The judge in Donald Trump’s hush money case denied a second request from defense attorneys to declare a mistrial over porn actor Stormy Daniels’ testimony, which concluded Thursday. Judge Juan M. Merchan, echoing his denial Tuesday of the defense’s initial mistrial motion, said Trump’s lawyers had ample opportunities to object to questions that elicited what they said were damaging details about the alleged sexual encounter between the former president and Daniels.
Here’s the latest:
Quick Read
Judge Denies Second Mistrial Request in Trump’s Hush Money Case
- Continued Trial: The judge overseeing Donald Trump’s hush money trial denied a second request for a mistrial from Trump’s defense team concerning Stormy Daniels’ testimony.
- Defense Arguments: Trump’s attorneys argued that Daniels’ testimony included damaging details about the alleged 2006 sexual encounter, which they claim could prejudice the jury. They also accused her of changing her story and attempting to extort Trump, which Daniels denied.
- Prosecution Response: The prosecution countered the defense’s claims about Daniels changing her story as “extraordinarily untrue” and emphasized that the details of the alleged encounter support the prosecution’s case regarding Trump’s motive to silence her.
- Legal Implications: This decision allows the trial to proceed without interruption, focusing on the accusations that Trump falsified business records to conceal hush money payments as legal expenses.
- Trump’s Reaction: Outside the courtroom, Trump criticized the judge’s ruling and the ongoing legal process, calling it a “disgrace” and expressing dissatisfaction with the handling of his case.
The Associated Press has the story:
Judge denies defense’s 2nd request for mistrial in Trump’s hush money case
Newslooks- NEW YORK (AP) —
The judge in Donald Trump’s hush money case denied a second request from defense attorneys to declare a mistrial over porn actor Stormy Daniels’ testimony, which concluded Thursday.
Judge Juan M. Merchan, echoing his denial Tuesday of the defense’s initial mistrial motion, said Trump’s lawyers had ample opportunities to object to questions that elicited what they said were damaging details about the alleged sexual encounter between the former president and Daniels.
Daniels spent roughly 7 1/2 hours on the stand over two days. The porn actor recounted, among other things, the alleged 2006 sexual encounter with the former president that she was eventually paid to keep quiet about during the 2016 presidential election.
The former president’s attorneys aggressively sought to poke holes in Daniels’ credibility during cross-examination accusing her of trying to extort Trump, rehearsing her testimony and changing her story over the years — all things she forcefully denied.
Trump denies the two ever had sex.
Also on Thursday, defense attorneys asked New York’s mid-level appeals court on Wednesday to expedite a decision on Trump’s gag order appeal.
The court did not take immediate action but set deadlines for court filings in the next two weeks.
Prosecutors say Trump and two of his associates orchestrated a scheme to influence the 2016 election by purchasing and then burying stories that might damage his campaign.
Daniels’ testimony is a build-up to the prosecution’s star witness Michael Cohen, who arranged the $130,000 payment to Daniels and later went to prison for orchestrating the payments and other charges.
Trump is accused of falsifying internal business records to cover up the hush money payments and instead recording them as legal expenses. He has pleaded not guilty.
The case is the first-ever criminal trial of a former U.S. president and the first of four prosecutions of Trump to reach a jury.
TRUMP LEAVES COURT, CALLS RULING ‘A DISGRACE’
Speaking briefly to reporters outside the courtroom late Thursday afternoon, Donald Trump railed against Judge Juan M. Merchan, who had just denied his lawyers’ requests to modify the gag order so he could respond to Stormy Daniels’ testimony, and to declare a mistrial based on what she said.
“This judge, what he did, and what his ruling was, is a disgrace,” Trump said. “Everybody saw what happened today.”
Court will resume on Friday morning.
JUDGE DENIES SECOND REQUEST FOR MISTRIAL
The judge in Donald Trump’s hush money case on Thursday denied another request from defense lawyers for a mistrial over Stormy Daniels’ testimony.
