Donald Trump has given a defiant address to his supporters after becoming the first former US president to face a criminal charges
Trump pleaded not guilty to 34 criminal charges during a historic court hearing in New York on Tuesday
He returned to Florida immediately after where he told an audience that the case was "an insult to our country"
"Our country is going to hell," he said, listing all the ways that he claims to have been persecuted
Trump also lashed out at the judge and prosecutors and claimed the case against him was politically-motivated
The 2024 White House contender is accused of falsifying business records to cover up hush payments to two women during his 2016 election run
Trump's team will have until August to file any motions against the case. The next court hearing is set for December
The former president's six-mile (9.6km) journey from Trump Tower to the Manhattan Criminal Courts Building is a major security operation that involves large numbers of police and US Secret Service agents.
The motorcade appears to be sticking to one major southward route from Midtown Manhattan to Lower Manhattan.
The vehicles are occupying two lanes as they navigate along the highway.
Image source, .Trump leaves residence on his way to courthouse
A motorcade of about 10 cars, including a police escort, is now making its way down to Lower Manhattan.
The convoy includes New York police and fire personnel.
The roads have apparently been cleared of traffic, meaning the journey time could be as little as 20 minutes.
Helicopter footage - which you can view at the top of this page - shows the motorcade travelling south.
Donald Trump has just left Trump Tower and is heading to the court building in Lower Manhattan where he'll be formally arrested.
The journey itself is about a 30-minute drive south through Manhattan, but that time could be much less if there's a full police escort.
You can watch live coverage by clicking the play button at the top of this page.
Image source, Reuters
Image source, ReutersJudge Merchan, seen in this 2022 courtroom sketch, oversaw The Trump Organization's criminal tax trial
Juan Manuel Merchan will be the history-making judge who, for the first time ever, will be presiding over a case with a former US president as the defendant.
Merchan, a New York Supreme Court justice, is a veteran of the New York court system with over 12 years on the bench.
Trump, who has denied all allegations, railed against the judge on his social media platform Truth Social on Friday, saying that Merchan “hates me”.
This isn’t the first time the two have crossed paths.
Merchan, 60, also presided over the trial last year involving Trump’s namesake real estate company. The case led to a conviction of The Trump Organization’s chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, for tax fraud.
Donald Trump will soon leave Trump Tower and make the roughly 30-minute journey to the Manhattan courthouse.
Asked about the ex-president's current frame of mind, one source told the BBC's US partner CBS News that Trump was “resolute, determined, and fighting for all Americans against injustice, persecution, and weaponisation".
According to CNN, Trump intends to make brief remarks - one line, to be precise - to the assembled crowd outside the courthouse when he arrives.
It's just gone 12:30 in New York, where Donald Trump will soon become the first US president to face criminal charges.
If you're just joining us, here's what we're expecting to unfold:
Stay with us.
Madeline Halpert
Reporting from New York
Trump supporters outside Trump Twoeter
In Midtown Manhattan, just down the road from Central Park, cars pass through a packed Fifth Avenue as dozens of police officers guard the perimeter surrounding Trump’s penthouse apartment at Trump Tower. They’re preparing for the former president’s exit, scheduled for later this afternoon.
Tourists are waiting in the wings, aiming to catch a glimpse of the former president as he begins his journey from Trump Tower to the Manhattan Criminal Courthouse.
A young boy walking by just screamed “What the heck is happening?” to his dad.
Further down the street, more than a dozen people are protesting against the former president, standing behind a rainbow banner that says “Don’t Believe Trump’s lies”. Some are holding signs with Trump’s face that read: “Tick Tock Times Up!”
Across the street from them, two people are demonstrating in support of Trump, with one woman claiming he’s “the best president we ever had”, arguing he was “innocent until proven guilty”.
Anti-Trump protesters are also out in force
Republican congresswoman and vocal Trump supporter Marjorie Taylor Greene struggled to be heard when she attempted to speak in favour of the former president ahead of his indictment.
Marjorie Taylor Greene drowned out by protesters
Sam Cabral
Live reporter, Washington DC
Image source, Getty ImagesIn just two years, Marjorie Taylor Greene has leveraged her staunch support for Donald Trump to become one of the most influential figures in the modern Republican Party.
