Donald Trump’s bid for re-election to the White House has been beset by legal difficulties with the former president facing 91 felony charges across four criminal cases and two civil lawsuits.

Mr Trump is staring down the barrel of potential jail time if he is found guilty in the criminal cases, while he could be struck with fines of more than $400 million for his civil trials. 

However, he was cleared by the Supreme Court to appear on the 2024 ballot ahead of Super Tuesday, in a major boost to his campaign. 

The court unanimously banned states from excluding Mr Trump from the vote over allegations that he incited an insurrection, overturning a previous ruling by Colorado’s Supreme Court. 

But Mr Trump has quickly turned his attention to another major case after the Supreme Court said it would consider his claims of presidential immunity from prosecution. 

The court, which has a 6-3 Republican majority, said it would take up the matter, beginning on the week of April 22, with a decision likely no later than the end of June.

As the first former president to face a criminal trial after leaving the White House, he has faced off against a special federal prosecutor appointed solely to bring cases against him.

Mr Trump — a property tycoon who is no stranger to the courtroom — has used the cases as a campaign tool, telling his followers that they are an attempt to discredit his brand of “MAGA” Republicanism and block his path to power.

The charges against him have raised unprecedented constitutional questions, and prompted fierce debate over whether he could even attempt to govern from jail.

In addition to claims that he tried to alter the election result, he faces criminal charges for allegedly paying hush money to a porn star and mishandling White House documents.

Here are the key cases, what’s going on, and where this could all finish.

Georgia election

Mr Trump has been charged with 13 counts relating to his alleged bid to overturn the election result in Georgia in 2020. He has been charged with racketeering, violating an oath of office, and other crimes.

A total of 19 co-defendants were indicted alongside the former president and four have pleaded guilty in a deal with Fulton County prosecutors. 

They are former Trump attorneys Jenna Ellis, Sidney Powell and Kenneth Chesebro, alongside bail bondsman Scott Hall. 

Under the plea deals, the former defendants may have to testify against Mr Trump in forthcoming trials. 

Other high-profile co-defendants include his White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, Rudy Giuliani, the former New York mayor, and lawyer John Eastman. 

Mr Trump has always denied he acted improperly in Georgia in the aftermath of the election, as he sought to overturn the result in the state after narrowly losing the vote to Mr Biden.

In a leaked call with Brad Raffensperger, the Republican secretary of state, Mr Trump pleaded with him to “find” thousands of votes that would allow him to win the crucial state.

“There’s nothing wrong with saying, you know, um, that you’ve recalculated,” Mr Trump is reported to have said. “All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state.”

Mr Trump’s legal team unsuccessfully argued that Fani Willis, a Georgia district attorney, should be barred from bringing charges against him and that a grand jury’s report should be thrown out.

The grand jury spent eight months interrogating some 75 witnesses and filed a lengthy report on Mr Trump’s conduct last year.

Mr Trump surrendered at a Georgia jail in August to be arrested in connection with the charges, after his bail was set at $200,000 with strict conditions attached to it.

The judge has not yet set a trial date for Mr Trump, but Ms Willis has proposed courtroom proceedings commence on Aug 5 2024 for the remaining defendants. 

If successful, this means the trial would begin just months before the US presidential election in November. 

However, the timetable has been thrown into doubt over allegations that Ms Wallis faced a conflict of interest over her romantic involvement with lawyer Nathan Wade, whom she hired to investigate Mr Trump.

If she is removed from the case, Georgia will have to find another prosecution team, which could delay the trial until after November’s presidential election.

Other 2020 election and Jan 6 charges

Aside from Georgia, Mr Trump has been charged with four criminal counts over the events that led to the riot at the US Capitol on Jan 6 2021.

In a 45-page indictment brought by special counsel Jack Smith, he was accused of trying to “overturn the legitimate results” of the 2020 presidential election.

He allegedly did so by pressuring officials in swing states where he had lost to assemble “fake electors” to ignore the popular vote, and pushing the Justice Department to open “sham” election inquiries.

Six co-conspirators are referred to in the indictment but have not been named. However, Mr Giuliani appears to be the individual named as “co-conspirator number one”.

Prosecutors say the former president also tried to convince Mike Pence, the then vice-president, to reject legitimate Electoral College votes.

Mr Trump faces two counts of conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding, having allegedly tried to block Congress from confirming Joe Biden’s victory. 

The felony charge was used against numerous rioters who stormed the Capitol.

He has also been charged with conspiracy against rights, which criminalises any joint effort to “injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate” others in an effort to stop them exercising their constitutional or federal rights.

