Donald Trump has claimed “it’s very possible” that his political opponents may face prosecution after he became the first former US president to be criminally convicted.
Trump seemed to raise the prospect of it happening if he became president again during an interview with conservative US outlet Newsmax.
The 77-year-old said: “It’s a terrible precedent for our country. Does that mean the next president does it to them? That’s really the question.”
He added: “So, you know, it’s a terrible, terrible path that they’re leading us to, and it’s very possible that it’s going to have to happen to them.”
The former president covered up a $130,000 (£102,000) payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels as part of a “hush money” scheme to bury stories he thought might hurt his presidential campaign in 2016.
He repeatedly made unfounded claims over the criminal proceedings, alleging without evidence that they were rigged against him before the jury found him unanimously guilty of all 34 counts he faced.
Image: Pic: Reuters
Claims of going after his political enemies have been a consistent talking point during Trump’s campaign ahead of the 5 November election, Sky’s US partner NBC News said, adding he has frequently raised the idea of prosecuting President Joe Biden.
“I will appoint a real special prosecutor to go after the most corrupt president in the history of America, Joe Biden, and go after the Biden crime family,” Trump said in June, just hours after being arraigned at a federal courthouse in Miami on charges related to his handling of classified documents after he left the White House.
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Voters react over Trump conviction
The recent verdict plunges America into unexplored territory ahead of this year’s election, with Trump and Mr Biden locked in a close race for the White House.
After Trump was found guilty by a jury in New York, something he said he would appeal, he faces a maximum sentence of four years in prison.
However, others convicted of the same offence often receive shorter sentences, fines or probation.
Meanwhile, Trump faces three more criminal cases.
He is also facing charges in relation to the attack on the US Capitol and over allegations he illegally held on to classified documents after leaving the White House.
Then, in Georgia, he is accused of criminally conspiring to overturn his narrow defeat in the state in the 2020 election.
But none of these cases have trial dates set, making it unlikely they will take place before the November election.
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Sean “Diddy” Combs kidnapped a former aide at gunpoint to join him as he attempted to confront love rival rapper Kid Cudi, his sex-trafficking trial has been told.
Capricorn Clark, who worked for the Bad Boy Records co-founder in different roles on and off for several years, told the court he banged on her door and told her: “Get dressed, we’re going to kill Mescudi.”
Ms Clark became tearful a few times as she gave evidence – which marked the start of the third week of the high-profile trial. She told the court her situation working for the hip-hop mogul was “complicated”.
Combs, 55, who has pleaded not guilty to charges of sex trafficking, racketeering conspiracy and transportation to engage in prostitution, is accused of subjecting his former long-term partner Cassie and others to years of physical, sexual and emotional abuse.
Image: Ms Clark became tearful a few times as she gave evidence. Pic: Jane Rosenberg via Reuters
While giving her own evidence in the first week of the trial, Cassie told jurors she dated Cudi briefly during a difficult period in her on-off relationship with Combs.
On Tuesday, Ms Clark said she warned Cassie about seeing Cudi, saying she took her to buy a burner phone as she thought it could be dangerous given how Combs might react. “The way she was moving, she was going to get us all killed,” Ms Clark said.
Combs arrived at her home with a gun in his hand on the morning of the attempted confrontation with Cudi, she told the court, and looked “furious”.
She says she told him she did not want to go with him, to which he allegedly replied: “I don’t give a f**k what you want to do.”
Image: Rapper Kid Cudi gave evidence last week. Pic: AP/ Richard Drew
Ms Clark said she had never seen “anything like this before”, but got dressed and left with Combs in a black Cadillac to head to the property in the Hollywood Hills.
She said she waited in the car as Combs went into the residence, and called Cassie to warn her. The rapper had her “with a gun and brought me to Cudi’s house to kill him”, she said she told her.
Cudi could be heard in the background of the call, she said, asking: “He’s in my house?”
After the incident, Ms Clark alleged Combs warned her and Cassie not to speak to police and threatened to “kill all you” if they did not convince Cudi not to either.
In the aftermath of this incident, Ms Clark alleged Combs “came at” Cassie with “100% full force”, repeatedly kicking her while she crouched “more and more” into a foetal position and cried “silently”.
The rapper told Ms Clark that if she tried to intervene, “he was going to f**k me up too”, she said.