Judge Juan M. Merchan, echoing his denial Tuesday of the defense’s initial mistrial motion, said Trump’s lawyers had ample opportunities to object to questions that elicited what they said were damaging details about the alleged sexual encounter between the former president and Daniels.
“There were many times, not once or twice, but many times when Ms. Necheles could’ve objected but didn’t,” Merchan said.
In particular, the judge said, the defense should’ve objected to prosecutor Susan Hoffinger’s question about whether Trump used a condom, which led to Daniels’ response that he hadn’t.
“I agree. That should never have come out. That question should never have been asked and that answer should never have been given,” Merchan said. “For the life of me, I don’t know why Ms. Necheles didn’t object.”
PROSECUTION SAYS CLAIM DANIELS CHANGED HER STORY IS ‘EXTRAORDINARILY UNTRUE’
Prosecutor Joshua Steinglass countered a claim by Donald Trump’s defense attorneys that Stormy Daniels changed her story as “extraordinarily untrue,” though there may be details “said in one forum and not another.” And, he said, the defense lawyers’ claim that they couldn’t foresee what prosecutors would ask and what Daniels would answer “is just nonsense.”
Steinglass said on Thursday that prosecutors have always contended that the details of the alleged 2006 encounter — a two-hour conversation Daniels said she had with Trump in his hotel suite — corroborate her account that they had sex and, therefore, adds to Trump’s motivation to silence her.
“If they want to offer testimony that the sex never happened, that’s their prerogative,” Steinglass said.
Steinglass argued the defense was trying to discredit Daniels’ allegations while precluding prosecutors from corroborating the details of the claim.
“They’re basically trying to have their cake and eat it too,” he said in pushing back against the defense’s request for a mistrial.
DEFENSE CALLS DANIELS’ TESTIMONY ‘SO PREJUDICIAL’
Defense attorneys in Donald Trump’s hush money trial on Thursday said Stormy Daniels’ testimony went far afield of rules established to protect Trump from being prejudiced by tawdry details, and didn’t match the account that was offered up to Cohen when he decided to pay her $130,000 for the rights to her story.
“That is a power description. That is an extremely prejudicial statement by a witness and there’s no evidence that was said to AMI or Mr. Cohen, no evidence it had anything to do with the motive to enter into that NDA,” Todd Blanche said, arguing in favor of a mistrial.
“That is so prejudicial and so incredible for a jury to hear,” Blanche added, blaming prosecutors for asking questions that elicited intimate details of the alleged sexual encounter, including asking Daniels about whether Trump had used a condom.
“It’s a dog whistle for rape,” Blanche concluded.
IN BID FOR MISTRIAL, TRUMP’S LAWYERS ARGUE DANIELS’ STORY IS INCONSISTENT
In renewing their bid for a mistrial in Donald Trump’s hush money case, Trump’s lawyers leaned on what they say are discrepancies between Stormy Daniels’ testimony and her previous tellings of the alleged sexual encounter, which Trump denies ever happened.
Under defense questioning earlier, Daniels insisted that while some reports on what she said had been incomplete, she hadn’t changed her story or fabricated it.
Defense lawyer Todd Blanche also alleged that prosecutors elicited a level of detail from Daniels that went far beyond what was agreed to.
“You have jurors who are now hearing about an imbalance of power between a man and a woman, none of that is information that goes to motive in this case,” Blanche said, adding: “We didn’t know these questions were coming. We didn’t know.”
Blanche further took issue with Daniels’ testimony about the visceral reaction she had when she says she saw Trump sitting on the bed of his hotel suite stripped down to his boxers and T-shirt. Daniels testified that she felt like the room was spinning, blood rushing from her hands and feet, and feeling like she’d blacked out.
Even as she described the power dynamic, though, Daniels told attorneys the sex was consensual.
