Americans have been waiting for a potential indictment of former President Donald Trump with bated breath—but they’ll have to wait a little longer, according to multiple reports.
High-ranking law-enforcement officials told Insider and other outlets that Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg ordered the grand jury investigating Trump’s alleged “hush-money” payments to stay home Wednesday, delaying the possible indictment.
The New York Times has confirmed the reports, with NBC New York adding that Bragg told the jury to be on standby for Thursday.
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Reasons for the postponement were not given.
The jury has been meeting regularly to hear testimony related to a $130,000 payment Trump allegedly approved to pornstar Stormy Daniels on the eve of the 2016 election in what prosecutors say was a violation of campaign finance laws. Daniels alleged that Trump was seeking to cover up an affair between them.
Witnesses in the trial included Trump’s own lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen, who personally facilitated the payments and spent three years in prison on charges including campaign finance violations.
News of the delay directly contradicts statements by both Cohen and the former president himself.
After testifying last week, Cohen told reporters that his testimony would be the last before the grand jury, insinuating that a vote on whether or not to indict was imminent.
However, this prediction was proven incorrect on Monday, when the jury heard testimony from Cohen’s legal counsel Robert Costello at the request of the defense. Costello had previously sought to cast doubt on Cohen’s credibility in a news conference.
Trump cited this development in a post on his Truth Social platform Wednesday, claiming that Bragg was “having a hard time with the Grand Jury, especially after the powerful testimony against him by Felon Cohen's highly respected former lawyer.”
Yet this news directly contradicted a prediction made by the former president Sunday, in which he posted that he “WILL BE ARRESTED ON TUESDAY OF NEXT WEEK” and called for protests from his supporters.
