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re: DAY 1-Hush Money Trial-TRUMP Miserable & Angry-1st Witness BOMBSHELLS
More SHOCKING Than OJs' & More Devastating Than Michael Cohen: First TRUMP Hush Money Witness Takes Stand
The former chairman of the National Enquirer’s parent company took the stand Monday as the first witness called in Donald Trumps New York hush money criminal trial
He confirmed, amongst other things, Trumps' motivation and intent when it came to his alleged attempt to buy the silence of an adult film star he's accused of sleeping with.
MSRAW 22 APR 2024
David Pecker, who once headed American Media, helped Trump bury embarrassing stories before they had a chance to circulate in the media.
He was also a key figure in the scheme to cover up the hush money payment Trump allegedly made to Stormy Daniels ahead of his 2016 campaign
As MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin points out, Pecker "can testify that Trump not only understood but heartily endorsed his publication’s offer to ‘catch and kill’ negative stories about him, especially as they pertained to Trump’s alleged extramarital affairs.
“And given how few people outside Michael Cohen directly communicated with Trump about the scheme at issue, Pecker’s testimony could be critical in establishing Trump’s intent and knowledge," Rubin wrote in a post to X.
New York University Law Prof. Ryan Goodman agreed, saying that Pecker “could be a key witness — in ways more devastating than Michael Cohen," adding that Pecker’s testimony “should be strong proof of core allegation that the hush money scheme was geared toward influencing the outcome of the presidential election,” Goodman wrote
Also that Pecker met with Trump and Cohen at Trump Tower to set up the catch-and-kill election operation that “set the whole scheme in motion.”
Salon reports that Pecker contacted former Trump attorney Michael Cohen, who then negotiated an agreement to send a $130,000 payment to Daniels to "purchase" her silence. The prosecution expects Pecker to shore up Cohen's testimony.
"Pecker will also likely testify about his involvement in a flurry of phone calls, a day after the Access Hollywood tape broke, to buy-and-bury Stormy Daniels' story," Goodman wrote in his post, adding that Pecker is "also likely to testify about his conversations directly with Trump and Cohen in December 2016 — on the arrangement for Trump to reimburse Cohen for the hush money payment to Daniels."
TRUMP Lashes Out Angrily Before Trials' Opening Statements
TRUMPs' Hush Money Trial Opening Statements
The Former Chairman of The National Enquirers Parent Company David Pecker Took The Stand
The first witness took the stand in former President Donald Trump’s hush money trial after both sides laid out parts of their cases to the jury in opening statements. During his testimony, David Pecker described his job at the time as the former chairman of the National Enquirer’s parent company.
Here's a recap of what he said;
MORE:
TRUMP is Miserable & Angry in Dinghy Courtroom
TRUMP Trial: Hush Money Was Election Fraud Pure and Simple Prosecutors Say
Ex-president ‘orchestrated a criminal scheme’ to corrupt 2016 election, prosecution says in opening statement
The Guardian 23 APR 2024
Donald Trump “orchestrated a criminal scheme to corrupt the 2016 presidential election” in his efforts to cover up an alleged affair with the adult film star Stormy Daniels.
The prosecution said on Monday in its opening statement in the former president’s criminal trial, with the defense countering that “there’s nothing wrong with trying to influence an election – it’s called democracy”.
After opening statements from both sides, the historic trial also briefly heard from its first witness, David Pecker, former publisher of the National Enquirer and a man at the heart of Trump’s alleged crimes.
A jury of seven men and five women living in Manhattan will weigh whether Trump’s alleged efforts to conceal an affair with Daniels, which he feared would damage his bid for the White House, were illicit. Trump was charged in the spring of 2023 with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records.
The case, brought by the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, hinges on a $130,000 payment that Trump’s former lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen, made to Daniels to keep her story under wraps. Bragg contends that Trump masked the true nature of the payment in business records, by describing repayments to Cohen as lawful legal expenses.
In his opening statements on Monday, the prosecutor Matthew Colangelo told jurors that Trump invited his friend Pecker to a meeting at Trump Tower in summer 2015. Trump had recently thrown his hat into the ring for the 2016 Republican nomination, and Colangelo said Trump, Cohen and Pecker hatched a plan to keep damaging information about Trump out of the press.
According to the prosecution, Pecker agreed to run damaging information in the National Enquirer about opponents – including an item claiming, falsely, that Senator Ted Cruz had family connections to the JFK assassination – as well as buying up negative stories for the express purpose of preventing them from being published.
Colangelo said this “catch-and-kill” campaign was geared towards helping Trump’s 2016 election campaign.
