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[BehoId, The Underminer! 11569]

50 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

I didn't realize Juror #2 had been dismissed. That was the Truth Social/X user. 

is this true?  no more truth social dude on jury?  if so, that's the best news on this affair yet.

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

Justice Merchan has repeatedly pushed Todd Blanche to clarify his arguments, only to have Blanche deny that he is saying what he seems to be saying. Trump is very lucky that the jurors are not here for this. Merchan is really dressing down Blanche right now.

“You’ve presented nothing,” Merchan just said to Blanche, who has been presenting his argument for some 20 minutes. It's devastating for Blanche.

Trump is growing more animated as Justice Merchan pushes back on Blanche. On several occasions while the judge was speaking, the former president sharply turned to his other lawyers at the defense table and whispered to them.

 

Justice Merchan is now pushing Todd Blanche to do a forensic accounting of how reposts happen in Trump’s world. “It’s not passive,” the judge finally says.

What’s interesting here is the throughline between Blanche’s argument that there is distance between Trump and his own reposts and the prosecution's argument against Trump, which is that he repeatedly used others — Michael Cohen, The National Enquirer — to do his dirty work.

This line of questioning is highlighting a longtime Twitter catchphrase -- that "retweets do not equal endorsements." When you are a former president sitting on trial, it would seem your reposts do carry more weight, particularly in light of this court’s gag order.

 

Todd Blanche says Trump is entitled to complain about “two systems of justice.” “There’s two systems of justice in this courtroom? That’s what you’re saying?” Justice Merchan says.

 

There’s a real similarity between the opening statements we saw yesterday and the arguments about the alleged gag order violations today: Again, prosecutors have an overarching narrative, saying that Trump willfully violated their order. Blanche is responding to the allegations one by one, and the judge, for now, isn’t having it.

 

Justice Merchan is basically taking on, one by one, Trump's favored social media strategies. One is constantly claiming something was “just found.” In this particular case, the subject was Stormy Daniels’ early 2018 statement denying having had a sexual encounter with Trump, which she has since disavowed. “LOOK WHAT WAS JUST FOUND!” Trump said in an April 10 Truth Social post. “I need to know what is true,” Justice Merchan says.

 

The judge loses patience with Todd Blanche, Trump's lawyer. “I’m asking the questions, OK,” he says. “Im going to decide whether your client is in contempt or not, so please don’t turn it around.” Blanche says in a higher-pitched voice that the prosecutors got as much time as they want. Justice Merchan makes a distinction, saying the prosecutors were answering his questions.

During the scold, Trump turned to another one of his lawyers, Emil Bove, and whispered a comment.

 

We’ll try to decode Todd Blanche’s attacks further, though they are confusing even in the room. He says that a post from Michael Avenatti, which caused Trump to launch into an attack on Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen, was a political argument, about speech not in the case but on social media and in interviews. Thus, Blanche is saying, Trump’s response is not in fact an attack on witnesses but a continuation of that political discussion. This is a hard pill for Justice Merchan to swallow, clearly.

The legal and political strategies by the Trump team have been intertwined since the first indictment. And Blanche’s argument brings that into stark relief.

It’s fascinating to see a lawyer for Trump try to separate out politics from legal proceedings. The Trump era, of course, has been marked by the opposite sort of context collapse: With Trump, everything is politics. That’s why this argument may not work.

[jimmyjazz 45211]

Well, Trump isn't going to say he felt he wasn't violating the gag order while under oath and then claim otherwise.

But, maybe the judge is laying the groundwork for a subsequent violation?  "We already discussed how you were violating the order, but I let you off the hook because you felt you weren't violating it.  You just did it again."

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

It does not appear as if we will get a ruling from the judge right now on whether or not Trump will be held in contempt and fined. David Pecker has entered the courtroom in a dark grey suit and made his way to the witness stand. Trumps shifted in his chair as Pecker passed.

[hornmpa96 2541]

2 minutes ago, BehoId, The Underminer! said:

is this true?  no more truth social dude on jury?  if so, that's the best news on this affair yet.