Mr Trump’s campaign said the “persecutions” were “reminiscent of Nazi Germany in the 1930s”. It added: “These un-American witch-hunts will fail and President Trump will be re-elected to the White House.”

Mr Trump pleaded not guilty in a federal courthouse in Washington DC at the start of August.

Mr Smith, who the former president has labelled as “deranged”, said he would seek a “speedy trial” over the four criminal counts.

Even if Mr Trump is convicted, the frontrunner for the Republican nomination has insisted he will continue to run for the presidency.

There are no mandatory minimum sentences for any of the crimes Mr Trump is accused of.

Conspiracy to defraud the government is the least punitive of the four charges and is punishable by up to five years in prison.

Conspiracy against rights carries a sentence of up to 10 years in prison, while conspiracy to obstruct and obstructing an official proceeding both mean up to 20 years in prison.

In October, US District Judge Tanya Chutkan hit Mr Trump with a gagging order that prohibits him from publicly disparaging witnesses, prosecutors and court staff members involved in the case.

In response to an appeal from Mr Trump, the gagging order was partially upheld, but restricted, by the judge in a ruling in early December.

In January, Mr Trump launched an appeal against the case in Washington, arguing that he should be immune from prosecution because his actions took place while he held the presidency. 

Prosecutors then asked the court to issue a “mandate” to limit Mr Trump’s efforts to further delay the trial. 

But the Supreme Court have since agreed to consider Mr Trump’s case for “absolute immunity”, with oral arguments scheduled to begin on April 22. 

This means the case is unlikely to reach trial before the November election, which could give Mr Trump the chance to pardon himself before a verdict is reached if he secures the presidency.

Classified documents

Mr Trump faces 40 felony charges related to the mishandling of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.

The indictment accused him of endangering national security by removing US secrets from the White House and storing them in “a ballroom, a bathroom and shower” at his Florida club.

Some were said to contain information about nuclear programmes, along with the defence and weapons capabilities of the US and foreign powers.

In July, three further charges were added after it was claimed that Mr Trump and two employees tried to delete Mar-a-Lago security footage before it could be handed over to the FBI.

A Trump spokesman has dismissed the case as “a continued desperate and flailing attempt” by the Biden administration “to harass President Trump and those around him”.

The trial was originally set to commence on May 20 2024 in Fort Pierce, Florida, but this timeline is likely to be scrapped, with prosecutors suggesting a July 8 start date instead.

Mr Trump’s lawyers have called for the case to be postponed indefinitely or at least until after the election, citing the “challenges” of juggling a criminal trial and campaigning. 

In a move that would favour the former president, the federal judge overseeing the case implied she was also inclined to delay the trial, saying the current deadlines were “unrealistic”. 

Only two of the charges that Mr Trump faces carry a possible prison sentence of fewer than ten years – the charges for scheming to conceal and making false statements and representations.

The 31 charges under the Espionage Act – the wilful retention of documents – carry a sentence of up to ten years in prison.

Prosecutors will have to prove that Mr Trump or his team – he is being tried alongside two co-defendants – “knowingly” mishandled materials “to impede, obstruct or influence” the investigation. 

The prosecution has also filed notices detailing the FBI agents they intend to call forward as expert witnesses. 

These agents will be asked to describe evidence found on the phones of Mr Trump’s co-defendants. 

Charges for obstruction of justice, withholding a document or record, corruptly concealing a document or record and concealing a document in a federal investigation could all mean a prison sentence of up to 20 years.

All charges are listed with a maximum fine of up to $250,000 (£198,000).

Stormy Daniels ‘hush money’

In April 2023, Mr Trump was charged in New York with 34 counts of fraud in relation to “hush money” paid to the porn star Stormy Daniels to keep quiet about an alleged affair.

The former president is said to have falsified business records to conceal a $130,000 payment.

According to the 16-page indictment, the payments aimed “to conceal damaging information and unlawful activity from American voters before and after the 2016 election”.

Michael Cohen, Mr Trump’s former lawyer, was sentenced to three years in prison in 2018 after admitting tax evasion and campaign finance violations in relation to paying off Ms Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford.

Mr Trump pleaded not guilty to the 34-count indictment, which he called a “political witch-hunt, trying to take down the leading candidate, by far, in the Republican Party”.

The case will be the first of the former president’s criminal cases to go to trial, after a judge turned down Mr Trump’s requests to delay. 

Jury selection will begin as planned on March 25 2024 in New York, in the middle of the Republican primaries.  

