Hush money isn't illegal, it's 'democracy,' Trump lawyer says in defiant trial opening statements

  • Opening statements began in Donald Trump’s hush-money trial on Monday.
  • Trump faces 34 felony counts for falsifying business records in the historic case.
  • “This case is about a criminal conspiracy and a coverup,” ADA Matthew Colangelo said.

Opening arguments in Donald Trump’s historic criminal trial got underway on Monday with a prosecutor describing the case as being about a “criminal conspiracy,” while a defense attorney for the former president likened hush-money payments to “democracy.”

“This case is about a criminal conspiracy and a coverup,” Assistant District Attorney Matthew Colangelo told the 12-person Manhattan jury in the hush-money trial.

Prosecutors in the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office allege Trump illegally falsified business records by covering up a $130,000 hush-money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels.

PorradaVFR,

Unfortunately for him the case is actually not about paying hush money, it’s about lying about the payments in company documents and its direct impact on the election.

Sure you can give money to people, the lying about it on financial/campaign finance documents is what he’s being tried for.

Of course the media keeps calling it “hush money trial” which it is not.

deweydecibel,

They’re calling it a “hush money” trial because it stands out more than “falsifying documents” trial, and that’s not an unreasonable thing to do when Trump has so many different trials going on at once that is kind of hard for the public to keep it all straight.

As for the defense attorney, this is just the opening arguments, he’s laying down track and trying to get certain facts on the jury’s minds right up front.

billiam0202,

I’m partial to Trial for the crime he committed and his former lawyer went to prison for covering up.

I agree, it’s not as pithy.

ArbitraryValue,

My understanding is that he’s denying that he was the one who had the documents altered.

IphtashuFitz,

“The buck stops at my paid employees, not me”…

PapaStevesy,

Good luck finding one that actually got paid.

Grobmobularb,

Zing!

Tolookah,

Wow, that would be an amazing outcome, if his stinginess made him the only employee, everyone else being a contractor that he can’t throw under the bus correctly.

njm1314,

The case may not be, but another one should be maybe. Paying hush money to hide something from the voters is fraud. He’s trying to deprive Americans of the information they need to make an informed decision. It’s perpetrating a fraud on the US people.

MyTurtleSwimsUpsideDown,

It’s because Hush Money Trial is pithy. It is succinct yet distinct. Fraud Trial would be a great name if there weren’t several more of them to differentiate from, and Election Fraud Trial Relating to the Disclosure of Hush Money Payments regarding a Mushroom Shaped Erection doesn’t fit in the headline.

Erection Fraud Trial does have a ring to it, though.

gregorum,

Also, you shouldn’t believe Michael Cohen because he’s a liar who went to jail! (for making and then lying about illegal hush money payments for Trump, lol)

Or Stormy Daniels who is a porn star who has a grudge! (yeah, the porn star Trump made illegal hush money payments to after sleeping with her, lol)

Besides, none of what they say matters! (none of the facts matter? lol!)

TheJims,

Also, you should believe trump because he’s a shining beacon of truth and who’s honesty is beyond reproach.

quindraco,

That’s not true.

He’s being charged with lying on his payments and that being connected to another crime, because that radically upscales the lying crime. The other crime in question genuinely is hush money.

whotookkarl,
@whotookkarl@lemmy.world avatar

All trials should be available to the public (video, transcript, etc). Body cams on cops and court cameras, transparency is necessary for justice.

cosmicrookie,
@cosmicrookie@lemmy.world avatar

Oh no. … have his attorneys missed the point of the trial too?

JdW,

No, they are confusing the issue so the jurors won;t know what he was really accused of. Their best tactic, and one that could very well pay off for them, sadly. Jury trials are a joke.

cosmicrookie,
@cosmicrookie@lemmy.world avatar

The judge and the prosecutors ought not to have too big issues with explaining this though right?