I don’t think it’s true. The juror that was dismissed after the Fox News report was originally going to be Juror #2 before the full jury was seated. She asked to be withdrawn due to the personal information shared and the Truth Social user was seated with the full jury as Juror #2.

[Kyrie Eleison 9312]

15 hours ago, RDCanecutter said:

I like to think that there is a semi-liquid poop pool down at the asshole, so that farts percolate up through it like pot smoke through bong water, except maybe with different effects.

aka “The Alabama Splash”…

[The Original Greaser Bob 2736]

Yeah, I would anticipate that in an order:  "You know all that stuff you said in your affidavit that you didn't think was a violation.  Well it is."

Shitgibbon neds to spend Saturday in the poke or at least cooling his heels in the state police department.

[The Original Greaser Bob 2736]

2 minutes ago, Francisco 2.0 said:

David Pecker has entered the courtroom in a dark grey suit and made his way to the witness stand. Trumps shifted in his chair as Pecker passed gas.

Edited for accuracy.

['stache 21591]

17 minutes ago, Dahobbs said:

Uh, I read that the opposite way. A judge asking for testimony under oath in connection with a sanction hearing is rarely a good sign for the person being sanctioned. It isn't a free out. It is an opportunity for Trump to dig himself a deeper hole. And, at least in my experience, when the judge asks for this, the judge is going to be asking some questions as well. This isn't a one shot free of cross examination. No way in hell I'd like Trump on the stand if I were his attorney. 

 

5 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

Well, Trump isn't going to say he felt he wasn't violating the gag order while under oath and then claim otherwise.

But, maybe the judge is laying the groundwork for a subsequent violation?  "We already discussed how you were violating the order, but I let you off the hook because you felt you weren't violating it.  You just did it again."

Sounds to me like he'll ask Trump if he truly believed he was not violating the gag order. Trump will say yes, he truly believes it was fair game. Judge will say, well it's not, I'm telling you right now, on the record, that if you repeat that conduct you'll be sanctioned not only for it, but for every violation that is currently alleged." Of course, he'll do it again, so the real meat will be to see what happens then. 

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

Steinglass is now asking about “The Apprentice,” which Pecker calls “an instant success.”

 

Pecker says that he’s had “a great relationship with Mr. Trump over the years,” and that he launched a magazine with him called Trump Style. When he proposed the magazine, Pecker says, Trump’s biggest question was, “Who’s going to pay for it?”

Pecker never did say who paid for it.

 

Pecker is being asked to point to and identify Trump, who he says he’s known since the late 1980s. They met at Mar-a-Lago, he says.

Pecker specifically says he was introduced to him through Nick Ribis, then a casinos executive for Trump and, until the early 2000s, one of his long-serving lawyers.

As Pecker identified the former president, Trump lifted his head and smiled tightly.

Edited April 23 by Francisco 2.0

[Dahobbs 17255]

1 minute ago, hornmpa96 said:

I don’t think it’s true. The juror that was dismissed after the Fox News report was originally going to be Juror #2 before the full jury was seated. She asked to be withdrawn due to the personal information shared and the Truth Social user was seated with the full jury as Juror #2.

That makes some sense. I was just going off of what was said in the prior post. That said, the reporting on this has been fairly confusing. There was a juror that asked to speak with the court after the jury had been selected. My understanding at the time was that juror was not dismissed. However, subsequent reporting seems to suggest the juror was in fact dismissed. Typically, once a jury is selected, you wouldn't renumber them if one leaves. The alternate just takes their place. However, maybe the reporting on juror dismissal had to do with a different event, which is why all of this is confused. I'll have to try and track down the actual timeline to get clarity here. 

[The Original Greaser Bob 2736]

Every part of this trial I am now channeling through moist yet fuzzy filter.

[Pancho 43016]

 

[HornPhD 1316]

7 minutes ago, The Original Greaser Bob said:

Edited for accuracy.

