GREENSBORO, UNITED STATES (AFP) – Donald Trump on Saturday railed against the “corrupt” United States (US) justice system, lashing out a day after federal prosecutors indicted him on multiple felony charges in an explosive development in the 2024 presidential election race.
The 37 counts of the indictment – released on Friday and focussed on his alleged mishandling of classified materials – set the former US president up for a far more severe legal reckoning than the charges of personal, political and commercial misconduct he has largely ridden out in the past.
And it also sets the stage for a White House race like no other before it, with US President Joe Biden’s Department of Justice pursuing the prosecution of the clear front-runner for the Republican nomination.
Trump appeared before two state Republican conventions – first in Georgia and then North Carolina – and railed against what he called an unfair legal attack on him.
“You’re dealing with crazy lunatics,” Trump said in his Greensboro, North Carolina appearance.
“The baseless indictment of me by the Biden administration’s weaponised department of injustice will go down as among the most horrific abuses of power in the history of our country,” he said.
Earlier in the day in Columbus, Georgia, Trump told the crowd he was being pursued in court because he was running for a second term in the White House.
“That’s why they’re doing it, if I wasn’t, there would be no witch hunt, there would be no indictment,” he told supporters.
