Donald Trump‘s grip on the Republican faithful was evident from the moment he left the federal courthouse in Miami last week.

Fresh off becoming the first former president to face criminal charges levied by the government he once oversaw, Trump’s motorcade moved through a crowd of hundreds of mostly adoring fans. He met more supporters at a Cuban restaurant in Little Havana, a Miami neighborhood that, like much of south Florida, has swung toward Republicans in recent years.

A federal indictment on charges of mishandling the nation’s most sensitive national security secrets would doom any other White House hopeful. But Trump’s reception in Miami — and the more than $7 million he raised after the indictment — was a reminder of the central tension coursing through the Republican Party as the 2024 presidential primary gets underway.

The announcement that federal prosecutors have reached a plea deal with President Joe Biden’s son Hunter over tax and gun charges marks the likely end of a five-year Justice Department investigation that has dogged the Biden family.

It doesn’t, however, mean that congressional Republicans are done with their own wide-ranging probe into nearly every facet of Hunter Biden‘s business dealings, including examining foreign payments and other aspects of his finances.

The reactions spilt out on social media through comments to reporters throughout the mid-morning just minutes after the indictment was announced, with none other than former President Donald Trump leading the charge.

John Bowden tracked their reactions.

The Trump-appointed judge has signed a court order listing the trial as starting on 14 August of this year in Fort Pierce, Florida.

“This case is hereby set for a Criminal Jury Trial during the two-week period commencing August 14, 2023, or as soon thereafter as the case may be called,” the court order states.

Gustaf Kilander has the story.

Donald Trump said on Monday night that the days of his family serving in the White House are over if he wins another term in office in the 2024 election.

The former president made the remarks in an extensive interview with Bret Baier of Fox News that was taped at his Bedminster summer home on his golf course in New Jersey.

“I said, ‘That’s enough for the family,’” he said when asked about the prospects of a second term. “It’s too painful for the family. My family has been through hell.”

Fox News has continued to cement its latest falling out with former president Donald Trump, with one longtime analyst saying he was “incoherent” in an interview with host Bret Baier.

Brit Hume, discussing the interview with his colleague Baier on Monday, dismissed the former president’s legal arguments over accusations of mishandling classified documents and suggested they would not hold up in a court of law.

“I will say a couple of things, one thing is his answer on the matters of the law seem to me to verge on incoherent,” Hume said.

Ever since former president Donald Trump announced his indictment two weeks ago, most Republicans have crowed about a supposedly two-tiered system of justice that held the former president and GOP frontrunner to a different standard than President Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden.

This thesis led House Republicans to create a special subcommittee on “weaponisation” of the federal government that came after the multiple probes into Mr Trump’s misconduct. To Republicans, the contrast showed how the so-called “deep state” specifically targeted conservatives while someone like Mr Biden was allowed to walk free.

But the news on Tuesday that Hunter Biden would plead guilty to two charges of failing to pay taxes, and would enter a pretrial diversion agreement for a charge related to the unlawful possession of a firearm, seemed to scramble the argument Republicans have made.

Mr Trump spoke in an interview with Fox News anchor Bret Baier at his property in Bedminster, New Jersey less than a week after he pleaded not guilty to 37 charges in a federal court in Miami for his arraignment in Miami. A federal grand jury had indicted him for allegedly willfully mishandling of classified documents, obstruction of justice and making false statements.

Late last month, CNN reported that federal prosecutors had obtained audio of a recording in the summer of 2021 where Mr Trump acknowledged that he had held onto a classified document from the Pentagon detailing a potential attack on Iran.

But Mr Trump denied there was a document.

Eric Garcia has the story.

President Joe Biden said he was proud of his son Hunter Biden, after the younger Mr Biden reached a plea deal with the Department of Justice, agreeing to plead guilty to federal charges following an investigation into his taxes.

The president responded to shouted questions from reporters in San Francisco, who asked if he had spoken to his son.

Eric Garcia and Megan Sheets report.

A Fox News host confronted Donald Trump in a heated interview with a long list of former staffers he appointed and later went against.

Mr Trump was challenged on his hiring choices during his tenure, with Fox News anchor Bret Baier reminding him of his 2016 statement that he was “going to surround myself with only the best and most serious people”.

“Well, I did do that,” Mr Trump responded. “That’s tremendous. Look, we had the best economy we’ve ever had, the world has ever seen.”

Baier then read out a long list of his former allies who are now running against him in the 2024 presidential elections.

Shweta Sharma has the story.