After former President Donald Trump pleaded not guilty in a history-making moment on April 4 to 34 felony counts related to falsifying business records, Professor Cheryl Bader analyzed the important pieces of the trial and what’s next in the case.
Cheryl Bader, associate clinical professor of law at Fordham University, said that she thought it was unlikely that Mr. Trump would have been required to post bail even before the laws were changed. Prosecutors would have had to show that there was reason to believe he would not show up to court.
“I think the court would find that that’s not likely,” she said. “Trump is often unpredictable, but I think he’s not likely to abscond and run away to Mexico.”
The gulf between the breadth of the election interference that prosecutors have alleged and the nuts and bolts of the charges they have brought against him form the crux and challenge of the criminal case against Trump.
“The prosecutor wants a story and a theory that the jury is going to find compelling and moving. Technical violations and false records are not that,” said Cheryl Bader, an associate professor at the Fordham University School of Law. “So the prosecutor is going to have to show that the real underlying story is about how Trump deceived the American public to get elected.”
How Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has laid out his allegations against Trump has attracted skepticism among election law scholars and white-collar defense attorneys. But other experts stress that Bragg has a case that plausibly could end in a guilty verdict and that his legal theories are on solid, albeit untested, ground.
“There are some risks and complications, but I also think there’s a path to conviction,” said Cheryl Bader, a former federal prosecutor who now teaches criminal law and procedure at Fordham University School of Law.
- Watch Reuters, “Legal analyst looks at what’s next for Trump case”
- Listen to 1010 WINS Radio, “Lori Madden spoke live with Cheryl Bader at Fordham Law School on the trial”