#TrumpTrial 🧵starts HERE. #Trump#legal
PLEASE NOTE: I likely can’t reply while live-posting. Adding NFL (Not For Laffy) helps! Thx.
1/…
Via Andrew Weissmann:
Court about to begin. The defense table, from left to right: Blanche, the defendant (ie Trump), Bove, and Necheles (notably farthest from Trump). Gaggle of photographers shoot Trump, inches from his face: he maintains an implacable and dour expression. ADA Josh Steinglass and his team now enter: Steinglass is very much the lead here.
All rise!
Justice: We'll have our hearing on contempt. The defense provided close to 500 pages in total. People, why don't you go through each of the violations and explain?
Prosecutor: The defendant is claiming that the order was not intended to allow others to attack him without him being able to respond. But he's already been found to have violated the order nine times and he's done it again.
Conroy reads the first quote from Trump, hours before his previous contempt hearing, "this judge...said that I can't get away from the trial. You know he's rushing the trial like crazy. Nobody's ever seen a thing go like this. That jury was picked so fast—95% democrats."
Conroy calls his defense of this allegation a "contrived justification" and says it's a little bit like his reposting argument but weaker.
The second violation is from 4/25, when Trump responded to a question about witness David Pecker: "He's been very nice. I mean, he's been — David's been very nice. A nice guy."
Conroy says Trump is saying, "Pecker be nice, to everyone else hearing this, I have a platform."
Prosecutor: On April 25, reporters were questioning him, I think it was all part of the plan, they asked about David Pecker, the defendant said, He's a nice guy. This is classic carrot and stick. He selectively responded to this question and not others
Moving to 3rd statement, from PA TV station interview on 4/23: "Michael Cohen is a convicted liar and he's got no credibility whatsoever."
Conroy says there's no q this is related to trial, clearly willful, clearly knowing.
👉🏼As Trump keeps his eyes closed.. last allegation from 4/23, made right outside the courtroom door.
All of these are clearly related to this proceeding, clearly willful, Conroy says. "This is the most critical time—the time the proceeding has to be protected."
Conroy is explaining how Trump keeps talking about witnesses, jurors, and this case.
He points out that Trump has chosen to ignore some reporters' questions but answered others—especially if he sees an opening to make veiled threats to witnesses.
Assistant District Attorney Conroy: “[Trump's] statements are corrosive to this proceeding, and to the fair administration of justice.”
Weissmann:
-ADA argues Trump wants to make this case about his politics, but it is about his criminal conduct.
👉🏼-ADA does not yet seek jail, so as not to "disrupt" the proceedings.
@GottaLaff NFL: As explained by various lawyers during the FTX case, prosecutors and courts don't actually want jail for defendants in long complex cases (unlike their demands in simpler cases), because it's a big slow pain in the butt for everyone to deal with daily transport to court and meetings with lawyers.
Actually, jail may result in fewer disruptions to the proceedings. It's difficult for Trump to misbehave and impede proceedings if he can only watch through a TV.
@GottaLaff
Would an ankle bracelet and home detention disrupt the trial?
I want that SOB drug tested as part of his bail, he can barely control himself.
He fears that more than any other action, because he will fail for Adderall and being a drug addict is the only thing his supporters may not overlook.
Conroy reminds court that on 4/23, Blanche said of Trump's knowledge of the order, "Trump does in fact know what the gag order allows him to do and allow him not to do."
👉🏼Prosecution is seeking a maximum $1,000 fine for each statement, but prefers to minimize disruptions to the trial, so they're not yet seeking jail.
Blanche is up now.
Blanche says that his response is guided by Merchan's 4/30 order and decision, which defense disagrees with.
🤦🏻♀️Blanche says the gag order and Merchan's intention is not to allow unfettered attacks on Trump—recognizing he's running for president. Blanche says there's no dispute that political attacks and responses do not violate the gag order.
Trump's lawyer Blanche: Since President Trump announced in '22, almost two years ago, there have been attacks by Michael Cohen and people he has on his podcast.
Justice Merchan: My main concern is with conduct after the gag order was issued.
Blanche pushes back on the prosecution's timing argument—since Trump announced his candidacy, there have been "multiple and repeated attacks" from Cohen and other people.
"My main concern is with conduct that took place after the gag order" was issued, Merchan says, it's not going to weigh heavily on his decision if Blanche refers to exhibits from a year or two ago.
As a reminder, the defense's exhibits number in the hundreds of pages.
Blanche wants to "keep in perspective" things "beyond just the gag order."
"You can do that. I'm telling you what I'm going to consider," Merchan replies quickly.
