Trump pleads not guilty to new January 6 charges
Trump pleads not guilty to new January 6 charges
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00:00Former President Donald Trump pleading not guilty to charges revised just last week by the special
00:05counsel in the 2020 election subversion case. That's a federal case here in Washington, D.C.
00:10CNN's Caitlin Polans is here. Caitlin, you just got a copy of the new filing.
00:14Yeah, it's a one-page filing, but there it has Donald Trump's big, black, bold signature on it,
00:20signing it, saying, I'm pleading not guilty. And also, when there's a hearing this coming week,
00:25the first hearing that we've had since this case has been paused, since it went to the
00:29Supreme Court, they gave him some presidential immunity. He doesn't want to be there in person.
00:34And so this paperwork serves as that. It's an important moment, though, Jake, because this
00:40is an indictment, and it went through a grand jury. Again, it's the same four charges,
00:44but he does have to enter a pleading. And he's saying, I plead not guilty. The other reason
00:50that that is important is that when you get a not guilty plea, things head toward a trial.
00:55And it's a reminder that that's where we are in this case. It's back in the trial court,
01:00and Judge Tanya Chutkan in the trial court is going to be moving things along toward a trial,
01:05especially now that she has this waiver of appearance and entry of a not guilty plea
01:12in this one-page filing from Donald Trump. All right, Caitlin Polans with the breaking news.
01:15Thanks so much. Let's bring in CNN senior legal analyst Ellie Honig and defense attorney Bill
01:19Brennan, who once represented Trump's payroll corporation. Ellie, remind us what changed
01:25between the original indictment and this one, and why would Trump be pleading not guilty right now
01:32as opposed to in person? So, Jake, this is essentially a revised, slimmed down version
01:40of Jack Smith's original January 6th indictment in order to accommodate and adjust for the Supreme
01:46Court's immunity ruling. What Jack Smith did was take his original indictment, which was 45 pages,
01:50file a new indictment last week, which is now 36 pages, where he took out the pieces of information
01:56that the Supreme Court specifically said are covered by immunity, including, for example,
02:00Donald Trump's dealings with the Justice Department. Those are out of this new indictment.
02:05There are some other minor adjustments, but essentially this is Jack Smith's effort to
02:09slim down his own case to enable it to go forward. As for why today, this is a piece of paper that a
02:14defendant like Donald Trump files so that he doesn't have to physically appear in court on
02:19Thursday. He essentially says, I've seen the indictment and I've authorized my attorneys to
02:23enter a not guilty plea for me when they're in court on Thursday. And, Bill, are you surprised
02:28that Mr. Trump does not plan to be there in person, as he has for other illegal skirmishes?
02:35No, Jake, I'm not, because, you know, the timing now, it's post-Labor Day, you know,
02:41it's game on for the campaign, for the presidency. And it really is not uncommon
02:48to waive a defendant's appearance in an arraignment. But as Ellie and Caitlin said,
02:54it's an important step in the proceeding because, well, when the arraignment happens and that plea
03:00is entered, it starts clocks ticking. You know, there's a typical 70 days until trial rule, but
03:07that often gets changed when it's a complex case or, you know, there's a need for continuance
03:12on either or both sides. So I don't think it's surprising. It's certainly not surprising that
03:17he pled not guilty. You know, he's pled not guilty in this case and all the cases from
03:22the beginning. But as Ellie said, this superseding indictment is a bit of a leaner, meaner document.
03:30It is an attempt by Jack Smith to excise all of the verbiage and counts that related to the
03:38defendant's activities as president, because as we know, the United States Supreme Court
03:44gave a wide ranging immunity opinion this year. So we'll see if it holds up.
03:51And Ellie, in a separate case, a federal judge denied former President Trump's request to move
03:56the New York hush money case into federal court, finding that there's nothing in the Supreme Court's
04:01immunity ruling that alters his view of the facts that were that the payments were, quote,
04:05private, unofficial acts. Can you explain this? Yeah, Jake, so this is one of two ways that Donald
04:12Trump is trying to postpone his sentencing in the Manhattan hush money case, which has long
04:16been scheduled for September 18th. So two weeks from now, one of the things Trump was trying to
04:21do was get the federal courts to take his case because he said, well, we have this new Supreme
04:25Court immunity case. I want to make an immunity defense to the hush money case because some,
04:29a little bit of the evidence in that case had to do with when Donald Trump was president.
04:33But now a federal court at the moment is saying, no, you can't bring that case over here. But
04:37Trump's also trying another way to sidetrack his sentencing. He's asking Judge Marchand in the
04:42Manhattan case, he's saying, I want you to throw out the verdict because of the immunity.
04:48I get to appeal before you sentence me. And the DA has said, we're fine either way. So,
04:53Jake, there's a pretty good chance, an increasing chance that Trump manages
04:57to wriggle out of that September 18th sentencing date on the hush money case.