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Prosecutors call #KeithDavidson, who negotiated 2 deals before the 2016 election that paid women from Trump’s past in exchange for their silence about sexual or romantic relationships w/him. He was a lawyer to #StormyDaniels during the #HushMoney transaction. He also represented #KarenMcDougal, a former Playboy model who was paid $150k by The #NationalEnquirer’s parent company for the rights to her story about a 10-month affair w/ #Trump starting in 2006.
Rebecca Mangold, one of the prosecutors, had Phillip Thompson walk through the validity of the transcript of Trump’s deposition in one of the #EJeanCarroll cases. We are now seeing video clips of #Trump in that deposition verifying that Truth Social is his social media site & what his handle is.
Asked to describe Truth Social, Trump answers, “It’s a platform that’s been opened by me as an alternative to Twitter.”
The third video shows #Trump at a news conference in 2017 during the presidential transition, saying, “#MichaelCohen is a very talented lawyer, he’s a good lawyer.”
Defense had no questions.
We've moved on to a new witness, someone named Phillip Thompson who works at a company supplying court reporters, interpreters that transcribed Trump's deposition in #EJeanCarroll trial. He was subpoenaed.
Next is video of a campaign event #Trump did in PA, in Oct 2016. He blasts media outlets & says, “Every woman lied when they came forward to hurt my campaign.” He later vows to sue, saying "the events never happened, never."
Merchan precluded prosecution from introducing direct evidence that many women, near the end of the 2016 campaign, accused Trump of #SexualAssault. They are getting some of that evidence into the trial w/these videos of Trump attacking the women on the campaign trail.
#law
Prosecutors played #CSPAN clips, starting w/one from an Oct 2016 #Trump campaign rally in NC, where he talks about 2 women who said Trump sexually assaulted them. “I have no idea who these women are,” Trump said at the time. “These are lies being pushed by the media & the Clinton campaign to try & keep their grip on our country. They’re all false, totally invented, fiction.”
Trump seems to be watching himself as the C-SPAN clip plays on the monitor in front of him.
Robert Browning explained that C-SPAN is a “public television network that telecasts events in their entirety.”
Browning is a custodial witness, or records custodian - witnesses certify the truth of records presented. In this trial, the defense did not agree on certain facts that the prosecution sought to stipulate were true. So, the prosecutors need these sorts of witnesses to help the jury understand the basic truth of the episodes they want to talk about at trial.
#Trump #TrumpTrial #law
The next witness is being called, & it’s not someone we’re familiar with. He is identified as Dr. Robert Browning.
Some laughter in the courtroom as Dr. Browning says he’s a “little bit” nervous about testifying for the first time.
#TrumpTrial #law #contempt #criminal #Trump
The judge returned to the bench but #Trump took some extra time to return to the courtroom, which is unusual in this case. Now Trump is back & #Merchan has warned Todd #Blanche, his lawyer: “Let’s try to keep the breaks short.”
Trump is joined by his son Eric again, although Susie Wiles & Dan Scavino, two of his aides, have not re-entered the courtroom.
During the break, the lawyers have continued to discuss the case with the judge. Now, a prosecutor, Matthew Colangelo, rises & says that if #Trump testifies, the prosecution would seek to cross-examine him about the judge’s ruling on the #GagOrder. This issue will be argued at length sometime later — & possibly not even today — but Colangelo raises it now.
After briefly consulting w/ his defense team & leaning down to whisper to #Trump, Todd #Blanche asked #GaryFarro directly if he ever had any communications w/ #MichaelCohen about Trump & if he ever spoke w/Trump himself. Farro said no.
Blanche has finished his cross-examination of Gary Farro, & Rebecca Mangold, a prosecutor, has returned for re-direct questioning.
#Gary Farro is reportedly a bit irritated w/ #Blanche, #Trump's lawyer. Blanche suggests that Farro opened up a shell corporation, & Farro bites back: “I don’t open up shell corporations. I open up LLC accounts.” Blanche is directing jurors' focus to what #MichaelCohen did -- that is, effectively start a shell corporation that was used to pay #StormyDaniels. It’s a way to attack Cohen through Farro, making the former fixer sound deceptive & potentially criminal.
#Blanche is trying to cast some doubt on #GaryFarro’s testimony & use him to criticize #MichaelCohen. He asks Farro to say again that Cohen was a “difficult client.” Farro agrees that he was.
