Former US President Donald Trump announced on Friday that he intends to “testify” in his criminal trial that begins Monday in New York as part of the lawsuit filed against him on charges of paying money to a porn actress to buy her silence before the 2016 presidential elections.
In response to a question about whether he believed that this testimony might be legally risky, the former US President said from his residence in Mar-a-Lago in Florida, “I will testify. I am telling the truth. I mean, all I can do is tell the truth.”
Judge Juan Merchan rejected Trump’s lawyers’ demands to postpone the first-ever criminal trial against a former president for at least 90 days and ordered jury selection to begin on April 15.
Trump is accused of falsifying business records for payments on the eve of the 2016 presidential election to ensure that adult film star Stormy Daniels would not go public with a sexual encounter.
In late March, Trump attacked the Democratic administration, saying, “These are rigged cases, all coordinated by the White House and the Department of Justice for the purposes of interfering in the elections… Our country is corrupt!”
He stressed that it was “unfair” to schedule his trial in the midst of the election campaign.
Trump served as president in the White House between 2017 and 2021 and aspires to return to it in 2025.
Trump denies that he had a relationship with Stormy Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford.
He pleaded not guilty to charges of altering the accounts of the Trump Organization to hide $130,000 paid in October 2016 to Daniels, so that she would remain silent about her consensual sexual relationship 10 years earlier, when he was married to Melania Trump.
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