He mentioned an earlier payment to Karen McDougal, the Playboy model who claimed to have had an affair with Trump. “Pecker will also testify that $150,000 was way more than AMI would normally pay for this kind of story, but he discussed it with Donald Trump and he discussed it with Michael Cohen, and he agreed on the deal with the understanding what Trump would find a way to pay AMI back,” Colangelo said. “The company coordinated directly with the candidate.”
He also read out a transcript of Trump’s infamous comments, caught on a hot mic, on the set of the Access Hollywood television show, where Trump bragged he could sexually assault women because he was famous. Colangelo quoted Trump saying: “Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything … Grab ’em by the pussy. You can do anything.”
Noting that the video was released to the public in October 2016, one month before election day, Colangelo said: “The campaign went into immediate damage control mode” and tried to frame the remarks as “locker room talk” – but were terrified the Daniels allegation would show that his boorish behavior extended to actions, not just talk.
“Another story about infidelity, with a porn star, on the heels of the Access Hollywood tape, would have been devastating to his campaign,” Colangelo said.
Cohen was therefore tasked with handling the payoff to Daniels, for $130,000, which Trump is alleged to have repaid to him after the election in checks that were listed in business records as legal services. Colangelo said that was a lie. “The defendant was paying him back for an illegal payment to Stormy Daniels on the eve of the election.
“He wanted to conceal his and others’ criminal conduct.”
“Look, no politician wants bad press, but the evidence at trial will show that this wasn’t spin or communication strategy,” Colangelo said. “This was a planned, coordinated, long-running conspiracy to influence the 2016 election, to help Donald Trump get elected through illegal expenditures – to silence people with something bad to say about his behavior,” Colangelo said.
“It was election fraud, pure and simple.” Colangelo added that “we’ll never know” whether this conspiracy made the difference “in a close election”.
TRUMPs’ Trial: Key Takeaways From Opening Statements
The ex-president appeared uncomfortable at times as his criminal trial Donald Trump was confronted on Monday with the unsavory details of his alleged attempt to illegally influence the 2016 election by covering up his hush-money payments to the adult film star Stormy Daniels, as the first criminal trial for a former US president got under way in New York.
Trump has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records – where the hush-money payments were recorded as legal expenses – to cover up the affair just weeks before the election.
Here Are The KEY Takeaways From The Start of The Trial:
1. Prosecutors Immediately Focused on The 2016 Election
The Manhattan district attorney’s office sketched out from the start of their opening statements that Trump committed one crime, the falsification of records, in the furtherance of a second crime, to violate campaign finance laws – which is what would elevate misdemeanor crimes into felonies.
The prosecutor, Matthew Colangelo, presented to the jury that Trump’s “catch-and-kill” scheme with the National Enquirer was entirely geared towards helping the Trump 2016 campaign.
Colangelo contended there were three parts to the alleged conspiracy: that the National Enquirer would run positive coverage, the National Enquirer would attack political opponents and that the National Enquirer would act as the eyes and ears for the campaign to detect and suppress negative stories.
“This case is about a criminal conspiracy and fraud. The defendant, Donald Trump, orchestrated a criminal scheme to corrupt the 2016 presidential election. Then he covered up that conspiracy by lying in his New York business records, over and over and over again,” Colangelo said.
2. Trump Appeared Uncomfortable
During much of Colangelo’s opening statement, Trump appeared uncomfortable in his seat with his brow furrowed while the unsavory details of the alleged affair with Daniels and his boasts about grabbing women’s genitals in the infamous Access Hollywood tape were read out to the jury.
But part of the Access Hollywood tape that was read out verbatim – when Trump remarked he could grab women “by the pussy” – caused Trump to frown deeper and fidget in his seat. The next six weeks are expected to be a test for Trump to keep his composure.
3. Trumps' Lawyer Meandered
Todd Blanche, the lead Trump lawyer, tried to present several themes to the jury – but his arguments at times seemed to meld together and were hard to follow.
The point Blanche tried to stress was that Trump had nothing to do with the hush-money payments and how it was all arranged because Trump left it up to his former fixer and lawyer Michael Cohen.
Blanche also suggested Trump did nothing wrong in trying to influence the 2016 election, in part because catch-and-kill schemes are not illegal. “Entering into a non-disclosure agreement is perfectly legal,” Blanche said.
But other parts of his opening statement seemed bizarre. Blanche tried to portray Trump as just a family man – which felt jarring against the affair allegations. And Blanche once added Trump “is a man” like him – oddly, with no follow-up statement.
Blanche also found some of his statements stricken after the judge sustained prosecutors’ objections, including on assertions that Cohen previously lied in court and that Trump did everything on the advice of counsel.
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