Image: Diddy’s mother Janice Combs was in court to support him again. Pic: Reuters
Earlier in her testimony, she told the court about the start of her employment with Combs and his label Bad Boy Records in 2004.
She said after he discovered she had previously worked for Marion “Suge” Knight’s Death Row Records – the West Coast rival to East Coast Bad Boy – he told her “if anything happened, he would have to kill me”.
Ms Clark said she perceived this as a “very serious” threat. She also told the court about another alleged incident just a few weeks into the job, when some diamond jewellery on loan to Combs went missing.
She told the court she was taken to a building in Manhattan and forced to repeatedly take lie detector tests over five days.
Image: Combs with his legal team before court began for the day. Pic: Reuters/ Jane Rosenberg
The man who carried out the test told her that if she failed, “they’re going to throw you in the East River”, she said.
Combs was not present for the tests and never spoke to her about them, she said, when questioned by defence lawyer Marc Agnifilo.
During her testimony, Ms Clark mentioned an incident involving fellow rapper 50 Cent’s manager, after both 50 Cent and Combs had done interviews for MTV.
Combs mentioned to the manager that they had some issues and told him, “I like guns”, she said, which she perceived as a vague threat.
Ms Clark also described attempting to leave Combs’s home in Miami on one occasion in 2006, when she was allegedly told to “get the f**k back here” by the rapper.
According to Ms Clark, he told her: “Your problem is you want a life, and you can’t have that here.”
The trial continues tomorrow, with evidence expected from LA police and fire officers.
If convicted, Combs could face between 15 years and life in prison.
Peter Mandelson, the UK ambassador to the United States, has told Sky News he “regrets” his association with paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
Lord Mandelson‘s links to the late billionaire were exposed in a 2019 report by JP Morgan bank, filed in a New York court.
Epstein killed himself in August of that year while awaiting trial on charges of sex trafficking minors.
He had previously served an 18-month sentence after pleading guilty to procuring a person under the age of 18 for prostitution.
Whilst serving that sentence, the JP Morgan report suggests that Mr Mandelson stayed at Epstein’s Manhattan flat.
Epstein wrote to his private banker on 17 June 2009: “Peter will be staying at 71st over weekend…”
At the time, Lord Mandelson was the Business Secretary in the UK government under then-Prime Minister Gordon Brown. He was appointed UK ambassador to the United States in December 2024.
Image: Jeffrey Epstein. File pic: New York State Sex Offender Registry via AP
Sky News asked him if he did, indeed, stay at Epstein’s flat while the disgraced financier was in jail.
He replied: “I’m not answering any questions about him. My knowledge of him is something I regret, I wish I’d never met him in the first place.”
Asked why he had an association with Epstein whilst he was in jail, Lord Mandelson replied: “Why did many people meet him? He was a prolific networker. And I wish I’d never met him in the first place.”
As US ambassador, Lord Mandelson represents Britain’s interests in Washington and has vowed to treat Donald Trump‘s administration with “respect, seriousness and understanding of where they are coming from politically”.
This comes after Lord Mandelson described the US president as a “danger to the world”, for which he apologised earlier this year.
He told the Alain Elkann Interviews podcast in 2019: “What Donald Trump represents and believes is an anathema to mainstream British opinion.”
Image: US President Donald Trump, vice president JD Vance, and UK ambassador to the US Peter Mandelson. Pic: AP
Mr Mandelson added: “Even those who have a sneaking admiration for Donald Trump because of his personality, nonetheless regard him as reckless, and a danger to the world.”
But in January this year, Lord Mandelson said he now considered his remarks “as ill-judged and wrong”.
Two people have been killed and nine injured in a shooting in Philadelphia’s Fairmount Park on Memorial Day.
Police said a large number of people were gathered near Lemon Hill Drive and Sedgley Drive at around 10.30pm local time on Monday when shots were fired.
A man and a woman were killed, and three teenagers – aged 15, 16 and 17 – were among the injured, all of whom were said to be in a stable condition.
“We have not recovered any weapons at this time,” a police officer told reporters.
“This is significant. It’s Memorial Day… we understand the significance of this event and we will make sure to provide an update on Tuesday.”
Memorial Day is a federal holiday in the United States, usually observed on the last Monday of May.
The day is dedicated to honouring and mourning military personnel who have died in the performance of their duties.