Transcripts For MSNBCW Chris 20240703

Reviewing it. We are also expecting additional comments from the white house. The Daily Briefing happens a little later this hour with john kirby, so we will get new information we expect then. The other big story were following, just about 15 minutes, testimony will resume in Donald Trumps Hush Money Trial. It has been quite the morning. The jury spent it hearing from jeffrey mcconney, a former Top Executive at the Trump Organization. He handled the reimbursements to Michael Cohen for paying off Stormy Daniels. There are a pile of documents were seeing for the first time, including these checks. If youre familiar with Donald Trumps signatures, those are checks that were signed by donald trump himself after an explanation about the difference between a trust, which was an account for the company, and a, essentially, private account for donald trump. Well, mcconney detailed how he kept notes and Bank Statements related to cohen stored in a locked door and how the Hush Money Checks had to be sent to the white house for donald trump to sign. I want to bring in nbcs Vaughn Hillyard outside the courthouse. Joyce vance is a University Of Alabama law professor. Tristan snell is with me, author of Taking Down Trump 12 rules for prosecuting donald trump by someone who did it successfully. Charles coleman is here, civil rights attorney, former brooklyn prosecutor, msnbc legal analyst, and republican strategist and msnbc political analyst, Susan Del Percio. In just a minute, charles, im going to get to the difference between, lets say all the salacious details about how catch and kill works, a glamorous witness, arguably in hope hicks. Those are the things we saw last week. This is supposed to be the dry stuff. Right . Right. And in some ways, a bunch of documents, its hard to make that turn. What was the connection made here that might have helped the jury get where the prosecution wants it to go. I think one of the things that helps the prosecution in terms of the jury grasping this case, chris, is just now making clear the understanding where the money came from with respect to donald trump and his organization. And its very important that they understand that for one main reason, and the biggest reason is weve heard the sub text throughout this entire case, and before it that donald trump has been arguing, look, i was paying Michael Cohen back for Legal Expenses, and thats a big premise of where the defense based their case, to essentially argue the case, this is repayment around Legal Expenses and reimbursement. That argument really does now have a lot of holes in it, base d off how they were paid by the organization if Michael Cohen is being reimbursed for Legal Services. He wasnt. He was being reimbursed by donald trump from what resembled more of a personal account, and that is a big problem for the defense. So this is beginning to crystallize around the prosecutions theory of the case. And at the same time, quietly the defenses case is crumbling. For anyone paying attention, if you understand where the money came, it undercuts the defenses premise around why donald trump gave Michael Cohen his money back in the first place. And not just the 130,000, but a little extra added on because there were going to be tax implications. Right. With all of these amounts, and its notes now put into evidence, all of this was, as they put it, grossed up. It made it look like these were legal fees, but it was all a deliberate disguise. And heres another key thing here is that the trump attorney himself bove actually slipped up as Andrew Weissmann was one of the first to point out following this word by word during the case that bove characterizes the payment to cohen as a reimbursement. And mcconney agrees with that. That was a huge slip up because thats their whole defense is that it wasnt a reimbursement. It was a legitimate payment for legal fees for services rendered. Joyce, if youre the prosecutor taking notes, that youre going to use in your closing argument, is that one of the points at which you point the finger . You know, it absolutely is. But as yall pointed out, its a slip of the tongue, and prosecutors wont focus too heavily on Something Like that. This case isnt about one witness or one piece of evidence. Its about all of the Circumstantial Evidence that this was not a payment for legal fees, that it was compensation for the payment that was made to Stormy Daniels and that trump was in on the scheme. So well see the Prosecution Layer Evidence upon evidence when they close to tell the jury its not a mistake. Its not an innocent explanation. Its exactly what it looks like. Its criminal conduct. Vaughn, mcconney is known to a lot of folks, he was at both of the previous trump org civil trials. Hes someone who made clear today on the stand he really loved working for donald trump. He was there, i think, for 35 years, and only left by his own admission when all of these legal problems just got to be too much, right . Reporter he was emotional on the stand in the civil fraud trial. He testified it was emotional, and the reason he left after 35 years, the Trump Organization, was he was tired of having roared focused on him as if he was engaged in wrong doing. Ultimately, he was found liable for insurance fraud, and he was barred by judge engoron from serving in a Leadership Capacity for a period of time for any corporation here in the state of new york and so yet again, one year later, hes back on the stand again in front of donald trump. And the difficulty here for mcconney was the extent to which he was working as essentially a middle man between allen weisselberg, the chief financial officer, who we do not expect to hear from as a witness,as he served time in rikersjail, and the extent he was taking orders, and Michael Cohen got invoices to them so they could be compensated with 3,500 checks in the court of 2017. When you hit around the conversation of reimbursement, he didnt acknowledge and testify today that he was even aware of exactly what reimbursement was for. At the same time, the prosecution, with him on the stand, brought forward the Financial Disclosure report that donald trump filed and signed himself in 2018 that showed within that very document, quote, the following. Mr. Cohen sought reimbursement of those expenses and mr. Trump fully reimbursed mr. Cohen in 2017, so for donald trump and their defense team, theyre dealing with the difficulty here that they have a close ally to donald trump, the 35year employee testifying that he knew it was a reimbursement and theyre dealing with a document that donald trump signed calling it a reimbursement here. So this is difficult as we get into the falsification