Summary
Here is a wrap-up of the day’s key events:
The prosecution started off by pointing to Judge Juan Merchan’s gag order. “The order was issued because of the defendant’s persistent and escalating rhetoric aimed at participants in this hearing … He’s already been found by the court to have violated the order nine times and has done it again here,” Christopher Conroy said of Donald Trump.
Chris Conroy referred to Donald Trump’s recent comments on Michael Cohen, his one-time consigliere-turned-star prosecution witness. “Michael Cohen is not a political opponent, defendant’s comments about Michael Cohen relate to issues at the heart of the proceeding,” he said, adding, “Defendant is doing everything he can to make this case about his politics – it’s not it’s about his criminal conduct.”
Juan Merchan was not buying Todd Blanche’s “Donald Trump is a victim to media” narrative. “Whats happening in this trial is no surprise to anyone,” the judge said. “It wasn’t the press that went to him, he went to the press,” Merchan said, adding, “You’re telling me that the scrutiny is outrageous. Nobody forced your client to go stand where he did that day.”
Joshua Steinglass asked Keith Davidson about a series of exchanges on election night, when it appeared that Donald Trump would win. “There was an understanding that our activities may have in some way assisted the campaign of Donald Trump,” Keith Davidson said on the stand. Prosecutors showed his election night texts with Dylan Howard. Davidson wrote, “what have we done?” and Howard wrote back “oh my god”.
Donald Trump’s lawyers are likely to seize on Keith Davidson, Stormy Daniels’s lawyer, insisting that he would never characterize the $130,000 payment to Daniels as “hush money” but as “consideration for a settlement agreement” – which sounds legal-related. Recall that the Manhattan DA’s underlying case is that Trump falsified business records because the $130,000 to Daniels was recorded as legal expenses or legal retainers to Michael Cohen. It is likely that Trump’s lawyers will try to argue “consideration” is a legal expense.
There was a lot of tension between Donald Trump’s lawyer Emil Bove and Keith Davidson. Davidson was clearly uninterested in talking about past less-than-flattering deals in which he has gotten payments for clients from Charlie Sheen. Bove kept saying Davidson “extracted” money from Sheen. “If you’re not here to play legal games, don’t say extract,” Davidson said.
Prosecution played Michael Cohen’s recording of conversation with Donald Trump. “I need to open up a company for the transfer...regarding our friend David [Pecker]... I’m going to do that right away, and I’ve spoken to Allen Weisselberg about how to set the whole thing up,” said Cohen.
Juan Merchan said he refuses to review things, including media articles, in advance that Trump wants to post to his Truth Social platform to warn him if they would violate his gag order. “I’m not going to be in the position of looking at posts and determining in advance whether he should or should not post these on Truth Social,” Merchan said.
Keith Davidson took the stand as a witness for the prosecution. Defence lawyer Emil Bove, representing Donald Trump, cross-examined him, asking him a 2011 blogpost on a gossip site called The Dirty, which was the first time he had interacted with Michael Cohen.
Bove pointed to connections between Daniels, her handler at the time, Gina Rodriguez, and The Dirty’s publisher, as reason for their ability to get the story taken down. “Isn’t it a fact that the reason Ms Daniels and Ms Rodriguez wanted that blogpost taken down is because they were trying to negotiate a better deal with In Touch magazine?” Bove asked. Davidson said he learned that later. “They were using my efforts to create an exclusive opportunity with a different publication,” he said on cross.
That’s it as we wrap up the blog for today. Thank you for following along.
Updated
Court is now over for the day.
It will be back in session tomorrow and will end at about 3:45pm.
Updated