The presidential candidate would normally expect to be travelling around the country on the campaign trail at this time, but a judge warned him not to make any commitments for this month. 

The multiple counts of falsifying business records carry a maximum four-year jail sentence if Mr Trump is found guilty.

Ms Daniels has downplayed the charges, however, arguing the former president does not deserve to be imprisoned.

“I don’t think that his crimes against me are worthy of incarceration,” she said on a TalkTV interview in April last year.

Civil cases

New York fraud case

Mr Trump was in September found to have exaggerated his net worth and the value of his properties, including Trump Tower and his Mar-a-Lago resort.

In February 2024, Donald Trump was fined almost $355 million and effectively banned from serving as a director of his own company for three years. After pre-trial interest was added, the mammoth fine climbed even further, being formally set at more than $454 million.

In his ruling in mid-February, Judge Arthur Engoron also barred the former US president’s adult sons from running the family firm for two years.

Eric and Donald Jr were also ordered to pay more than $4 million each.

However, he stopped short of a life ban, which was described as a “corporate death sentence”, although the judgment does present the family with logistical problems in running the former president’s property empire over the next few years.

Mr Trump announced he is appealing against the ruling by a “crooked New York state judge” and accused Laetitia James, the New York Attorney General of being “horribly corrupt” and election interference.

Mr Trump has attacked Judge Engoron as “unhinged”, “deranged” and a “political hack”.

The former president had already been hit with a $15,000 fine by Mr Engoron, after he insulted the presiding judge’s clerk on social media, violating a gag order in the case. 

An appeals judge denied Mr Trump’s request to pay only $100 million of the full $454 million fine but agreed to lift a ban on the former president’s ability to obtain loans from New York banks. 

E Jean Carroll

E Jean Carroll, a former magazine columnist, has been awarded $83 million damages from Mr Trump after he called her a “whack job” a day after he was found to have sexually abused her in a civil lawsuit.

Ms Carroll claimed that Mr Trump raped her in a Bergdorf Goodman department store dressing room in Manhattan in the mid-1990s. 

The civil jury rejected the rape claim but ordered the former president to pay $5 million in damages for sexual abuse in May 2023.

In a televised town hall hosted by CNN the following day, Mr Trump accused her of telling a “made-up story”.

He told the audience at the event: “What kind of a woman meets somebody and brings them up and, within minutes, you’re playing hanky-panky in a dressing room, OK?”

Ms Carroll’s lawyers claim he “persisted in maliciously defaming Carroll yet again”.

Ms Carroll can proceed with her defamation claim against Mr Trump after the Justice Department ruled his presidency did not shield him from liability.

It said it no longer believes Mr Trump could claim his comments about the right were carried out as part of his presidential duties.

A US judge ruled that Mr Trump was liable for making defamatory statements against Ms Carroll and her second lawsuit would be for damages only, in a defeat for the former president. 

The former magazine columnist had already won $5 million from Mr Trump after he was found in May to have sexually abused and defamed her.

Mr Trump has since sought a new trial in the defamation case brought by E Jean Carroll, arguing that the judge restricted his testimony and should substantially reduce the $83.3 million judgment against him.

Could Trump be banned from the ballot?

Mr Trump had previously been the subject of another appeal at the Supreme Court against attempts by several states to ban him from the election ballot over claims that an obscure constitutional amendment would prevent him from running for a second term.

However, Mr Trump was cleared to run for president in a unanimous decision by the court on the eve of Super Tuesday, a series of votes that could secure his Republican nomination. 

In a speech at his resort in Miami, the former president praised the “unifying and inspirational” ruling after the Supreme Court agreed it would be “incongruous” to give individual states the power to disqualify candidates for the presidency.

In mid-December, the Colorado Supreme Court had ruled that Mr Trump was disqualified under the 14th Amendment, which prevents individuals guilty of “insurrection” from holding high office. 

Maine followed suit on Dec 28, with Secretary of State Shenna Bellows disqualifying Mr Trump from the ballot in her state, leading Mr Trump to appeal the decision.

The amendment was originally designed to ban confederate generals from running for the presidency, but fell into obscurity until it was revived by legal scholars in 2023.

Since then, several states had begun proceedings to see Mr Trump taken off the ballot papers in the 2024 election – in both the primary race and the general election.

The Supreme Court heard legal arguments in February and appeared sceptical over Colorado’s arguments before overturning the proceedings. 

However, they are also considering Mr Trump’s claim that he has immunity against all criminal charges.

At the beginning of February, a federal appeals court rejected his claim and ruled he should face trial for a criminal indictment accusing him of seeking to overturn his loss to Joe Biden.