Note, this strategy is one that right wing commentators have parroted to. Oh poor Donny, what is he to do in the face of non-stop badgering from the fixer he sold out?!?!
They ignore the very limited time frame of the gag, bc they're easy marks for propaganda.
McB:
"My main concern is with conduct that took place after the gag order" was issued, Merchan says, it's not going to weigh heavily on his decision if Blanche refers to exhibits from a year or two ago.
Blanche references Biden's comment at the WH correspondents dinner: "Donald has had a few tough days lately. You might call it Stormy weather." Blanche suggests that the gag order prevents Trump from responding to statements like that.
Merchan isn't convinced.
Blanche: Exhibits 61-126 are mostly tweets or RTs by Michael Cohen, certain recent Mea Culpa podcasts, and video transcripts.
Blanche hands up a thumb drive of exhibits, and Merchan asks why it wasn't submitted before today.
Moments ago during the "stormy weather" exchange, Merchan told Blanche: [Trump] can respond to president Biden. Biden can make a reference to this trial, and Trump can respond in certain ways.
Those ways do not include talking about witnesses.
Blanche categorizes Trump's comments about Pecker as "neutral."
"It's not just about Mr. Pecker," Merchan says. "It's about what all the other witnesses who come here see." He expressed concern about Cohen and Daniels, but it's about the others too.
Trump's lawyer Blanche: There may be a need to remove some people from the gag order if they don't need protecting. On Pecker, President Trump said on April 23 for a news show in Philadelphia answering on Pecker. President Trump was factual and neutral, no warning
Trump's lawyer Blanche: President Trump has known Mr. Pecker for decades-
Judge: It's not just about Mr. Pecker, it's the message to other witnesses. I have expressed my concerns about Mr. Cohen. But it's about the other witnesses, that's a concern
Blanche: Every word that's being said here is being reported, in real time. President Trump has to respond. What's happening in this trial -
Justice Merchan: It's not surprising we have press here. The defendant is the former president
NFL...
Blanche complains about Trump's inability to respond to press and witness statements: "Everyone in the world can say everything that they want."
that's a major issue with trumps mental failings... he MUST respond to absolutely everything said about him...
Blanche: "Everybody can say whatever they want, except for President Trump."
Judge Merchan responds that only Trump is the defendant and he's the one subject to the gag order.
Trump is now shaking his head and turning around with an incredulous look on his face.
Justice Merchan: The defendant is the leading Republican candidate, now... I don't have the authority over the press. I can't extend the gag order to them. Let me ask you, when your client went to that holding area - he went to them, not the press to him.👈🏼
Blanche: I agree, but Pres Trump has to be able to speak, he's running.
Judge: That is why the area is set up. He can speak about the DA of NY county.
Blanche: On Pecker, what President Trump said was that he was nice. That's all.
Merchan: I'm not terribly concerned with that one.
Trump's lawyer Blanche: Mr. Cohen has been inviting, almost daring President Trump to respond to him. Let me put some on the screen-
Justice Merchan: Hurry.
[On screen, photos of Trump in orange, & Mandela
No ruling yet, but sounds like Merchan may not hold Trump in contempt for allegation re: his statements abt Pecker.
Taking small win in stride, Blanche moves breezily back to Trump's comments re: Cohen. "Quickly," Merchan urges as Blanche shows an exhibit
Chuckles ripple thru room as Cohen's posts displayed, incl caption of "I won't send $ to your commissary" & AI-generated photo of Trump in orange cape with the caption SUPER VICTIM.
Note that because the exhibits are displayed on screen, it's difficult to see Trump's reaction, if any, because the video of him is relegated to a small corner of the screen.
-Blanche delivery is halting and anxious and desperate.
-Blanche shows exhibit from Cohen reposting a reference to Trump as "Von ShitzinPantz" - interesting exhibit choice.
-Merchan: Trump chose to speak to press and to go into the courthouse area where the press are - an area the court arranged so he would have that ability, but nothing about that meant he had to speak about witnesses.
"You've made your point," Merchan says as Blanche tries to show more exhibits.
Blanche is tying it all together now: Finally, as is reported, "because it's true," Cohen has been going on TikTok nightly and "literally making money" off of criticizing Trump.
"This is not a man who needs protection from the gag order," Blanche says of Michael Cohen.
"Can I ask you to address the comments that were made about the jury?" Merchan asks, wanting to move on from Cohen.
Blanche offers a defense, "We very much believe that this is a political persecution—a political trial," pointing to the political makeup of the jurisdiction.
👉🏼 Merchan cuts in, impatiently: "Did he violate the gag order? That's all I want to know."👈🏼
38/ Press:
Blanche: This is not a man who needs protection from the gag order.