JUDGE REJECTS REQUEST TO ALTER GAG ORDER
Judge Juan M. Merchan on Thursday rejected the defense’s request to modify the existing gag order to allow Donald Trump to publicly respond to Stormy Daniels’ testimony.
“My concern is not just with protecting Ms. Daniels, or a witness who has already testified. My concern is with protecting the integrity of these proceedings as a whole,” Merchan said.
As the judge described his “very threatening attacks” on potential witnesses, Trump sat forward in his chair, hands clasped in front of him. Once the order was read, Trump leaned back, appearing to exhale.
The gag order bars the former president from speaking publicly about jurors, witnesses and others connected to the hush money case.
PROSECUTION PUSHES BACK ON DEFENSE REQUEST FOR CHANGES TO GAG ORDER
The prosecution in Donald Trump’s hush money case pushed back Thursday on a defense request for changes to the gag order that bars the former president from speaking publicly about jurors, witnesses and some others connected to the case.
Prosecutor Christopher Conroy responded that the gag order shouldn’t be altered to allow comments about Stormy Daniels because those remarks could have a chilling effect on other witnesses. He added that he’s spoken with one future witness who is worried about the consequences of taking the stand.
Trump, Conroy said, goes after “anyone he deems worthy of his venom. He does it selfishly with no concern for the safety of the people he’s attacking.”
Conroy said he’d had a conversation Wednesday night with a witness whose role was simply to authenticate some records and who was worried about the consequences of testifying.
“Modifying this gag order now would signal to future witnesses that they could be at risk,” Conroy argued.
TRUMP’S LAWYERS ASK JUDGE TO LET HIM PUBLICLY RESPOND TO DANIELS’ TESTIMONY
Donald Trump’s attorneys have asked Judge Juan M. Merchan to alter his gag order so that the former president can “respond publicly to what happened in court over the last day and a half” with Stormy Daniels’ testimony.
Defense lawyer Todd Blanche was concerned that Trump is being harmed by unchecked reporting on various claims she made about him on the witness stand.
“He needs an opportunity to respond to the American people and the reasons for the gag order as it relates to Ms. Daniels is over. She’s no longer a witness,” Blanche said.
Blanche contends “this isn’t just the same story that has been going around for the last couple years, it’s much different.”
Prosecutor Christopher Conroy, meanwhile, accused Trump’s defense team of living in an “alternate reality” and said that the gag order shouldn’t be altered to allow comments about Daniels because those remarks could have a chilling effect on other.
TESTIMONY CONCLUDES FOR THE DAY AS DEFENSE RENEWS MISTRIAL MOTION
Testimony in Donald Trump’s hush money case has concluded for the day.
Madeleine Westerhout’s testimony will continue on Friday. The judge is now sending the jury home so that he can attend to several issues the defense plans to raise, including renewing its motion for a mistrial following Stormy Daniels’ testimony.
FORMER SECRETARY ON WHY SHE WAS FIRED FROM THE WHITE HOUSE
Madeleine Westerhout wiped tears from her eyes and asked for a moment as prosecutors turned to her exit from the White House during her testimony on Thursday.
She said she was fired after divulging private details about the job during a dinner with reporters that she believed was “off the record.”
“I am very regretful of my youthful indiscretion,” she said. Donald Trump at the time said she was dismissed for saying things about his children.
As she spoke in court, Trump shook his head twice from the defense table.
Westerhout went on to publish a book, “Off the Record,” about her time in the White House, in order to “to share with the American people the man that I got to know,” she testified. “I don’t think he’s treated fairly and I wanted to tell that story” she added.
STACKS OF CHECKS WERE SENT TO WHITE HOUSE FOR TRUMP TO SIGN
Earlier Thursday, Trump Organization executive assistant Rebecca Manochio testified about her practice of sending batches of unsigned checks to the White House via FedEx for Donald Trump to sign from his personal account.
Westerhout provided the White House perspective on that arrangement, recounting how Trump would receive packages about twice a month — some containing one check and others with a stack about a half-inch thick. The checks were often attached to invoices stating what the payment was for.
