Trump grand jury session postponed
One more witness possible in ex-president’s hush-money case, source says
NEW YORK — Manhattan prosecutors postponed without any explanation a scheduled grand jury session Wednesday in the investigation into Donald Trump over hush money payments during his 2016 presidential campaign, at least temporarily slowing a decision on whether to charge the ex-president.
The postponement was confirmed by four people familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity to The Associated Press because they were not authorized to discuss an ongoing investigation by name. It was not immediately clear why the proceedings were postponed, but the grand jurors were told to be on standby today since the New York panel has also been meeting on Thursdays in recent weeks.
When the grand jurors next meet, they may hear from yet another witness, according to a person familiar with proceedings that appear to be nearing a decisive vote on whether or not to indict Trump.
The panel has been probing Trump's involvement in a $130,000 payment made in 2016 to porn actor Stormy Daniels to keep her from going public about a sexual encounter she said she had with Trump years earlier. Trump has denied the claim, insisted he did nothing wrong and assailed the investigation, led by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, as politically motivated.
Wednesday's abrupt development, which a person familiar with the matter said was not connected to security concerns, came amid growing anticipation that Trump could soon be charged. Grand jury proceedings are shrouded in secrecy, making it hard to predict with certainty what action might be taken and when.
As the panel has been hearing from final witnesses, Trump has contended his arrest is imminent and law enforcement officials have accelerated security preparations in the event of unrest accompanying an unprecedented charge against a former U.S. president.
The district attorney's office declined to comment on the postponement, which was earlier reported by Business Insider.
CLASSIFIED DOCUMENTS
Separately, a federal appeals court in a sealed order Wednesday directed a lawyer for Donald Trump to turn over to prosecutors documents in the investigation into the former president's retention of classified records at his Florida estate.
The ruling is a significant win for the Justice Department, which has focused for months not only on the storing of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago but also on why Trump and his representatives resisted demands to return them to the government. It suggests the court has sided with prosecutors who have argued behind closed doors that Trump was using his legal representation to further a crime.
The order was reflected in a brief online notice by a threejudge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. The case is sealed, and none of the parties in the dispute is mentioned by name.
But the details appear to correspond with a secret fight before a lower court judge over whether Trump lawyer M. Evan Corcoran could be forced to provide documents or give grand jury testimony in the Justice Department special counsel probe into whether Trump mishandled top-secret information at Mar-a-Lago.
Corcoran is regarded as relevant to the investigation in part because last year he drafted a statement to the Justice Department asserting that a “diligent search” for classified documents had been conducted at Mar-a-Lago in response to a subpoena. FBI agents weeks later searched the home with a warrant and found roughly 100 additional documents with classified markings.