Trump Grand Jury Will Not Meet Wednesday; Vote Unlikely This Week

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's grand jury hearing evidence about former President Donald Trump's alleged involvement with a hush-money payment to a porn star will not meet Wednesday, according to multiple reports.

"It could be anything from an illness to a logistical scheduling issue to someone basically, you know, gave [Bragg] a little tap on the head there and said, 'Are you sure you want to do this? Are you seeing the reaction out there?'" Trump attorney Joe Tacopina told Newsmax's "John Bachman Now" shortly after the news broke.

Tacopina told host Bianca de la Garza that warnings for Bragg's overreach might be coming "not from the partisan right but from all sides of the aisle" on "how horrific this would be."

Jurors have been given the day off Wednesday, and even if they reconvene Thursday, a vote on a potential indictment of Trump would not come before the weekend, a law enforcement official told Business Insider.

The grand jury has been told to remain on "standby" for Thursday, according to multiple reports. The grand jury meets Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays in the Trump "hush-money" case, according to the news outlet.

"This would be a case of first impression, but it would be a case that is unsustainable because legally there is no crime — and I say that with the utmost confidence," Tacopina added to de la Garza. "So, I don't know if it's just him having sort of a second thought here, maybe reviewing things, or it could just be ... a logistical thing. Who knows. It's something I have absolutely no inside information on."

Sources say Monday's grand jury testimony from Robert Costello, a former legal adviser for Michael Cohen and onetime lawyer for former President Donald Trump, is potentially behind the delays.

Bragg's case seeks to find a potential criminal indictment surrounding bookkeeping on a 2016 election-eve payment of $130,000 to porn actor Stormy Daniels.

Trump claimed Wednesday morning on Truth Social that Bragg "is having a hard time with the Grand Jury, especially after the powerful testimony against him by Felon Cohen's highly respected former lawyer."

The delay comes amid mounting signs the grand jury is nearing the completion of its work and after Trump over the weekend claimed he expected to be arrested Tuesday, though the day came and went without that happening.

A conclusion to the year-long investigation could possibly result in first-ever charges against a former or sitting U.S. president.

Trump's former so-called fixer Cohen has alleged he made the payments at Trump's direction to buy Daniels' silence about Trump's alleged extramarital affair.

Trump has denied the affair took place, and others in his orbit have said Cohen acted on his own.

Security was high around the courthouse where the grand jury has been meeting, with court officers out early and barricades up around the building.

About half of Americans believe the New York investigation is politically motivated, but a large majority find it believable he paid hush money to a porn star, according to a Reuters/Ipsos opinion poll concluded Tuesday.

Cohen went to prison after pleading guilty to federal charges stemming from the payoff, but prosecutors in that case did not charge Trump. Manhattan has started and stopped its own investigation into the matter several times.

If charges were filed, Trump would have to travel to New York from his Florida home for a mug shot and fingerprinting. Security officials are bracing for possible unrest, but so far few of Trump's supporters have heeded his call for protests.

Trump's fellow Republicans have criticized the probe by "George Soros-funded" Bragg, a Democrat, as politically motivated, including Florida GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis.

Trump and his political allies also face two criminal investigations, one in Georgia and one by the federal government, stemming from their challenge of the 2020 presidential election results.

He faces another federal probe into his handling of sensitive government documents after leaving office, two investigations in New York into his business practices, and a defamation case by a woman who claims he raped her in the 1990s, a claim Trump denies.

Trump has escaped legal peril numerous times. In the White House, he weathered two attempts by Congress to remove him from office as well as a yearslong probe into his campaign's contacts with Russia in 2016.

Trump and allied groups have tried to capitalize on news of the probe, sending a flurry of fundraising messages based on the potential indictment over the past few days. One such email, on Tuesday, was titled, "Barricades arrive at Manhattan Criminal Court" and included a picture that appeared to show a metal barrier being unloaded from an NYPD truck.

It was not immediately clear how much Trump might have raised from the indictment-linked fundraising appeals. Some moderate Democrats worried an indictment would carry political risk.

"You have to be very careful; the court system should not be perceived to be involved in the political process," Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., told reporters. "I think it'd have the reverse effect of what people might be thinking. It just emboldens him. I mean, he's the type of person that's sometimes emboldened by more outrageous things."

Information from Reuters and The Associated Press was used in this report.