After signing the checks, Westerhout said Trump would give them back to her and she’d sent them back to the Trump Organization using a prelabeled FedEx envelope.
At times, Westerhout said Trump would sometimes pull aside a check and ask for more information before signing. In those instances, she said she remembered Trump calling the company’s then-chief finance chief “Allen Weisselberg or someone else in the Trump Organization to ask for clarification.”
Manochio had testified earlier that, to her knowledge, Trump didn’t speak to Weisselberg once he became president.
JURORS SEE TRUMP CONTACT LIST, INCLUDING BILL O’REILLY, TOM BRADY AND OTHERS
Jurors in Donald Trump’s hush money trial got a look at a redacted contact list that Trump’s assistant at his company sent to Madeleine Westerhout, representing people he spoke to frequently or might want to.
It’s a who’s who of big names, including former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly, tennis player Serena Williams, casino mogul Steve Wynn, football legends Tom Brady and Bill Belichick, and “The Apprentice” producer Mark Burnett.
Their contact details are redacted.
Closer to home, the list included the names of some of Trump’s family members, as well as trial figures David Pecker, Michael Cohen and Allen Weisselberg.
Another name on the list, Fox News’ Jeanine Pirro, was in attendance at the trial earlier Thursday, watching Stormy Daniels’ testimony from an overflow room down the hall.
EX-DIRECTOR OF OVAL OFFICE OPERATIONS TAKES THE STAND
Prosecutors in Donald Trump’s hush money trial called Madeleine Westerhout — Trump’s personal secretary from 2017 to 2019 and the former director of Oval Office Operations for the Trump White House from February to August 2019 — to the stand Thursday afternoon.
Before going to the White House, Westerhout worked for the Republican National Committee. She was there when Trump’s infamous “Access Hollywood” tape was made public weeks before the 2016 election.
She recalled, in testimony, the tape “rattling RNC leadership” and that “there were conversations about how it would be possible to replace him as the candidate if it came to that.”
After Trump won the 2016 election, Westerhout and others from the RNC began working frequently in Trump Tower to aid the transition. And late that year, she said, her boss asked whether she had any interest in working right outside the Oval Office.
“I said, ‘Yes, I would. That sounds like a really cool job,’” she recalled with a smile.
MANOCHIO CONCLUDES TESTIMONY
Following roughly four minutes of cross-examination after a lunch break Thursday afternoon, Rebecca Manochio finished giving testimony in Donald Trump’s hush money trial.
Manochio, a junior bookkeeper at the Trump Organization at the time Donald Trump was president, was responsible for sending unsigned checks for him to sign at the White House for his personal expenses.
Manochio confirmed previous testimony that Trump was the only person authorized to sign checks for his personal account and that he was not involved in signing any checks for his business because those assets had been put into a revocable trust while he was president. His son Donald Trump Jr. and Allen Weisselberg, then-Trump Organization chief financial officer, had authority to sign checks for the business.
Manochio testified that Trump and Weisselberg would speak at least once a day before Trump embarked on his run for president. After Trump started campaigning and was out of the office more often, the frequency of their contacts decreased, Manochio said. And, to her knowledge, she testified, Trump and Weisselberg didn’t speak at all after Trump became president.
DEFENSE TO RENEW CALL FOR A MISTRIAL
Before breaking for lunch, Trump lawyer Todd Blanche told Judge Juan M. Merchan that the defense plans to renew its call for a mistrial in the hush money case based on Stormy Daniels’ testimony.
Blanche also said they will seek to prevent former Playboy model Karen McDougal from testifying and that they will make further arguments about the gag order that bars Donald Trump from speaking publicly about jurors, witnesses and others connected to the case.
Merchan said he would send the jury home at 4 p.m. and subsequently take up the defense’s arguments.