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

Pecker is describing a symbiotic relationship between Trump and The National Enquirer centered in part around “The Apprentice.” Pecker says that Trump would tip him off first as to who was going to be fired — “or eliminated,” as Pecker puts it — from the show, and The Enquirer would write about it.

Trump’s history of tipping off the New York City tabloids about his own life was legendary well before The Apprentice.

 

Prosecutors are working to situate Pecker in Trump’s orbit before the jury. He’s not coming across as a combative witness, but, on the contrary, as a longtime fan, friend and ally of Trump. If he testifies, as we expect, about a series of hush money deals they arranged together, this gentle impression will help make him all the more credible.

If anything, Pecker is appearing like the kind of person who the Trump campaign, in another context, would ask to serve a validator for Trump’s past successes.

Edited April 23 by Francisco 2.0

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

Note:  I gotta say; all this shit about Trump being frugal is just fucking hilarious.  ..

 

Steinglass asks Pecker about Hope Hicks, another intermediary for Trump. He is slowly weaving Pecker into Trump’s world, through his connections with people who will come up again at this trial. Because he is the first witness, this serves as an introduction to the fuller cast of characters, whose names the jury may already be familiar with.

Trump has been watching Pecker’s testimony but appears to perk up when certain people are mentioned, like Hicks, his former spokeswoman, or Ivanka Trump, his older daughter.

 

Overall, Pecker’s affect as a witness is calm, understated, almost grandfatherly. If he holds up this way under cross-examination, that could help him bolster his credibility with the jury.

Pecker is now describing what he calls his first meeting with Michael Cohen, in 2007. He says Trump introduced them at his office, and that he was told to route all communications to Trump through Cohen.

 

“He was very cautious and very frugal,” Pecker says of Trump’s approach to money.

Any testimony from Pecker that establishes Trump’s track record of keeping a close eye on his own finances — “almost a micromanager,” in Pecker’s words — will help the prosecution prove its core accusation: that the former president falsified records to cover up a sex scandal.

 

 

Edited April 23 by Francisco 2.0

[jimmyjazz 45211]

Well, I guess not paying bills is "frugal" in a sense.

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

You can see Steinglass, the prosecutor, gently leading the jury step-by-step into the bizarre world of Trump’s relationship with Pecker’s supermarket tabloid empire. This line of questioning will soon get to the heart of the issue: the “catch-and-kill” operations that Pecker launched to aid Trump’s political ambitions.

 

Pecker says that Trump was “viewed as the boss.” Prosecutors are using him to establish two things: that Trump was a “micro-manager,” particuarly with money, and that he often delegated point people for others to deal with. Pecker says that his was Michael Cohen.

[Willfully Horn 7892]

Very good stuff, Francisco. Thanks for your posts.

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

Pecker is asked if Bill and Hillary Clinton’s names came up in the meeting. Pecker says that when you run a magazine, you have to choose the topic of the week. Coverage of Hillary Clinton running for president that described Bill Clinton as “a womanizer” was a big seller, he says. “I was running the Hillary Clinton stories, I was running Hillary as an enabler for Bill Clinton, with respect to all the womanizing.”

 

As expected, Pecker is describing himself as the agent of “catch-and-kill” schemes in which he or others would help Cohen suppress negative information about Trump, specifically negative information pertaining to “women selling stories.”

 

Pecker is, in essence, confessing to promoting “fake news” on behalf of Donald Trump.

 

Pecker says he had expected “there would be a lot of women who would come out to try to sell their stories” about Trump, because he was known as “the most eligible bachelor and dated the most beautiful women.” (Trump married his current wife, Melania, in 2005.)

 

The jurors are being shown their first exhibit, an email sent to Pecker inviting him to Trump's campaign announcement at Trump Tower. They are paying close attention.

Steinglass is now drilling down on the key meeting in what prosecutors say was a conspiracy — an August 2015 gathering between Trump, Cohen and Pecker. “I received a call from Michael Cohen telling me that the boss wanted to see me,” Pecker says.