Blanche is also trying to separate Cohen's actions from #Trump's, arguing that the account was never established as related to Trump. Basically it’s defense's entire argument: that Cohen was acting on his own.
#Trump's lawyer Todd #Blanche, will conduct cross. It’s Blanche’s 1st #CrossExamination this trial.
It’s also the 1st time we’ve seen Blanche since the hearing last week in which he sought to argue that Trump had not violated the judge’s #GagOrder. Blanche lost that hearing.
Gary Farro was asked by Blanche about speaking with “the people,” (the prosecutors) Trump shook his head pointedly when Farro talked about meeting w/ prosecutors he had in DC ahead of his testimony.
Mangold, one of the prosecutors, walked the banker Gary Farro through a wire transfer that occurred immediately after Essential Consultants LLC was created. The documents displayed show that on Oct. 27, 2016, #MichaelCohen & the LLC wired $130k to Keith Davidson, #StormyDaniels’ lawyer at the time. Cohen wrote that the purpose of the wire transfer was for a “retainer.”
#Trump #TrumpTrial #law
An email was shown from a FirstRepublic banker to #MichaelCohen, flagged as “high importance,” confirming his request to transfer $131k from his home equity line of credit acct to the Essential Consultants LLC acct.
Farro’s testimony is a reminder that moving money around always leaves an electronic footprint. There are wire transfers & paperwork inside the bank. It doesn’t always stop a fraud from happening but is helpful after the fact.
#Trump #TrumpTrial #law
First Republic did not do business w/the porn industry, as Farro testified last week. If the paperwork #MichaelCohen submitted had made allusions to its actual purpose, “there would be a determination made by the 2nd & 3rd line of defense” at the bank. The payment would have been flagged by bank auditors, as “it is an industry that we do not work with,” said Farro.
#Trump #TrumpTrial #law
#GaryFarro is testifying about LLCs & know-your-client forms. The prosecutor questioning him has asked him to spell out what LLCs are. Know-your-client forms are used by banks to verify who a client is.
“Everything was urgent w/ #MichaelCohen,” Gary Farro testifies about Cohen’s interest in opening his acct quickly. Cohen used the account to make the hush-money payment to #StormyDaniels.
He says Cohen did not make it clear that it would be used to pay a porn star.
#Trump #TrumpTrial #law
Justice #Merchan explicitly called #Trump’s claim that reposts don’t count as violations of the #GagOrder “counterintuitive and absurd.”
Justice Merchan rejected the defense’s claims that Trump had merely reposted the messages from others and that he had largely been acting in response to political attacks from two potential witnesses in the case: #MichaelCohen & #StormyDaniels.
Justice #Merchan wrote that he was “keenly aware of, and protective of, Defendant’s First Amendment rights.” But nonetheless, he wrote that he would not tolerate continued violations of his orders and that if necessary & appropriate, he would “impose an incarceratory sentence.” In plain language, he is warning #Trump that he will send him to #jail if necessary.
Already, prosecutors have alerted to the judge to 4 new potential violations. Those were not covered by Justice #Merchan’s order & will be discussed at another hearing, which will be held on Thurs morning.
In addition to fining #Trump after finding him in #contempt, Justice Merchan ordered him to remove the offending Truth Social posts today.
The judge, Juan M. #Merchan, fined him $9,000, punishing the former president for repeatedly violating a #GagOrder that bars him from attacking witnesses, prosecutors & jurors.
Merchan determined that #Trump had broken the #GagOrder by making several public statements on social media & on his campaign website in which he attacked #witnesses & the #jury.
The judge says the people have met their burden of proof on some violations & fines #Trump $2,000 to begin with. There are more fines coming.
#TrumpTrial 🧵
Testimony started w/a bang last week as David #Pecker, the fmr publisher of The #NationalEnquirer, said that he had entered into a secret plot w/ #Trump & #MichaelCohen to #CatchAndKill negative stories about Trump as he ran for president in 2016.
#GaryFarro, the 3rd to testify, started off w/dry details about banking transactions. But #Farro is leading us to the #HushMoney payment
During his testimony, #KeithDavidson had to explain another text he sent to #DylanHoward where, in reference to the deal The #NationalEnquirer was making w/the fmr #KarenMcDougal, Davidson wrote:
“Throw in an ambassadorship for me. I’m thinking Isle of Man.”
