A photo of Donald Trump sitting in a New York courtroom has accompanied countless front-page stories about the first-ever criminal trial against a sitting or former U.S. president.
Its coverage is not limited to the United States. World media carried stories about the man who wants to return to the White House and the lawsuit against him.
Trump has denied 34 charges of falsifying business records related to a $130,000 payment by a lawyer to buy an adult film star's hush right before the 2016 election. She claims they had an affair. He denied the story.
So how are the historic trials from Beijing to Rome being covered? We asked his colleagues at BBC Monitoring, which tracks and analyzes media around the world.
'SleepyDon' trial poses unprecedented problems for the US – China
Written by Tom Lamb, BBC Monitoring China Specialist
Chinese media has covered Trump's trial, but it has not featured as prominently on the news agenda as one might expect. Still, this provided a new opportunity for the media to demonstrate what they saw as the turmoil and polarization of American politics.
English reporting focusing on the facts of the case. The state-run Xinhua news agency highlighted that Donald Trump is the first former president to face a criminal trial. The newspaper also reported that the defendant described the trial as “political persecution” and said the country was “failing”. The state-run English newspaper China Daily focused on her jury selection, with more than 50 of her original 96 potential jurors excused on grounds of unfairness.
The Paper, a national media outlet, provided an infographic and timeline of the trial, citing U.S. surveys showing polarized opinions on the trial among U.S. voters. It also highlighted conflicting reports about the possible impact on the November general election.
The state-run China News Service (CNS) spoke of the “unprecedented challenges” facing the U.S. justice system if Trump wins in November and is convicted.
The nationalist Global Times newspaper cited high interest rates, inflation and the Middle East crisis as evidence of Trump's view that the world has spiraled out of control under Biden.
But state-run tabloids did not spare the Republicans either. On April 16, the newspaper ran a wide-ranging report highlighting reports that he had fallen asleep in court, and posted a meme deriding him as “#SleepyDon.”
“Fascinated and anxious” – Latin America
By Pascal Fletcher, BBC Monitoring Latin America Expert, Miami
From Mexico and Cuba to Argentina, media coverage reflected intense interest in U.S. political events south of the border. Several articles about the Trump trial emphasize its “historic” nature.
Most of the coverage has made a point of publishing a striking photo of a stern-looking President Trump sitting in the media's “defendant's seat,” which many critics of the president in Latin America see as a sign of justice. likely to be considered.
The mere possibility of President Trump becoming president again is both fascinating and potentially alarming to many Latin American leaders, governments, and societies. These people vividly recall Mr. Trump's vitriolic anti-immigrant rhetoric during his previous term and what they saw as his barely veiled contempt for struggling developing countries. White House.
Infobae, a Latin American news website based in Argentina, published an extensive article about the “Colombian judge who will make the final decision in the case against Donald Trump,” noting that Judge Juan Melchán was “the judge who will make the final decision in the case against Donald Trump.” “I was not daunted by the gag order.”
Some Latin American reports slipped into commentary by Mexico's left-wing daily La Jornada, which said Trump was “not the savior and defender of the homeland, as he says, but a payer to the United States.” He was accused of trying to cover it up.” A porn star who tried to keep his illicit sexual contacts quiet. ”
In an April 16 editorial titled “Trump and the Unthinkable,” Brazil's leading daily Folha de São Paulo cast doubt on the scenario in which Trump is imprisoned and then pardoned as president. He clearly took an anti-Trump position. He called on American voters to avoid such scenarios at the polls.
“Fabricated incident” – Russia
By Andrei Vladov, BBC Monitoring Russia Expert, London
It was clear that much of the coverage had a pro-Trump bias. On state TV Russia 1's main evening news, the host used the Russian slang word “besprödel,” which means outright misconduct and abuse of power, in connection with the trial and other criminal charges facing President Trump. used.
Some media outlets consistently linked the court proceedings to the White House election. Olga Skabeyeva, host of Russia 1's political talk show “60 Minutes,'' said the only chance for President Trump's enemies to defeat him in the election is to put him in jail. “In this regard, the case regarding bribery for the silence of porn actress Stormy Daniels was fabricated,” Skabeeva concluded.
Igor Dunaevsky, writing in the pro-government daily Rossiyskaya Gazeta, said: “Democratic politicians do not hide their hope that the pursuit of Donald Trump will prevent them from participating in the 2024 elections.” I wrote.
Russian state media has consistently ridiculed the current US president as “senile” and incapable of actually controlling events. Donald Trump, on the other hand, has found it much easier to ride the pro-Kremlin press.
“Far-fetched indictment” – Europe
Laura Gozzi, Europe Digital Reporter, London
Across the Atlantic, an editorial in Switzerland's Le Temps newspaper described the charges as outlandish, saying that given what they already knew about Mr. He questioned whether the revelation of his affair suspicions really had an impact.
“As Donald Trump once again calls on Americans to vote, if Donald Trump only reacts to the falsification of financial documents in New York, and does not respond to the attack on the Capitol or the assault on American democracy, “If they didn't respond to that, that would be concerning.”
A New York reporter for the left-wing Italian newspaper Il Manifesto described the scene outside the courthouse and said sharply that it all led to “the normalization of Trump's threat, or a hypnotic repetition of the denigration of the abnormal.” I concluded with.
Opinion writer Jedrzej Bielecki gave a wide-ranging opinion for the Polish daily Rzeczpospolita. He said the case was “a great example of the strength of the rule of law in America, to which everyone, both the powerful and the weak, must answer, at least in theory.”