Pecker says he didn’t know the purpose of the meeting before he arrived. When he got there, he says, Cohen and Trump asked him what he and his magazines could do “to help the campaign,” a quote that will be key to prosecutors' argument that the hush money payments were made to help Trump win the election.

Edited April 23 by Francisco 2.0

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

It remains striking how calm Pecker is. The testimony he’s offering is really, really bad for a very, very powerful man who is sitting in this courtroom. Pecker seems unfazed.

It’s fascinating watching Pecker talk directly to the jurors. Some, but not all, are watching him.

 

Pecker repeats that “writing positive stories about Mr. Trump and covering the election, and writing negative stories about his opponents” helped them both, increasing tabloid newsstand sales while benefitting the Trump campaign. Steinglass then makes him clarify that suppressing negative news about Trump only benefitted the candidate, not the tabloid. Pecker agrees.

 

Asked about Trump’s reaction to the stories, Pecker says, “he was pleased.” He says that Michael Cohen was also pleased about “the way I was going to handle these issues.”

 

Recall that Blanche, in his opening statement, tried to convince the jury that Trump’s relationship with Pecker was par for the course in the world of journalism. But a naked appeal by a political candidate to a magazine publisher “to help the campaign” is not normal.

 

Pecker suggests that since these stories were popular, there was a “mutual benefit” to running them — it would help Trump’s campaign, he says, and “it would also help me.”

Earlier, we noted that Pecker and Trump had a symbiotic relationship, scratching each other’s back. Pecker just testified that the arrangement continued during the campaign.

Edited April 23 by Francisco 2.0

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

Pecker asked that the "catch-and-kill" arrangement be kept secret. Steinglass asks him to explain why. Pecker says he was helping the campaign, and didn’t want it to “leak” that his publication was aiding Trump. He wanted it “very confidential,” he says. Steinglass, satisfied, moves on.

[Shut up Lou Holtz 1990]

Thanks for your posts Francisco!

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

Pecker is asked about the nature of Cohen’s relationship to the Trump campaign. Pecker says Cohen always said he didn’t work for the campaign, and that he was instead “Mr. Trump’s personal attorney.” But jurors just heard that Cohen was central to feeding the tabloid negative information about campaign opponents.

“Michael was physically in every aspect of whatever the campaign was working on,” Pecker says. He adds that because Cohen wasn’t officially employed by the campaign, he may have heard things “informally” or “injected himself into it.”

Pecker finally says something mildly helpful to the defense. He says he doesn’t know who Cohen spoke to, and adds that Cohen may have essentially been freelancing, acting of his own volition as he tried to get more involved with the campaign.

 

Now, we are discussing negative headlines attacking three of Trump's Republican opponents in 2016, Ben Carson, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, which prosecutors argue illustrate the outcome of the agreement reached during the Trump Tower meeting. Pecker says that Cohen would feed him negative information and that The National Enquirer would “embellish” and add onto it.

Trump jumped on the negative coverage of Ted Cruz, especially about his father, in 2016. The campaign promoted it like it had come about organically and Trump was simply responding to it.

 

Trump just leaned in toward the monitor in front of him and squinted to look closer at a collection of headlines from The National Enquirer that praised him. They included: “Donald Trump — Cruzin to victory! Ted endorses Donald” and “Obama’s Half Brother — Cheering on Donald at Debate.”

 

 

Edited April 23 by Francisco 2.0

[speed817 18926]

Pecker seems like he's being a dick to Trump....

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

Pecker is now being asked about being introduced to Steve Bannon, Trump's top strategist, in October 2016. He recalls Trump saying, “I believe you and Steve would get along really well.”

 

Pecker is being asked about an infamous Enquirer story linking Ted Cruz’s father to the John F. Kennedy assassination. He says it originated with Dylan Howard, The Enquirer's editor.

 

Pecker said that after the Republican debates, Cohen would call him and direct him to focus the negative coverage on whichever candidate had been most successful onstage.