The right-wing Georgia congresswoman may have been drowned out by the crowds at a rally outside the Manhattan courthouse earlier, but she is getting her message across in multiple media interviews.
Talking to Right Side Broadcasting Network's Brian Glenn, whom she is currently dating, Greene argued that Trump was "joining some of the most incredible people in history [by] being arrested today".
"Nelson Mandela was arrested, served time in prison," she said.
"Jesus was arrested and murdered by the Roman government."
Reiterating that the former president was being "persecuted", she added: "I just can't believe it's happening, but I'll always support him. He's done nothing wrong."
The media-savvy provocateur is fresh off a widely panned appearance on CBS News' 60 Minutes programme, in which she defended calling her political opponents "paedophiles".
Nada Tawfik
Reporting from New York
The scene at the back of the courthouse
At the back of the courthouse, the atmosphere is completely different to the madhouse at the front.
Preparations are well in place for the arrival of Donald Trump’s motorcade, with the area well fortified. Secret service officials are patrolling with sniffer dogs, along with the NYPD officers wearing flak jackets.
Barricades prevent civilians from coming and going. And the park here isn’t filled with protesters. Instead, people are calmly playing cards and enjoying the beautiful spring weather.
But in the front of the courthouse, there's a different scene. Police barricades separate Trump supporters from Trump protesters. And what the crowds lack in size, they make up for in intensity.
Image source, CBS NewsAn aerial view of protesters in front of the courthouse
In about an hour, Donald Trump will take a six-mile drive (9.6km) from the New York Trump Tower to the Manhattan Criminal Courthouse to face potential criminal charges.
We've captured the journey in video here.
Trump's journey to the courthouse
Donald Trump has a videographer travelling with him who has been with the former president since he left his Florida home yesterday, according to CNN.
The videographer is reportedly there to record the "behind the scenes" of Trump's surrender, a signal that he is likely to try and use his indictment and arraignment for his own political advantage.
The videographer is likely to accompany him to the courthouse, but it is unclear what he will be able to film, considering the court's restrictions.
A judge ruled on Monday that news outlets will not be allowed to broadcast the arraignment, but photographers will be allowed to take still pictures before the hearing begins.
Alexandra Ostasiewicz
Reporting from New York
US comedian Jason Scoop dressed as Donald Trump outside the courthouse
Many have said Trump’s court appearance today would be a spectacle.
Adding to the circus-like atmosphere is comedian Jason Scoop.
He came out dressed as Trump to film material for his YouTube channel and describes the scene as “complete pandemonium”.
“All of this could have been avoided,” he told me. “I’m not a Trump lover or anything, but I don’t know, I don’t really think these charges should have been brought.”
Mike Wendling
US disinformation reporter
Image source, Getty ImagesMarjorie Taylor Greene speaks to a crowd of Trump supporters in New York
Donald Trump finally got the protest he called for on Tuesday morning when a group of his supporters gathered in Manhattan.
The organisers included Georgia congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. Once a fringe Republican, she now has powerful Congressional committee seats.
Taylor Greene was the subject of a CBS profile over the weekend, external in which she backed away from her previous support for the QAnon conspiracy theory - but insisted that Democrats are paedophiles who “support grooming children”.
Other organisers are perhaps less familiar, but no less extreme.
Jack Posobiec is a former navy intelligence officer turned far-right media figure.
He gathered a large online following during the 2016 election by organising stunts, including infiltrating anti-Trump protests to spread calls for violence. He later propagated the “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory and worked for the pro-Trump One America News Network.
Graham Allen is a US Army veteran and podcaster. He’s also collected a large social media following for pumping out inflammatory opinions and, of course, hardcore support for Donald Trump.
The event is being hosted by the New York Young Republican Club, an establishment organisation that has tacked to the right since Trump’s political rise. The club held a small protest last month when rumours of the indictment first began to emerge.
Kayla Epstein
Reporting from New York
Trump is getting the VIP treatment at court today.
Instead of languishing for hours once he arrives at the courthouse, he’ll be quickly processed and then hurried up to his arraignment hearing. He will not be held or physically restrained, unlike many of the other defendants who appear in Manhattan criminal court. While there are serious security considerations for a former president, this is a departure from what most defendants experience.