Trump attorney and Stormy Daniels trade barbs during questions about alleged 2006 sexual encounter
Quick read
Tense Exchange Between Trump’s Attorney and Stormy Daniels During Testimony
- Allegations Questioned: Trump’s defense attorney, Susan Necheles, challenged Stormy Daniels on the consistency of her account regarding an alleged 2006 sexual encounter with Donald Trump. Necheles suggested that Daniels had altered details over time, which Daniels denied.
- Contentious Interactions: During the questioning, Necheles accused Daniels of fabricating the story, to which Daniels firmly responded “No.” The exchange was marked by a trading of barbs, reflecting the high tensions of the courtroom proceedings.
- Focus of Trial: Despite the intense focus on the personal details of the encounter, the trial’s core issue remains the alleged illegal hush money transactions intended to influence the 2016 election, not the veracity of the sexual encounter itself.
- Legal Strategy: Trump’s legal team aimed to discredit Daniels, portraying her as unreliable and motivated by financial gain, while emphasizing that the payments were meant to protect Trump’s personal reputation rather than his political campaign.
- Daniels’ Testimony: Daniels described feeling a significant power imbalance during the encounter, which contributed to her decision to not refuse Trump’s advances. This was challenged by Necheles, highlighting Daniels’ experience in the adult film industry as supposedly contradictory to her claims of feeling discomfort and intimidation.
The Associated Press has the story:
Trump attorney and Stormy Daniels trade barbs during questions about alleged 2006 sexual encounter
Newslooks- NEW YORK (AP) —
Donald Trump’s defense attorney on Thursday accused Stormy Daniels of slowly altering the details of an alleged 2006 sexual encounter with Trump, trying to persuade jurors that a key prosecution witness in the former president’s hush money trial cannot be believed.
“The details of your story keep changing, right?” attorney Susan Necheles asked at one point.
“No,” Daniels said.
As the jury looked on, the two women traded barbs over what Necheles said were inconsistencies in Daniels’ description of the encounter with Trump in a hotel room. He denies the whole story.
“You made all this up, right?” Necheles asked.
“No,” Daniels shot back.
But despite all the talk over what may have happened in that hotel room, despite the discomfiting testimony by the adult film actor that she consented to sex in part because of a “power imbalance,” the case against Trump doesn’t rise or fall on whether her account is true or even believable. It’s a trial about money changing hands — business transactions — and whether those payments were made to illegally influence the 2016 election.
Trump is charged with 34 counts of falsifying internal Trump Organization business records. The charges stem from paperwork such as invoices and checks that were deemed legal expenses in company records. Prosecutors say those payments largely were reimbursements to Trump attorney Michael Cohen, who paid Daniels $130,000 to keep quiet.
The testimony over the past three weeks has seesawed between bookkeepers and bankers relaying the nuts-and-bolts of check-paying procedures and wire transfers to unflattering, seamy stories about Trump and the tabloid world machinations meant to keep them secret.
This criminal case could be the only one against the presumptive Republican presidential nominee to go to trial before voters decide in November whether to send him back to the White House. Trump has pleaded not guilty and casts himself as the victim of a politically tainted justice system working to deny him another term.
Meanwhile, as the threat of jail looms over Trump following his repeated gag order violations, his attorneys are fighting Judge Juan M. Merchan’s order and seeking a fast decision in an appeals court. If the court refuses to lift the gag order, Trump’s lawyers want permission to take their appeal to the state’s high court.
At the same time, they also asked Merchan to modify the order so that Trump could publicly respond to Daniels’ testimony. Merchan denied the request, as well as two requests for a mistrial.
“My concern is not just with protecting Ms. Daniels or a witness who has already testified. My concern is with protecting the integrity of these proceedings as a whole,” Merchan said.
At the time of the payment to Daniels, Trump and his campaign were reeling from the October 2016 publication of the never-before-seen 2005 “Access Hollywood” footage in which he boasted about grabbing women’s genitals without their permission.
