Donald Trump is in the courtroom for his hush money trial

Donald Trump arrived at a New York court Monday to start jury selection for his hush money trial — the first time a former U.S. president has ever faced a criminal trial.

“Nothing like this has ever happened before,” Trump told reporters before going into the courtroom.

“This is political persecution,” he said. “It’s an assault on America and that’s why I’m very proud to be here.”

Trump’s lawyers last week repeatedly sought to delay Monday’s start date with last-ditch efforts in an appeals court, but those efforts all failed.

In all, defense attorneys tried about a dozen times to dismiss or delay the trial, but only succeeded in pushing it back by a few weeks.