It should be pointed out that Pecker’s testimony isn’t just damaging to Trump. He is, in effect, laying waste to his own professional career by going through headline after headline and suggesting he attacked Trump’s rivals to aid Trump.

 

Edited April 23 by Francisco 2.0

[Doc Sam Beckett 5727]

"Ted Cruz shamed by a porn star" 

Well done Pecker

[Pato del Muerto 52117]

You’re a saint, Francisco 

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

Pecker is now being asked about being introduced to Steve Bannon, Trump's top strategist, in October 2016. He recalls Trump saying, “I believe you and Steve would get along really well.”

 

It’s worth recalling that this happened around the same time as the Wikileaks email dump, after a hack of Clinton’s top adviser John Podesta’s account, and the Trump team used that material frequently.

 

We are taking a short break. From our perspective, it seemed as if the jurors needed it. A few looked like they were flagging. We have no lunch break today — usually it’d be about a half hour away — and this is a lot of information to absorb. Jurors often feel a special responsibility to understand what they’re being told, given their role. It can be very tiring, regardless of the subject matter.

 

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

Trump’s lawyers have objected all along to prosecutors couching Trump’s relationship with Pecker and Michael Cohen as a conspiracy — after all, Trump is not facing a conspiracy charge. But Joshua Steinglass, one of the prosecutors, just noted for the first time in court that one of the election statutes the case is based on does in fact have a conspiracy provision. That could prove important later when the jury is instructed on the laws they must consider in reaching a verdict.

[BehoId, The Underminer! 11569]

6 minutes ago, Francisco 2.0 said:

Trump’s lawyers have objected all along to prosecutors couching Trump’s relationship with Pecker and Michael Cohen as a conspiracy — after all, Trump is not facing a conspiracy charge. But Joshua Steinglass, one of the prosecutors, just noted for the first time in court that one of the election statutes the case is based on does in fact have a conspiracy provision. That could prove important later when the jury is instructed on the laws they must consider in reaching a verdict.

that's an odd caveat.  both sides just realized what the statute says?

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

Trump pulls down the lapels of his jacket sharply and walks out, again looking frustrated. To me, he’s looked far angrier yesterday and today than he did during all of last week, during jury selection.

[jimmyjazz 45211]

1 minute ago, BehoId, The Underminer! said:

that's an odd caveat.  both sides just realized what the statute says?

Doubtful.  Trump's lawyers are just trying to downplay any malfeasance possible.

[Woland 715]

Trump pulls down the lapels of his jacket sharply and walks out, again looking frustrated. To me, he’s looked far angrier yesterday and today than he did during all of last week, during jury selection.

He is angry because he is losing control of the narrative. Defending himself has nothing to do with presenting facts that support his arguments.

[C-Man 26755]

So, it was kicked around on this thread -- or maybe another -- what happens with SS detail if the orange dipshit goes to jail, soon for breaking gag order or later if he's convicted. Well, the SS goes to jail too!

https://dnyuz.com/2024/04/23/could-trump-go-to-prison-if-he-does-the-secret-service-goes-too/

Quote

The U.S. Secret Service is in the business of protecting the president, whether he’s inside the Oval Office or visiting a foreign war zone.

But protecting a former president in prison? The prospect is unprecedented. That would be the challenge if Donald J. Trump — whom the agency is required by law to protect around the clock — is convicted at his criminal trial in Manhattan and sentenced to serve time.

Even before the trial’s opening statements, the Secret Service was in some measure planning for the extraordinary possibility of a former president behind bars. Prosecutors had asked the judge in the case to remind Mr. Trump that attacks on witnesses and jurors could land him in jail even before a verdict is rendered.

(The judge, who is holding a hearing Tuesday to discuss whether Mr. Trump should be held in contempt for violating a gag order, is far more likely to issue a warning or impose a fine before taking the extreme step of jailing the 77-year-old former president.)