Justice Merchan: What about the comments made abou the jury?
Blanche: It was 15 sec from a 20 min interview. This trial matters to voters. We believe this is political
Merchan: He said the jury was rushed through. Does this violate the gag order?
Trump's lawyer Blanche: He wasn't speaking about a particular juror, if they are Democrat - the press has done that.
Justice Merchan: It's 10:10, let's wrap it up.
Blanche up, and his tone is measured as well. Blanche has bupkis to work with:
-Basically says Cohen asked for it!
-Merchan cuts Blanche off, saying talking about Trump's being attacked a year ago and more are not important to what the allegations are after the gag order.
-Blanche says because Biden joked about "Stormy weather" about the trial that permitted Trump to attack witnesses like Cohen & praise Pecker. Huh? Merchan notes Trump was free to attack Biden.
You have to wonder if Blanche is REALLY hoping Trump will fire him. I'm sure he's been paid upfront, like all the legitimate lawyers who have taken on Trump as a client over the past year or two, so it's no skin off his nose.
Calling Trump a nightmare client is an insult to nightmares.
The reason Trump's legal fees have been so astronomical is because he has to pay lawyers millions of dollars up front now because of his well-earned reputation of stiffing his lawyers. Just ask Rudy Giuliani.
It's now 10 min after jury expected in & Merchan trying to move this along. He's reeling Blanche back in to matter at hand.
"I understand your argument, thank you," Merchan says conclusively
We're taking 5 minutes before we go to the jury.
*To clarify, we're taking 5 min before we bring in the jury..jury not present for any of that, nor will know or see Merchan's decision on contempt allegations (just as they did not see or witness his decision holding Trump in contempt for other 9)
What you could see if this trial were televised: on a large video screen, you would see the Judge at the top, the witness chart in a box on the right, and in two large boxes at the bottom, the prosecution and the defense tables. No shots of the jury. - When an exhibit is shown, you see it in a big screen, with the other boxes on the right in a column.
Steinglass asks Davidson to read a 10/26/16 email from Dylan Howard to him and Cohen, which we see on the screen, confirming agreement on "Keith's client."
What is your understanding of what this email is about? asks Steinglass. Long, careful pause from Davidson.
The email followed a conference call between the three men, as there was difficult in comms btwn Cohen and Davidson, the latter of whom had lost trust in Cohen, and Howard came in as a "mediator."
Why the loss of trust? "I believed he was not telling me the truth," says Davidson, regarding "delays in funding."
Davidson comes off as both a reluctant and hostile witness. One imagines he is not happy to be here, and may have well resisted any prep meetings with the DA's office. -Never seems to fail to dump on Michael Cohen (which may prove warranted); grudging in his answers (even resisting the ADA on whether a document is one he produced to the DA's office).
@GottaLaff NFL I am so impressed with Laffy’s coverage. Log in at 7:30am and the thread is already 50 posts long! We need to send this girl on a long vacation when the trial is over!
@GottaLaff one nice thing about other instances is they sometimes come with higher post length limits (my personal one I set to 1000), enjoy the threads but wonder if life would be easier for you with more characters?
Davidson said that there was so much delay on the part of Trump making the payment to Stormy Daniels that he began to distrust Cohen and had to use Howard as a mediator to get the deal done.
They are walking through the important terms of the CONFIDENTIAL SETTLEMENT AGREEMENT AND MUTUAL RELEASE, ASSIGNMENT OF COPYRIGHT AND NON-DISPARAGEMENT AGREEMENT.
The final version kept payment at $130K. The $1 million in liquidated damages clause was inserted by Michael Cohen.
In the agreement, "DD” is "Donald Trump.” David Dennison” was used as his pseudonym. Stormy Daniels was referred to as "PP" for the pseudonym "Peggy Peterson."
The prosecution shows Davidson a copy of the agreement that has signatures from Cohen, Daniels, and Davidson, but not one from Trump, which Davidson says he never received.
STEINGLASS: “Who signed the agreement on behalf of David Dennison?” DAVIDSON: “Michael Cohen, Esquire.”
Davidson: I think there was an understanding between Dylan and I that our efforts may have in some way… “...Our activities may have in 👉🏼👉🏼some way assisted the presidential campaign of Donald Trump.”👈🏼
Davidson testifies that Cohen called him after Election Day and: 👉🏼“He said something to the effect of, Jesus Christ, can you fucking believe I’m not going to Washington. After everything I’ve done for that fucking guy. I can’t believe I’m not going to Washington. I’ve saved that guy’s ass so many times you don’t even know.”
I think I'm caught up now. Moving to Weissmann's take.