Prosecutors have argued that the political firestorm over the “Access Hollywood” tape hastened Cohen’s payment to keep Daniels from going public with her claims that could further hurt Trump in the eyes of female voters.
The tape rattled RNC leadership, and “there were conversations about how it would be possible to replace him as the candidate if it came to that,” according to testimony from Madeleine Westerhout, a Trump aide who was working at the Republican National Committee when the recording leaked.
Daniels was on the stand for 7 1/2 hours over two days. During questioning from prosecutors, she relayed in graphic detail what she said happened during their encounter, after the two met at a celebrity golf outing at Lake Tahoe where sponsors included the adult film studio where she worked.
Trump scowled and shook his head through much of Daniels’ description, including how she found him sitting on the hotel bed in his underwear after she returned from the bathroom and that he did not use a condom. At one point, the judge told defense lawyers during a sidebar conversation — out of earshot of the jury and the public — that he could hear Trump “cursing audibly.”
Trump’s lawyers have sought to paint Daniels as a liar and extortionist who’s trying to take down Trump after drawing money and fame from her story about him. And they say the hush money payments were an effort to protect his reputation and family — not his campaign — by shielding them from embarrassing stories about his personal life.
On Thursday, Necheles grilled Daniels on her description of the encounter in which she described fear and discomfort even as she consented to sex. She testified earlier this week that while she wasn’t physically menaced, she felt a “power imbalance” as Trump, in his hotel bedroom, stood between her and the door and propositioned her.
As for whether she felt compelled to have sex with him, she reiterated Thursday that he didn’t drug her or physically threaten her. But, she said, “My own insecurities, in that moment, kept me from saying no.”
Necheles suggested that her work in porn meant her story about being shocked and frightened by Trump’s alleged sexual advances was not believable.
“You’ve acted and had sex in over 200 porn movies, right?” Necheles asked. “And there are naked men and women having sex, including yourself, in those movies?”
Necheles continued: “But according to you, seeing a man sitting on a bed in a T-shirt and boxers was so upsetting that you got lightheaded. The blood left your hands and feet, and you felt like you were going to faint.”
The experience with Trump was different from porn for a number of reasons, Daniels explained, including the fact that Trump was more than twice her age, larger than her and that she was not expecting to find him undressed when she emerged from the bathroom.
“I came out of a bathroom seeing an older man that I wasn’t expecting to be there,” she said.
Necheles pressed her on why she accepted the payout to keep quiet instead of going public.
“Why didn’t you do that?” she asked, wondering why Daniels didn’t hold a news conference as she had planned.
“Because we were running out of time,” Daniels said.
Did she mean, Necheles asked, that she was running out of time to use the claim to make money?
“To get the story out,” Daniels countered. The negotiations were happening in the final weeks of the 2016 presidential campaign.
While she was in talks with Cohen, Daniels was also talking with other journalists as a “backup” plan, she testified. Necheles accused her of refusing to share the story with reporters because she wouldn’t be paid for it.
“The better alternative was for you to get money, right?” Necheles said. Daniels said she was most interested in getting her story out and ensuring her family’s safety.
“The better alternative was to get my story protected with a paper trail so that my family didn’t get hurt,” Daniels replied.
But she testified that she never spoke with Trump about payment, and said she had no knowledge of whether Trump was aware of or involved in the transaction.
“You have no personal knowledge about his involvement in that transaction or what he did or didn’t do,” Trump lawyer Susan Necheles asked.
“Not directly, no,” Daniels responded.
Prosecutor Susan Hoffinger later asked Daniels: “Have you been telling lies about Mr. Trump or the truth about Mr. Trump?”
“The truth,” said Daniels, who also said that although she has made money since her story emerged, she also has had to spend a lot to hire security, move homes and take other precautions, and she still owes Trump hundreds of thousands of dollars in attorneys fees.
“On balance, has publicly telling the truth about Mr. Trump been a net positive or net negative in your life?” Hoffinger asked.
“Negative,” Daniels replied quietly.