Last week, as a result of the prosecution’s request, officials with federal, state and city agencies had an impromptu meeting about how to handle the situation, according to two people with knowledge of the matter.

That behind-the-scenes conversation — involving officials from the Secret Service and other relevant law enforcement agencies — focused only on how to move and protect Mr. Trump if the judge were to order him briefly jailed for contempt in a courthouse holding cell, the people said.

The far more substantial challenge — how to safely incarcerate a former president if the jury convicts him and the judge sentences him to prison rather than home confinement or probation — has yet to be addressed directly, according to some of a dozen current and former city, state and federal officials interviewed for this article.

That’s at least in part because if Mr. Trump is ultimately convicted, a drawn-out and hard-fought series of appeals, possibly all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, is almost a certainty. That would most likely delay any sentence for months if not longer, said several of the people, who noted that a prison sentence was unlikely.

But the daunting challenge remains. And not just for Secret Service and prison officials, who would face the logistical nightmare of safely incarcerating Mr. Trump, who is also the presumptive Republican nominee for President.

“Obviously, it’s uncharted territory,” said Martin D. Horn, who has worked at the highest levels of New York’s and Pennsylvania’s state prison agencies and served as commissioner of New York City’s correction and probation departments. “Certainly no state prison system has had to deal with this before, and no federal prison has had to either.”

Steven Cheung, the communications director for Mr. Trump’s campaign, said the case against the former president was “so spurious and so weak” that other prosecutors had refused to bring it, and called it “an unprecedented partisan witch hunt.”

“That the Democrat fever dream of incarcerating the nominee of the Republican Party has reached this level exposes their Stalinist roots and displays their utter contempt for American democracy,” he said.

Protecting Mr. Trump in a prison environment would involve keeping him separate from other inmates, as well as screening his food and other personal items, officials said. If he were to be imprisoned, a detail of agents would work 24 hours a day, seven days a week, rotating in and out of the facility, several officials said. While firearms are obviously strictly prohibited in prisons, the agents would nonetheless be armed.

Former corrections officials said there were several New York state prisons and city jails that have been closed or partly closed, leaving wings or large sections of their facilities empty and available. One of those buildings could serve to incarcerate the former president and accommodate his Secret Service protective detail.

Anthony Guglielmi, the spokesman for the Secret Service in Washington, declined in a statement to discuss specific “protective operations.” But he said that federal law requires Secret Service agents to protect former presidents, adding that they use state-of-the-art technology, intelligence and tactics to do so.

Thomas J. Mailey, a spokesman for New York State’s prison agency, said his department couldn’t speculate about how it would treat someone who has not yet been sentenced, but that it has a system “to assess and provide for individuals’ medical, mental health and security needs.” Frank Dwyer, a spokesman for the New York City jails agency, said only that “the department would find appropriate housing” for the former president.

The trial in Manhattan, one of four criminal cases pending against Mr. Trump and possibly the only one that will go to a jury before the election, centers on accusations he falsified records to cover up a sex scandal involving a porn star. The former president is charged with 34 counts of felony falsifying business records. If convicted, the judge in the case, Juan M. Merchan, could sentence him to punishments ranging from probation to four years in state prison, though for a first-time offender of Mr. Trump’s age, such a term would be extreme.

If Mr. Trump is convicted, but elected president again, he could not pardon himself because the prosecution was brought by New York State.

Under normal circumstances, any sentence of one year or less, colloquially known as “city time,” would generally be served on New York City’s notorious Rikers Island, home to the Department of Correction’s seven jails. (That’s where Mr. Trump’s former chief financial officer, Allen H. Weisselberg, 76, is currently serving his second five-month sentence for crimes related to his work for his former boss.)

Any sentence of more than a year, known as state time, would generally be served in one of the 44 prisons run by New York State’s Department of Corrections and Community Supervision.

The former president could also be sentenced to a term of probation, raising the bizarre possibility of the former commander in chief reporting regularly to a civil servant at the city’s Probation Department.

