicted in New York, according to his lawyer: ‘There will be no standoff at Mar-a-Lago.’
Former President Donald Trump’s lawyer told the Daily News on Friday that if the Manhattan district attorney criminally charges him, he will not refuse to surrender.
“There will be no standoff at Mar-a-Lago with the Secret Service or the Manhattan District Attorney’s office,” Joe Tacopina said.
DA Alvin Bragg is expected to make a charging decision in his office’s long-running investigation into Trump and his business dealings.
If Trump is charged, he must surrender to authorities in New York and appear in court to enter a plea. According to Lucian Chalfen of the Office of Court Administration, no criminal defendants are being arraigned virtually at the moment, despite the fact that a judge could theoretically agree to conduct the hearing remotely.
According to a source with direct knowledge of the meeting who asked to remain anonymous, DA staffers met with members of the NYPD’s intelligence bureau on Thursday for a preliminary meeting to address security concerns ahead of the possible indictment.
The NYPD did not respond immediately to a request for information about security preparations. Emily Tuttle, a spokeswoman for the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, declined to comment.
The grand jury proceedings are private, and it is unclear whether the group appointed in January will vote to indict Trump. If that happens, it will be the first criminal case in American history against a former president.
According to sources close to the four-year-long investigation, Bragg is considering charging Trump with crimes related to how he and his business classified reimbursement checks to his former fixer Michael Cohen for the hush money payment to Daniels and concealed the payment to conceal a second crime.
Cohen testified before a grand jury hearing evidence in the investigation on Wednesday. He claimed that every single engaged juror had a question for him and that he was “certain” he’d given the most thorough account of the 2016 hush money deal with Daniels, for which he served federal prison time.
“I’m relieved that my role is now, for the time being, finished. “I have fulfilled every request made by the district attorney’s office,” Cohen stated.
Trump has denied having a sexual encounter with Daniels and has recently described himself as an extortion victim in connection with the hush payment, which Daniels also denies.
Tacopina stated earlier this week that Trump would not accept the DA’s invitation to testify, fueling speculation that the investigation is nearing its conclusion.
Tacopina said on Friday that Trump, who is running for president for the third time, would find a way to use the potential criminal charges to his advantage.
“Most people would collapse under this,” Tacopina told The News. “He seems to turn everything into a positive and everything into a boost for his campaign, so I’m sure this will just be another thing that people think no one can overcome, but he will.”