NEW YORK — Testimony in Donald Trump’s secret trial is expected to conclude in the coming days, putting the landmark case on track for jury deliberations that will determine whether it ends in a mistrial, acquittal — or the first felony conviction of a former American president.
Over the course of a month, jurors heard testimony about sex and accounting, tabloid journalism and presidential politics. His task will be to decide whether prosecutors who charged Trump with 34 counts of falsifying business records proved their case beyond a reasonable doubt.
Here’s a look at what the two sides discussed, who’s missing from the case, what to hear in recent days and what prosecutors will have to prove to secure a conviction.
Through witnesses including a porn star, a veteran tabloid editor and longtime Trump aides, the prosecution sought to link the presumptive Republican nominee for the White House this year to a secret money scheme during the 2016 presidential campaign that resulted in filing false business records. to mask the alleged conspiracy.
Jurors heard testimony that two women and a doorman were paid tens of thousands of dollars to remain silent during the campaign about stories that, if they had surfaced, could have embarrassed Trump. Jurors heard sex allegations, saw copies of texts, emails and checks and heard a secret recording in which Trump and his then-lawyer can be heard discussing a plan to buy a Playboy model’s silence.
One witness, David Pecker, a former National Enquirer editor and longtime friend of Trump, testified that he agreed to be the “eyes and ears” of the Trump campaign, alerting it to any negative stories about him.
Actress Stormy Daniels told jurors, occasionally in explicit terms, about a sexual encounter she says she had with Trump in 2006; he denies everything. She described Trump’s then-lawyer and personal adviser Michael Cohen’s offer of $130,000 to remain silent after saying he was looking for ways to sell the story and get it out.
Cohen, the prosecution’s star witness, spent days on the stand recounting what he said was Trump’s role in authorizing the hush money payments. Cohen described Trump as concerned that stories alleging extramarital sex could harm his campaign standing with women voters and said the then-candidate instructed him to suppress the stories, citing him as saying exhortations including: “Just do it” and “We need to stop this from coming out.
Trump’s legal team has not yet called witnesses, and it remains unclear what exactly his lawyers will do when it is their turn to present evidence.
But they have highlighted, through cross-examination of prosecution witnesses, specific areas where they think they could sow doubt in the jury, along the way challenging the fundamental premises of the case.
They disputed Daniels’ account of a sexual encounter in a hotel suite, with the actor facing aggressive cross-examination from a defense attorney who said at one point, “You made this whole thing up, right?” Daniels said no.
And they suggested that Trump’s celebrity status made him an easy target for extortion. They grilled the Los Angeles lawyer who negotiated Daniels’ settlement over other celebrities from whom he had previously “extracted” money in exchange for a client’s silence.
But the most important interrogation, by far, was that of Cohen. The defense tried to portray him as a fame-seeking fabulist desperate to contribute to Trump’s conviction.
The interrogation began tawdry, with Trump lawyer Todd Blanche asking the former fixer if he remembered referring to the lawyer with an expletive on TikTok last month. The prosecutors objected, the judge summoned the parties to court and the issue was raised. But the point was clear.
Over the hours, Blanche refreshed Cohen’s recollection of a litany of colorful but often profane nicknames he had bestowed on Trump — “Cheeto-covered cartoon villain” was one of them — as a way of painting Cohen as blatantly biased, blinded by hate and therefore not credible.
There was also an avalanche of questions about Cohen’s past crimes and lies. Blanche forced Cohen to acknowledge that he lied under oath during his own 2018 plea hearing about not feeling pressure to plead guilty. In a dramatic moment, Blanche suggested that Cohen hadn’t told the truth when he said he talked to Trump about paying Daniels before transferring $130,000 to his lawyer.
Blanche confronted Cohen with texts indicating that what was on his mind, at least initially, during the phone call were harassing calls he was receiving from an apparent 14-year-old prankster.
The strategy was predictable given Cohen’s importance to the case, but it is too early to say how it reached the jury.
Several characters essential to the saga were named in court, but were notably absent from the witness stand.
One of them is Karen McDougal, a Playboy model who said she had an affair with Trump and received $150,000 from the National Enquirer in a secret deal that Cohen helped broker. Keith Schiller, Trump’s bodyguard, was described in court as the person who asked Daniels for his phone number on Trump’s behalf and was an important conduit for Cohen when he needed to contact Trump.
And then there is Allen Weisselberg, the former chief financial officer of the Trump Organization, who is now serving a five-month prison sentence for lying under oath in the New York attorney general’s civil fraud case against Trump.
Weisselberg did not testify at the silence trial, but it is important because, according to Cohen, he was present at a discussion at Trump Tower that arguably more directly links Trump and the refunds at the center of the case that prosecutors say are fraudulent.
Cohen says the 2017 Trump Tower meeting took place on the eve of Inauguration Day and was where he, Trump and Weisselberg worked out the mechanics of reimbursing him for paying Daniels’ hush money. There, Cohen said, they agreed that the lawyer would receive a total of $420,000 in monthly installments for what would be billed — misleadingly, prosecutors say — as legal services.
“He approved,” Cohen testified. “And he also said, ‘This is going to be an amazing trip in DC.”’
It’s unknown whether the jurors wanted to hear from Weisselberg, but in a case that centers more on paperwork than sex, the account of that meeting will likely be considered by prosecutors as vital evidence and it will be important to see how they return to the subject when they close the case. with closing statements.
To convict Trump of the crime of falsifying business records, prosecutors must convince jurors beyond a reasonable doubt that he not only falsified or caused business records to be entered falsely, but that he did so with the intent to commit or conceal another crime. Any verdict must be unanimous.
Prosecutors allege that Trump booked Cohen’s reimbursement as legal expenses to hide several other crimes, including violations of campaign finance law and a violation of a state election law by alleging a conspiracy to promote or prevent an election.
In his opening statement, Assistant District Attorney Matthew Colangelo told jurors that the case “deals with a criminal conspiracy and a cover-up – an illegal conspiracy to undermine the integrity of a presidential election and then the actions that Donald Trump took to hide this illegality.” electoral fraud.”
Specifically, prosecutors say, the payments to McDougal, Daniels and the doorman violated federal restrictions on corporate and individual campaign contributions and were intended to hide damaging information from the voting public.
Among other evidence, jurors heard testimony about Cohen’s 2018 guilt of a campaign finance crime and the National Enquirer’s non-prosecution agreement and $187,500 fine for McDougal’s payment, which the Federal Election Commission deemed a contribution illegal corporate action for the Trump campaign.
New York also has a misdemeanor charge of falsifying business records, which requires only proof that the defendant made or caused the false entries, but is not part of Trump’s case and will not be considered by jurors.
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Tucker reported from Washington.