He would have to follow the probation officer’s instructions and answer questions about his work and personal life until the term of probation ended. He would also be barred from associating with disreputable people, and if he committed any additional crimes, he could be jailed immediately.

 

[Willfully Horn 7892]

1 minute ago, Woland said:

He is angry because he is losing control of the narrative. Defending himself has nothing to do with presenting facts that support his arguments.

Attacks are the only defense he understands, in keeping with his narcissism.

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

So, we are 2 hours or so into some testimony, from one witness.  And it's not going well for Trump.   Cross will be interesting, of course, but really, I don't think they will be able to refute much, if anything that Pecker has testifed to already.

Is there any wonder why his counsel kept stalling and delaying as much as possible?  Imagine, if we ever get a chance, what a federal trial will be like for Trump.

 

 

[jimmyjazz 45211]

4 minutes ago, Francisco 2.0 said:

So, we are 2 hours or so into some testimony, from one witness.  And it's not going well for Trump.   Cross will be interesting, of course, but really, I don't think they will be able to refute much, if anything that Pecker has testifed to already.

Is there any wonder why his counsel kept stalling and delaying as much as possible?  Imagine, if we ever get a chance, what a federal trial will be like for Trump.

eLEctIon INterFeREnCE!

[Willfully Horn 7892]

11 minutes ago, C-Man said:

The trial in Manhattan, one of four criminal cases pending against Mr. Trump and possibly the only one that will go to a jury before the election

This statement is why folks are questioning the justice system’s ability to defend our Republic from a known and, perhaps existential, threat.

[High Plains Drifter 10937]

23 minutes ago, C-Man said:

Steven Cheung, the communications director for Mr. Trump’s campaign, said the case against the former president was “so spurious and so weak” that other prosecutors had refused to bring it, and called it “an unprecedented partisan witch hunt.”

“That the Democrat fever dream of incarcerating the nominee of the Republican Party has reached this level exposes their Stalinist roots and displays their utter contempt for American democracy,” he said.

 

This fat fuck (Cheung, not the orange one) has never made a comment that wasn't some bullshit like this. If this is all he can say, the "journalists" need to stop quoting him. 

 

 

[locodos 5257]

45 minutes ago, Francisco 2.0 said:

It should be pointed out that Pecker’s testimony isn’t just damaging to Trump. He is, in effect, laying waste to his own professional career by going through headline after headline and suggesting he attacked Trump’s rivals to aid Trump.

 

Pffft ... Tabloid exec?  

I have more respect for McDonald's Fry cooks.

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

And we are back after a break

 

Pecker says Cohen called him furiously denying that the child in question was Trump's, saying that he offered to take a DNA test and that because he was German-Irish and the woman was Hispanic, it was impossible for the child to be his.

To be clear, Pecker appeared to be saying that Cohen indicated that a child with a Hispanic mother couldn’t be Trump’s.

Trump has often talked about “good genes” and blood lines. While running for president, he has denigrated immigrants from Latin American countries and said undocumented immigrants are “poisoning the blood of our country.”

 

Pecker is now being asked about Dino Sajudin, a doorman who worked at a Trump building and looked to sell a story — which was apparently false — about Trump fathering a child out of wedlock. This is the first of three catch-and-kill deals that Pecker is expected to describe and we will likely get a fair amount of detail on each of them.

This story clearly bothers Trump. Just like yesterday when it came up during opening statements, he frowned and shook his head.

Pecker says the love child story would have been a big story, and he believed it was important to have it “removed from the market.” Cohen told him “the boss would be very pleased.”

Edited April 23 by Francisco 2.0

[Dnaguy 11599]

9 minutes ago, Willfully Horn said:

This statement is why folks are questioning the justice system’s ability to defend our Republic from a known and, perhaps existential, threat.

To be fair, the justice system was never designed to or for protection of the Republic. It should work slow as state removal of liberty is big AF. 

The people through their congressional representatives were given the ability to impeach, remove, and restrict from office those who would imperil our system of government. There's no such thing as 'beyond a reasonable doubt' in politics.