ADA takes a smart tack of tying Davidson questioning closely to the emails, texts, and documents (including the Daniels settlement agreement) is smart - gives Davidson little wiggle room to vary from the facts.
Davidson offers that the "liquidated" damages provision of $1 million per violation of the settlement agreement between Daniels and Trump would be unenforceable as being so outlandishly unrelated to any actual damages. Provision was sought by Trump side.
-Allegations re Pecker and Cohen-- "classic carrot and stick" says the ADA (Assistant District Attorney). Trump's denigrating certain witnesses and praising others.
As an illustration, the ADA compares Trump statements about Cohen vs Pecker. Tone: the ADA, like Judge Merchan, is dispassionate and workmanlike in his presentation (no histrionics), and seems to have the benefit of being the right approach with this judge.
an interesting and potentially important point: the jury just saw the settlement agreement side letter between Daniels and Trump, but whereas Daniels and her lawyer Davidson signed it; for Trump, only Cohen signed and no signature is on the document for Trump.
DEVASTATING TEXTS: --"what have we done?" text from Davidson to Dylan Howard, on 11/9/2016 night of the election. -
-Howard response: "oh my god." Davidson testifies this was because they understood what they had put in place with this agreement was to aid Trump election.
Davidson testifies he got a call from Cohen in December saying, in essence (my summary, not verbatim), "can you believe this f'ing guy is not taking me to Washington (referring to Trump).. after everything I did for him. More than you know. And he never repaid me the $130,000...."
My impression: what a sleazy world we are in.
--Last week, Pecker says he disseminated false stories attacking Trump adversaries and killed damaging stories.
--Now we learn from Davidson about side deals, fake names, money to keep quiet, and misleading and/or false denials of an affair by Daniels pursuant to the agreement with Trump.
Davidson testifies that Cohen called him after Election Day and: “He said something to the effect of, Jesus Christ, can you fucking believe I’m not going to Washington. After everything I’ve done for that fucking guy. I can’t believe I’m not going to Washington. I’ve saved that guy’s ass so many times you don’t even know.”
In court, Keith Davidson reads aloud a statement he drafted on 2/13/18 to be sent to Chris Cuomo, then of CNN, at a time he understood Cohen was "under some fire and wanted some validation."
He wrote, in part: "I read today that Michael Cohen reports that the source of the $130,000 paid to Ms. Clifford was from his own personal funds. That assertion is in complete harmony with what he informed me of at the time of the transaction."
Why does that matter? According to the statement of facts, Cohen and Trump met in person, in the Oval Office, four days later on Feb. 17, 2017 . . . to solidify the arrangement Cohen and Weisselberg devised to repay Cohen.
Next texts: Davidson runs his reply to a press inquiry from Chris Cuomo by Cohen.
Davidson said reports that Michael Cohen paid Daniels through "personal funds" is in "complete harmony with what [Cohen] informed me of at the time of the transaction.”
On 1/10/2018, Davidson received a comment call from WSJ shortly before that day, seeking a comment on "any interaction between Stormy Daniels and Donald Trump."
Davidson testifies that Cohen urged him to prepare a written denial for Stormy to sign.
When asked by prosecutor about this denial, Davidson responds that "an extremely strict reading of this wd tech be true."
For ex. in the 1st two sentences, Davidson says: "I don’t think that anyone had ever alleged that any interaction between [Stormy] and Mr. Trump was romantic.”
STEINGLASS: Would you use the phrase hush money to describe the payment? DAVIDSON: “I would never use that word” STEINGLASS: “What would be the word you would use to describe it?” DAVIDSON: “Consideration”
Prosecutor: Did you check it with Mr. Cohen then send it to Christopher Cuomo?
Davidson: Yes. And I believe it was truthful. It was what Cohen had told me: "F*ck it, I'll just do it myself," he'd said.
Prosecutor: But you believe that the ultimate source of funds was Mr. Trump?
Davidson: At the time of the transaction... Later in the department store conversation, he said he had not been reimbursed.
Here is Michael Cohen's April 14, 2024 post introduced into evidence by Trump lawyer #ToddBlanche
The caption reads "Keep messing with me Donald and I won't send any money to your commissary!"
Trump in Prison orange "Get your hands on the limited edition Prison Suit Trump Action Figure. Featuring a vibrant orange jumpsuit and removable hair. Grab yours now- before they all escape! "
My point in saying Trump's claim is outlandish that he should be able to respond to everybody. No, he should not! He gets to respond to Joseph Biden in limited ways. That makes sense. The rest—why should he have that privilege?
Keep your mouth shut, DEFENDANT! Do not tamper with your own trial!
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