Trump prepares for arraignment in case that will test U.S. democracy

Donald Trump prepares to formally respond to criminal charges for a third time in under four months on Thursday, but this time where he once held the seat of power, and where he hopes to again in 2025.

Trump, again a Republican candidate for the presidency, is scheduled to be arraigned at the Elijah Barrett Prettyman Federal Courthouse in Washington, D.C., at 4 p.m. ET in connection with charges related to to his efforts to undo the 2020 election. Trump supporters rioted at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, the same day formal certification of his defeat was taking place in Congress.

An indictment Tuesday from Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith charges Trump with four felony counts, including conspiracy to defraud the U.S. government and conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding. The charges could lead to a yearslong prison sentence in the event of a conviction.

The 45-page indictment lays out a pressure campaign directed at vice-president Mike Pence, who was presiding over the congressional certification, as well as a scheme to install Trump-friendly alternate electors in swing states.

"Sadly the president was surrounded by a bunch of crackpot lawyers, who kept telling him what his itching ears wanted to hear," Pence said on a campaign stop on Wednesday.

Potential Trump defences include that he was exercising free speech, that he was merely following the advice of counsel and that he truly believed his fraud claims against all evidence.

"You can't commit fraud if you believe what you're doing is correct," former U.S. federal prosecutor Joseph Moreno told CBC News Network on Wednesday.

Moreno said prosecutors will face a significant challenge proving any counts beyond a reasonable doubt, given the situation is so unprecedented. For example, fraud charges, he said, are typically employed in cases involving alleged financial crimes.

John Lauro, a lawyer for Trump, has said in media appearances this week that the 45th president was following the advice of respected constitutional scholars like John Eastman, but former White House attorney Ty Cobb said he was highly skeptical of that potential strategy, in an interview with CBC Radio.

"In my experience at the White House, Trump doesn't listen, he doesn't take advice," said Cobb, who served in the White House from 2017 to 2018. "I think the theory that he was relying on lawyers will be quickly debunked."

While Trump in campaign appearances to this day remains committed to the idea that the 2020 election was stolen, Cobb said presenting evidence on the former president's state of mind presents one significant challenge.

"Who's going to testify about that? Mr. Trump's not going to testify and nobody else is competent to testify about his state of mind, so I don't see that occupying a great deal of the trial either."

Per the indictment, Trump is alleged to have told Pence that he was "too honest" for rejecting Trump's false claims that the vice-president had the power to overturn the vote.

"That particular sentence is extremely damaging because it shows that he knew that what he was asking was improper, illegal and wrong and that only an honest man would tell him that," Jill Wine-Banks, former Watergate special prosecutor, told CBC News on Wednesday.