Donald Trump Addresses Latest Rumors He's Getting Indicted

Former President Donald Trump has a simple response to the rumors yet another indictment against him is coming down the pike: fake news.

Last week, numerous legal commentators began publicly speculating special prosecutor Jack Smith could soon be filing formal charges against the former president in a pair of sweeping investigations into allegations including an attempt to overturn the result of the 2020 presidential election and later, an additional effort to obstruct an investigation into whether he'd illegally removed a small trove of classified documents from his time at the White House.

Talk of a possible indictment reached a fever pitch on Wednesday following news a former aide to the president—Taylor Budowich—and his former Chief of Staff Mark Meadows had agreed to comply with subpoenas compelling their testimony, fueling additional talk that an indictment against the former president was imminent.

On Wednesday, several outlets reported the Department of Justice was making preparations to request a Washington, D.C., grand jury to indict the former president in one of its investigations for violations of the Espionage Act and for obstruction of justice related to the classified documents case, with some reports indicating an indictment could come as soon as Thursday.

If true, it would represent the second-such criminal indictment against Trump this year, and just the second criminal indictment against a former U.S. President in history. It would also lend additional baggage to his bid for the Republican nomination for president, where the real estate tycoon is still widely considered a leading candidate.

Per the New York Times' Maggie Haberman, Trump maintains that he'd done absolutely nothing wrong and that news of a potential indictment is a farce.

"It's not true," Trump reportedly said.

He later expanded on his remarks in a post on his social media platform, Truth Social, shortly after Haberman posted his remarks to Twitter.

"No one has told me I'm being indicted, and I shouldn't be because I've done NOTHING wrong," he said in a rambling post criticizing a Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation he claims has been "weaponized" against him.

He then called on Congressional Republicans—who are already in the midst of a series of investigative committee hearings on the "weaponization of government"—to make his case their "number one issue."

"A TRAVESTY OF JUSTICE & ELECTION INTERFERENCE AT A LEVEL NEVER SEEN BEFORE," Trump wrote.

Newsweek has reached out to Trump's campaign via email for comment. However, some Republicans in Congress are already preparing a defense for the president in Congress, per a recent piece in Roll Call. Others—including Texas Republican Senator Ted Cruz—have already begun their counterattack, claiming Attorney General Merrick Garland only seeks to indict Trump because he "still holds a grudge from Republicans' effort to keep him off the Supreme Court in 2016."

"Mark my words: I believe Merrick Garland will indict Donald Trump," Cruz told Fox News in a Monday interview. "He wants to indict Donald Trump because he hates Donald Trump. He hates him. He's angry. Merrick Garland is angry that he wasn't confirmed to the Supreme Court."