Asafum,

I’m not a legal expert but I wonder if the defense can actually object to that as they’ll see it as pressing the jury to make a judgment framed in a specific way.

cosmicrookie,
@cosmicrookie@lemmy.world avatar

WTH…

pineapplelover,

I think they’re confusing democracy from capitalism

Bahnd,

Im I wrong to think that we (the media) should stop calling it a “hush-money” case? I think its a poor move to put more focus on the moral issues of him spending a night with a porn star and paying them to keep quiet than to focus on the fact that he falsified business records to save face during a presidential campaign.

ilinamorato,

I don’t tend to mind the “hush money” framing, since that makes him sound like the mobster that he definitely is.

chakan2,
@chakan2@lemmy.world avatar

No…and it’s like Trump already won the court of opinion due to it. It’s terrible messaging.

No one really cares that he banged a prostitute. Clinton was all over that too…We DO care that he committed fraud.

But reading through this…well…who cares really: washingtonpost.com/…/trump-hush-money-trial-charg…

Instead of framing this as Trump is a terrible person who did terrible things, it’s worded like he tripped on a very complex piece of legislature.

TL;DR: You made an important point.

Daft_ish,

Yes, let’s talk upfront about how the system is failing.

CosmicTurtle0,
  • That didn’t happen.
  • And if it did, it wasn’t that bad. <-- We are here
  • And if it was, that’s not a big deal.
  • And if it is, that’s not my fault.
  • And if it was, I didn’t mean it.
  • And if I did You deserved it.
SupraMario,

I’m pretty sure we’re way further down that list

jayrhacker,
jayrhacker avatar

We have been over that list so many times I've lost count on which round we're looking at…

surewhynotlem,

It’s more of a circle really

Daxtron2,

It jumps around a lot

ILikeBoobies,

We’re at step 1

The problem is the falsifying records to hide the payments

resin85,

meanwhile, the ex-president can’t attend the hearing on the unlicensed bond he claimed to secure for the nine-figure fraud judgment against him because he’s in a different court on trial for charges of criminal falsification of records to influence an election

circuitfarmer,
@circuitfarmer@lemmy.world avatar

Just like corporate donations are “speech”. Some Citizens United logic here.

frezik,

“Democracy is when you give money to porn stars” - Julius Ceasar

ripcord, (edited )
@ripcord@lemmy.world avatar

When you give money to cover up a time when you awkwardly, briefly, floundered your body on a sex worker.

whereisk,

Mentioned it to his best friend, Brutus, as he was crossing the Rubicon.

TheJims,

One of the best parts of this story is Mr Art of the Deal, the master negotiator payed a porn star to keep quiet and she wrote book.

bradv,

I like this take

youngGoku,

Remember when Bill Clinton was impeached for lying about sex?

It’s not about the sex it’s about the lies.

queue,
@queue@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Like I personally don’t give a shit that Clinton had sex with an intern. If it was all informed and consensual, that should between them and his wife. Same for any president. If Biden or Trump wants someone to give him a blow job in the oval office, go for it. I genuinely don’t care how the president gets their rocks off, as long as it’s not illegal or rape.

But the fact that its considered bad to have sex in puritanical society, they have to lie and now its a perjury case. It’s weird how we can impeach a president for lying about getting a blowjob, but we can’t stop an orange fucker for making a riot happen in the capitol.

Maybe this is me starting to be mentally coherent during the second term of Dubya, but Jesus Christ. You can lock kids in cages and no one gives a shit, you can start an attempt at a coup, and almost nothing happens. But somehow a blowjob was a major scandal that harmed the next election because your VP is running.

njm1314,

Just a quick note how is it consensual? How is a sexual relationship with that vast of a power differential truly consensual? An intern versus the most powerful man in the world? People need to stop talking about that as if they were star-crossed lovers it’s fucking gross.

Dkarma,

Consent is when two adults agree.

NeptuneOrbit,

Consent is NOT when your boss implies or promises or conditions something.

billiam0202, (edited )

If you want to ignore literally any context, sure.

edit: here’s the context:

Consent is when two adults freely agree.

