As a practical matter, Donald Trump’s hush-money trial is fundamentally about election interference and hiding information from the American people that could have influenced the outcome of the 2016 election. Legal experts generally agree that the testimony by witnesses for the prosecution — including David Pecker, former publisher of The National Enquirer, and Stormy Daniels’ former attorney Keith Davidson, as well as the bankers and assistants who had knowledge of Trump’s financial matters as they relate to the hush-money payments, have been very damaging to the ex-president's defense.
To that point, a highlight (or low point, depending on one's point of view) of this trial came last Thursday when an audio recording of Trump speaking with his then-attorney Michael Cohen about buying the silence of Karen McDougal (one of Trump's alleged sexual partners) was played in court for the jurors. This evidence is critical to the prosecution's case because it establishes a pattern of behavior.