“For all the outcry of his advisers about how terribly he’s being treated, he’s actually getting tremendously special treatment, and he’ll be able to go home at the end of the day,” said Cynthia Godsoe, who was a public defender representing juveniles in the 2000s and now teaches at Brooklyn Law School.
She recalled that many of her clients, some as young as 11, were shackled, and waited hours to be processed and appear before a judge. Most were young men of colour, and not many had the money to post bail.
Many defendants at criminal court wait in jail for their trial. Some wind up in New York city's largest and most notorious jail, Rikers Island, which has been subject to numerous investigations about the conditions and safety for inmates.
Immediately after his arraignment, the Secret Service will whisk Trump away. He's set to fly home to his sprawling Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, where he’s expected to address his supporters tonight.
Morgan Gisholt Minard
Reporting from New York
Image source, Getty ImagesThe area outside the courthouse is filled with more press than protesters at this point.
One woman was blowing into a piercing police whistle in an attempt to drown out the speech Marjorie Taylor Greene delivered into a megaphone.
"We don’t speak MAGA here in New York City - go back to Georgia!” she said.
Next to her, a pro-Trump supporter was using an app on her phone that sounds like an air horn siren, in a competing attempt to drown out the anti-Trump whistles - so far with little success.
Alexandra Ostasiewicz
Reporting from New York
Image source, ReutersA chaotic scene erupted in front of the courthouse as US Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene attempted to rally Donald Trump's supporters ahead of his arraignment later this afternoon.
Despite shouting into a bullhorn, whistles and jeers nearly drowned out the lawmaker as she attempted to make her case in support of the former president.
"This has never happened in America ever and every single American should be concerned," Greene said, referring to Trump being the first president to be indicted.
Anthony Zurcher
North America correspondent
Image source, AFPMarjorie Taylor Greene
Who is the woman leading the pro-Trump rally outside the New York court?
Marjorie Taylor Greene first made her mark on America politics as a citizen-provocateur, won an election to Congress and now has become one of the most prominent voices defending Donald Trump and advocating for his political agenda.
Her appearance as the headliner for the pro-Trump rally near the Manhattan courthouse where the former president will be arraigned only cements that status.
Greene has been a lightning rod for controversy throughout her political rise, which began when she quit her job as an exercise instructor around the time of Trump’s 2016 presidential bid. She has trafficked in conspiracy theories tied to the group Q-Anon, including allegations that Democrats were running a paedophilia ring out of a Washington, DC, pizza parlour and that California forest fires were started by satellite lasers controlled by a Jewish cabal.
In 2019, while working with a conservative news outlet, she chased Democratic members of Congress on Capitol Hill, accusing them of dereliction of duty. After her election to the House in 2020, she was stripped of her seat on congressional committees by the Democratic majority because of her sympathetic response to death threats against Democratic officeholders on social media.
Her seats were restored when Republicans took over the chamber in 2022, and she has become a close ally of Speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy.
At a rally in Texas two weeks ago Trump said Greene should run for US Senate in Georgia. According to Trump advisor Steve Bannon, she is also on his short list as a vice-presidential running mate if he were to win the Republican nomination next year.
Click here to read more about Greene.
Sam Cabral
Live reporter, Washington DC
Image source, NoneCongresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, one of Donald Trump's staunchest allies, is leading a rally outside the courthouse, swarmed by press.
Counter protesters - separated from Trump supporters by police barricades - are chanting “lock him up” as they create noise with drums and whistles, drowning out much of what is being said to the scrum of reporters and protestors.
Chelsea Bailey
Live reporter, Washington DC
Image source, BBC NewsDonald Trump's supporters have started to arrive outside the courthouse ahead of a planned rally for the former president.
A woman wearing a baseball cap emblazoned with Make America Great Again and carrying a smouldering sage stick fanned smoke in the air in an apparent effort to purify the space.
Another supporter, wearing American flag overalls and socks, documented the event on what appeared to be a GoPro. But the main attraction of this morning's protest will be US lawmaker Marjorie Taylor Green, who is expected to begin speaking shortly.
Image source, BBC News