However, half the people are broken in their brains. Partisan interests have trumped loyalty to the constitution due to monied gentry, religious zealots, and legally anthropomorphic corporations using their $ and power to pervert the very system of government meant to represent the people. Instead it represents entrenched wealth and ideologues who themselves prop up power hungry sociopaths who use politics as a personal means to enrich themselves. 

And therefore the only real lever designed to protect us has been perverted to the point where we have to rely of the justice system as a last resort.

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

Regardless of whether the allegation about Trump fathering the child was true or not, the jury is now being shown a contract the National Enquirer reached with Dino Sajudin, the doorman, in which the words “Donald Trump’s illegitimate child” feature prominently. Things like that can leave a mark.

[Dnaguy 11599]

5 minutes ago, Francisco 2.0 said:

Regardless of whether the allegation about Trump fathering the child was true or not, the jury is now being shown a contract the National Enquirer reached with Dino Sajudin, the doorman, in which the words “Donald Trump’s illegitimate child” feature prominently. Things like that can leave a mark.

Is it just me, the simulation, or just the fact that trump hates the story so much that makes me wonder if Trump has fathered a child out of wedlock?

 

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

Steinglass, the prosecutor, is asking Pecker why he paid so much for this story. “I made the decision to buy the story because of the potential embarrassment it would have to the campaign and Mr. Trump,” Pecker responds. This is catch-and-kill in a nutshell and Pecker just said several times in different ways that he was acting on Trump’s behalf.

[Longhorn_Fan68 33723]

Just now, Dnaguy said:

Is it just me, the simulation, or just the fact that trump hates the story so much that makes me wonder if Trump has fathered a child out of wedlock?

 

considering his penchant for banging porn stars I'd bet it's more likely than not that he has at least one illegitimate child

[locodos 5257]

1 minute ago, Longhorn_Fan68 said:

considering his penchant for banging porn stars I'd bet it's more likely than not that he has at least one illegitimate child

pretty sure, regardless of bloodline, you can count Eric as illegitimate too

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

We are fifteen minutes — at most — away from the end of the day. Steinglass, the prosecutor, appears to be putting a bow on the story of the doorman who sought to sell Trump’s story. But he moves on immediately to the second catch-and-kill deal, which involved the former Playboy model Karen McDougal. She, too, had story about Trump to sell.

 

Prosecutors like to end the day with the most intriguing question-and-answer series they can. I’d expected Steinglass to finish with the doorman, and perhaps allow the jurors to leave early. But by moving onto this next deal, he could be setting up a nice cliffhanger to leave jurors with, that he'll pick back up when we return Thursday morning.

Edited April 23 by Francisco 2.0

[Francisco 2.0 32225]

David Pecker tells the courtroom that he asked Dylan Howard, the former editor of The National Enquirer, to investigate Karen McDougal’s story and that he told Cohen he had done so. He seems to indicate his conversations with Cohen soon increased in frequency and the two men began to talk multiple times daily. Cohen said they should communicate over Signal, an encrypted app, which is often used for conversations that a person wants to keep private.

The jury is quite alert for this portion of Pecker’s testimony.

 

Trump’s body language changed when Pecker started testifying about the catch-and-kill deal involving McDougal. He started moving his head, squinting and pursing his lips, and then crossed his arms over his chest.

 

Pecker says he advised Trump to purchase McDougal’s story directly. “I think you should buy it,” he recalls having said to Trump, who was then a candidate for president. He says Trump said he’d think about it and have Cohen call Pecker back.

 

McDougal, by the way, was selling a story of having had an affair with Trump. Pecker concluded the day’s testimony by saying that Michael Cohen was becoming increasingly agitated as The National Enquirer editor, Dylan Howard, traveled to hear McDougal’s story. “It looked like he was getting a lot of pressure to get the answer, like, right away,” Pecker says of Cohen at the time.

Edited April 23 by Francisco 2.0