Trump news today: Trump repeatedly pleading 5th deposition video leaked as Stormy Daniels mocks him

Mr Trump’s only comment on the footage, which was posted on his Truth Social page on Tuesday, was “wow!”

“I would be somebody who would be different, I think you see that I’ve been recognized nationally as being somebody who would be different, who would be a leader, who could be somebody like a Paul Ryan very quickly,” Mr DeSantis says in the footage.

Following Mr Trump’s criticism of his handling of the pandemic, Mr DeSantis responded to the former president on Tuesday by noting that he was reelected while Mr Trump wasn’t.

“I roll out of bed, I have people attacking me from all angles, it’s been happening for many, many years,” Mr DeSantis said during a press briefing in Bradenton, south of Tampa. “The good thing is, is that the people are able to render a judgment on that whether they reelect you or not. And I’m happy to say, you know in my case, not only did we win reelection, we won with the highest percentage of the vote that any Republican governor candidate has had in the history of the state of Florida … That verdict has been rendered by the people of the state of Florida.”

Wyoming Republican Senator Cynthia Lummis defended Ron DeSantis and argued that it wouldn’t be disloyal for him to run for president in 2024, despite recent comments from Mr Trump arguing that it would be.

“I expect to see a number of Republican candidates for president and a number of them had President Trump’s endorsement so I don’t see it as an act of disloyalty to run for president, even people on the president’s cabinet may get in this race,” she told The Hill, referring to Mr Trump’s 2018 endorsement of Mr DeSantis when he ran for the Florida governorship.

“So, it’s not a matter of disloyalty,” she added. “The person who best articulates a future agenda for the country will emerge from [the] Republican primary and it’s not a foregone conclusion who that will be.”

On his plane this weekend while making campaign trips to New Hampshire and South Carolina, Mr Trump argued that he got Florida Governor Ron DeSantis into the governor’s mansion by supporting him in 2018. Mr DeSantis previously served in the US House from 2013 until 2018.

“So then when I hear he might run, I consider that very disloyal. But it’s not about loyalty, but to me it is, it’s always about loyalty, but for a lot of people it’s not about loyalty,” he told reporters.

Following the criticism from Mr Trump, GOP Senators defended Mr DeSantis and his possible 2024 campaign.

Texas Senator John Cornyn commented on a possible DeSantis campaign, telling The Hill that “he ran an impressive reelection campaign for governor from an important state. It looks to me like he’s polling well. I think we need some new blood and I think he’d probably qualify”.

The outlet noted that Mr Cornyn “barely stifled a laugh” when asked if it would be disloyal for Mr DeSantis to run.

“No, no, I don’t think so,” he said.

Video footage was recently released showing Mr Trump in a deposition at the office of the New York attorney general in August, in which he used the Fifth Amendment to avoid answering questions more than 400 times, according to CNN.

“Donald cannot keep track of the lies that he tells, and so, what better way to stop a fool from being deposed and hurting himself further than to tell him to plead the Fifth at least 400 times,” his former fixer Michael Cohen told the network on Wednesday.

Michael Cohen, Donald Trump’s former personal lawyer and fixer, has said that he has handed over his cell phones to the Manhattan District Attorney’s office.

Cohen made the revelation on CNN on Wednesday morning.

“Most recently, they asked for my cell phones because they want to be able to extract from it the voice recordings that I had had with Keith Davidson, former attorney to Stormy Daniels before Michael Avenatti, as well as a bunch of emails, text messages and so on,” Cohen told CNN on Wednesday morning.

John Eastman, who led Donald Trump’s legal bid to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, could be stripped of his licence to practise law after he was hit with 11 charges stemming from his efforts fuelled by the former president’s election lies.

The State Bar of California’s Chief Trial Counsel George Cardona announced the case against Mr Eastman on Thursday.

Read more about the second member of Mr Trump’s legal team to face consequences for the campaign to overturn the election:

Former president Donald Trump invoked his Fifth Amendment rights more than 400 times while testifying in New York attorney general Letitia James‘s civil fraud investigation last year.

The 45th president sat for deposition on 10 August last year where he was questioned about his financial affairs, according to a video obtained by CBS NEWS.

When asked by the attorney general if he were aware of the rules for giving a deposition, Mr Trump answered with a “yes”. However, over the course of nearly four hours, the former president reportedly invoked his right against self-incrimination while refusing to answer questions over 400 times.

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