Any relationship where one person has power over the other, either physically (like using a weapon) or non-physically (like a boss and his/her subordinate) cannot be said to be “freely consensual.”

michaelmrose,

This implies that the party with less power couldn’t have initiated the relationship. It implies that the attraction couldn’t have been mutual. It implies that 2 people can’t have an adult interaction where turning down the more powerful party instantly turns into recriminations. It implies that people can’t be anything but cardboard cuttouts.

GreyEyedGhost,

I agree with this in principle, but if you include wealth as power, it gets very messy. “Would you date Jeff Bezos?” “Sure!” “Would you date Jeff Bezos if he wasn’t a billionaire?” “Well…” Sure, he could use that money to coerce people into sleeping with him, but him expressing interest in a person, them turning him down, and him just moving on doesn’t sound like coercion to me.

And, yes, I think Clinton crossed that line, simply because he could fire her if she turned him down.

AllonzeeLV, (edited )

It’s not democracy, but pay for play, hush money, and an overall culture of bribery is more American than apple pie ever was.

The prominence of Trump is just a symptom of America’s long running greed disease of putting capital miles above people.

If we had altered our economy and culture not to worship at the alter of sociopathic avarice and reckless growth/metastasis, Donald Trump would have gone to jail before he was a game show host, let alone POTUS.

I’m voting for Biden to keep my conscience clean but without hope, because the sad truth is, Donald Trump absolutely represents what America is in all it’s grotesque, sociopathic, schadenfreude reveling, toxic hyper-individualistic, inhuman glory.

He’s like a cartoon embodiment of who we actually are as a society in practice, and why I can’t stand this place, a nepo-wealth bully obsessed with wealth hoarding that’s got his, knows that means he makes the rules, and fuck you 🇺🇸

dasenboy,

The hours practicing that Hitler look at the mirror…

Pistcow,

That’s him, just toddler grunting as he’s shitting himself.

gregorum,

I bet he has a mirror in front of his toilet so he can do both

Gradually_Adjusting,
@Gradually_Adjusting@lemmy.world avatar

Between practicing his Hitler gaze, sleeping in court, and bouts of shitting his diapers, it’s no wonder he hasn’t found much time to campaign.

BeatTakeshi,
@BeatTakeshi@lemmy.world avatar

Wrong…he’s just trying real hard to hold it

xmunk,

Can we kill this whole concept that money is fucking speech? Shit like this is part of the reason why citizens united is a fucking train wreck.

djsoren19,

The only people who ever pushed it as a concept were the rich, and it was never agreed upon by any of the masses. It was agreed upon by a group of judges that were likely bought by corporate interests, and most of them still sit on our highest court.

Kolanaki,
@Kolanaki@yiffit.net avatar

“Money talks.”

“Whoa. What’s it say?”

“Not literally, ya dope.”

reddig33,

Wouldn’t it be nice if you could pay your bills by just blabbing on the phone to your landlord for an hour? Money is speech after all.

givesomefucks,

Good luck.

Biden and the DNC changed their rules so a Billionaire doesn’t even have to use a PAC for insane contributions.

It’s the only way he can fund his expensive campaigns (2020 was over a billion) because he can’t attract small donors like actually popular candidates.

However, during a primary, the value of big donors and high-dollar bundlers is greatly reduced by federal contribution limits — it was why Biden consistently struggled, and it was why Bernie Sanders’ grassroots dollars made him such a prolific fundraiser. Biden, along with every other candidate, was limited to receiving a maximum of $5,600 from an individual or $11,200 from a couple.

That changed in mid-May, after Biden secured enough delegates to become the presumptive nominee. This status allowed the Biden campaign to create a joint fundraising agreement with the Democratic National Committee and various other committees and state parties. After inking this contract with the DNC and 26 state Democratic Party organizations, “The Biden Victory Fund” took the $5,600 contribution cap and expanded it more than 100-fold — the new committee can now accept up to $620,600 per person. Every dollar after the initial $5,600 that is given to the campaign is then shared with the DNC and various organizations that are all organizing in support of Biden’s candidacy.

realclearpolitics.com/…/what_youre_not_being_told…

If you think getting money out of politics is important, you need to fight Republicans and “moderates” like Biden.

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