Trump trial live updates: Closing arguments set to begin today in former president’s hush money case

Before we get onto the trial in earnest, here’s a disturbing line worth noting.

Trump has reportedly told campaign donors that he would deport pro-Palestinian student demonstrators in order to get them to “behave” should he return to the White House in November.

The former president promised a crackdown on campus protests – that have swept across the country over the past few months – as he spoke at a roundtable event in New York earlier this month.

“One thing I do is, any student that protests, I throw them out of the country. You know, there are a lot of foreign students. As soon as they hear that, they’re going to behave,” Trump said, according to event attendees, who spoke to The Washington Post anonymously.

Here’s more from Mike Bedigan.

The defendant was sounding distinctly rattled on his social media platform last night as he raged against Judge Merchan and Bragg, complaining about witnesses that did not appear and the order in which the prosecution and defense get to present their closing arguments in among the usual baseless gripes that the justice is “Highly Conflicted” and the DA “Soros backed”.

He fears being labelled “a common criminal” should he be convicted, it appears.

Trump also belatedly got Biblical on Memorial Day, this after a less than dignified attack on the “human scum” he accuses of working against him yesterday.

By way of contrast, its worth noting that President Joe Biden spent the day delivering a moving address for fallen servicemen and women at Arlington National Cemetery, touching on his grief for his late son Beau seven years after his passing.

Donald Trump’s New York hush money trial enters its final stages on Tuesday as the prosecution and defense prepare to deliver their closing arguments in Judge Juan Merchan’s courtroom.

The Republican presidential candidate stands accused by Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg of falsifying business records in order to conceal a $130,000 payment made to the adult film actress Stormy Daniels in October 2016 in order to ensure her silence about a sexual encounter she alleges she had with the politician a decade earlier.

Trump denies both the extramarital affair and the 34 charges he faces and has repeatedly insisted that the case is a “scam” brought against him by his political enemies in order to keep him cooped up in court and off from the campaign trail.

After five weeks of often explosive testimony, the prosecution hopes to convince the jury of 12 Manhattanites that the misdemeanour offenses with which the defendant has been charged should be elevated to felonies because they were carried out in order to subvert a presidential election, an accusation the defense denies.

The jury could begin its deliberations as soon as Wednesday.

Here’s Alex Woodward with the latest.

Hello and welcome to The Independent’s live coverage of Donald Trump’s New York hush money trial, with closing arguments scheduled to take place on Tuesday before the jury begin their deliberations on Wednesday.

How long they will take to reach a verdict is anyone’s guess but we could potentially have an answer as soon as tomorrow.

The 12 jurors must unanimously agree on a guilty or not guilty verdict.

If they can’t reach a consensus after several days of deliberations, the judge will likely ask them to keep trying.

If they’re still deadlocked, he could declare a mistrial.