Davidson said the text was a joke that referenced #Trump's campaign. Pressed further by the prosecutor, Joshua Steinglass, he added that he understood that getting McDougal a deal would help Trump’s candidacy.
#Trump losing 17% of the vote in a closed swing-state primary to a candidate who dropped out months ago should lead to a lotta commentary about his weakness. It won’t, because the press is obsessed with Trumpers sticking with Trump regardless, but it should.
Imagine how they’d cover Dean Phillips pulling those numbers against #Biden.
Inform yourselves on NY #GagOrder law: #TrumpTrial
"The judge would be on firm legal footing to sanction #Trump for all of the statements, but in an abundance of caution, may distinguish some of the repostings for the sake of taking a balanced approach and an incremental one...We expect the court to impose fines against Trump for a substantial number of the violations and to warn him that future violations will result in additional fines and potentially jail time" justsecurity.org/94878/why-tru…
Why Trump Will Likely be Held in Contempt and What Then
Explaining former President Donald Trump's gag order in his New York criminal trial, the alleged violations, and the legal framework.Siven Watt (Just Security)
#Blanche downplayed the 34 charges of falsfying records #Trump faces as a "business records violation."
He highlighted the disparity between the $130k #HushMoney payment & what was paid to #MichaelCohen. He asks them, if Trump really was so frugal, would he have repaid Cohen so much? "This was not a payback," he said, adding: “He was President Trump's personal atty."
"would a frugal business man …repay [a] $130k debt to the tune of $420k?"
It seems like #Blanche will seek to convince the jury that everything was appropriate & done by the book, not even worthy of notice. That #Cohen was #Trump's lawyer, & he was paid for #legal services. But he'll also seek to distance his client from the matter: "President Trump had nothing to do w/the invoice," he said.
#criminal #law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney
"I have a spoiler alert: There's nothing wrong w/trying to influence an election," #Blanche says. "It's called democracy." [not the charge. The charge is falsifying business records, the #MensRea is to influence. Besides which, influencing an election through illegal means is duh illegal]
"They put something sinsiter on this idea as if it were a crime," he continued. "You'll learn it's not."
#criminal #law #Trump #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney
#Blanche said that the prosecution told a “clean nice story," but that it is not as simple as they would have the #jury believe. He said that many of the docs in evidence are almost a decade old. The testimony, he suggests, is similarly old. He said, the story that #jurors heard "is not true."
#Trump largely avoided looking at the jury during prosecution's opening statement. He shifted his body in their direction during defense’s.
#criminal #law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #ElectionInterference
Todd #Blanche presented the defense's opening statement.
"President Trump is innocent," are the first words of Blanche's opening.
“President Trump did not commit any crimes."
"He is cloaked in innocence.”
Blanche highlights that #Trump is entitled to the presumption of innocence, which is something that some of his more heated critics sometimes lose sight of.
Blanche seeks to have the jurors relate to his client, as he says Trump is doing "what any of us would do."
#Colangelo encourages #jurors to "tune out the noise" & "focus on the facts" during the course of the #TrumpTrial. He summarizes the evidence again, & says after all the evidence is in, Joshua Steinglass, another prosecutor, will do the closing argument.
He ends by saying there is "only one conclusion: Donald Trump is guilty of 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree."
#criminal #law #Trump #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney
#Colangelo depicted #MichaelCohen as a flawed man who has lied before, saying he lied about the payment to #StormyDaniels initially "to protect his boss."
"This case is about a #criminal #conspiracy & a #coverup," Colangelo says, st the start of his conclusion of his opening statement, adding that at the end of the case, jurors will have no #ReasonableDoubt about #Trump's #guilt.
#criminal #law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #ElectionInterference #HushMoney
#Colangelo insists that much of #Cohen's testimony will be #corroborated, incl’g by witnesses from The #NationalEnquirer & "an extensive paper trail."
Because the prosecution bears the burden of proving its case beyond a reasonable doubt, it gets to go first (& last) in a #criminal case. The advantage of that can be seen in action here, as Colangelo gives the jury his own frame through which to view #MichaelCohen.
#law #Trump #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #ElectionInterference #HushMoney