of Business Records against donald trump. As im reading through the documents that we put into our running sort of reminder of whats happening inside, but also then at the end of the day, we get, you know, the full readout of what happened in court. Im always looking for things that i wonder if people who are following this closely, who are true swing voters, who maybe voted for donald trump and then voted for joe biden or maybe voted for donald trump last time. Im looking for things that i wonder if theyll resonate, one thing i thought of as im reading today, mcconney at one point talked about how those cohen reimbursement checks, the one we saw with his very distinctive signature had to be sent to the white house. And whether there is something about that connection that will resonate with those folks. The swamp that was the Trump Organization seeped into the white house because of donald trump, and that is disturbing for a lot of voters. But at the end of the day, i think right now, most people, even if theyre following the trial, they know that donald trump paid the hush money. They know or they suspect, not knowing the way the jury will have to conclude that it was Hush Money Payments, and it was to protect him in the election. So i think a lot of those calculuses were already made up. But what im particularly curious about, and keep hearing this word, it was an emotional time for people who worked for donald trump, well, whats going to happen when Stormy Daniels gets on the stand, and not so much what she will say but how will donald trump react. Will he take his anger out vocally, will he be a disruption in the courthouse. Could he be held in contempt for it. Those are the things im watching for because i think that would be new to the story that independent and swing voters, in particular women, are looking at. I will say, leading up to this, though, joyce. It has been interesting to me, that so many people involved in this still say, you know, that they felt they were very happy to work for donald trump. Certainly hope hicks was, but david pecker who still doesnt have terrible things to say about them, you know, theres been person after person after person up to mcconney now, who were very happy to be working for the Trump Organization, and particularly happy to work for donald trump. And i wonder how that part of the testimony might play for jurors, do you think . Right. So the prosecution is front loading these witnesses who still have warm feelings for donald trump. There have been brief exchanges, nonverbal ones between trump and his long time aide rhona graff in the courtroom. These witnesses in essence are vouching for the Michael Cohen testimony that is still to come. Obviously Michael Cohen and donald trump dont have a good relationship, and trumps lawyers will argue that cohen has a grudge match, that hes made much of this up to try to get back at the former president for not taking him to washington with him. By putting on witness after witness who has testified they like donald trump even know, and by eliciting testimony from them that will back up cohens story. The prosecutors are skillfully building a narrative that the jurors will be able to believe even with all of the problems that Michael Cohen will take him to the witness stand. Tristan, i want to ask you about something that happened move we started to hear about all of these documents today, and that was the judge making a decision about the gag order, another fine for donald trump. But this time, it seems a little more forcefully he threatened jail. If he keeps doing it again and again and again. In your experience, when judges look, let me take that back. There is no experience that uses the former president and probable nominee for president of the United States as the defendant, but it seemed to me like reading that order, that he loved left himself a little wiggle room. Even if the d. A. s office does not seek incarceration, he might just do it, and its within his rights to do it. Within his rights as a judge. Its up to his discretion. Usually theyre going to not go there if the prosecution isnt asking for it, but he can. Hes effectively giving trump a last warning here, if you keep doing this, youre going to leave me with no choice because i have to actually protect the integrity of this courtroom and of the process. We know hes in a tough position, charles, but, i mean, when is a threat not a threat . I mean, hes really walked up to the line with donald trump, judge merchan. He is, and i think hes going to continue to balance the interest of the entire trial because we dont know what youre unleashing by putting donald trump in jail for contempt. And that is a Thought Process that judge merchan is calculating as he thinks about future violations and how to deal with them. And i also think thats also why the prosecution havent themselves asked for the notion of putting donald trump in jail as a penalty. They understand that that comes with some consequences, and those consequences beyond anything that goes outside of the trial is you create an environment that could potentially be more disruptive to the trial itself. Its a risk that judge merchan may ultimately end up having to take should donald trump continue to do what many of us, including myself, expect he will in future violations of the gag order. Right now, to your point, i think that judge merchan is giving himself a little more room to wait for a little bit more before he makes the decision to take that ultimate step. But it is something that i think judge merchan is calculating because we dont see a situation, and when i say we, im talking about most of us, do not see a situation where donald trump changes his behavior to such a degree that this no longer becomes a concern or consideration on the part of judge merchan. Were seconds away from 2 15 when judge merchan said they would go back into order, and in fact, were waiting for the judge, but donald trump and the Defense Table is full. Hes been chatting with todd blanche who is now in the lead seat. Eric trump and alina habba are seated in the gallery behind trump. They are seen chatting with each other. Juan merchan is on the bench, and what we are waiting for is prosecutors to call their next witness. As were waiting for that, let me get a final thought from you, if i can, joyce, and what are you looking for as we head into the afternoon. Well, the star witness in this case is the documents, the checks, the invoices, the ledger entries. What prosecutors are doing now is theyre laying the foundation to offer all of those materials into evidence. Explaining them to the jury, and this is the trajectory that well see continue for the remainder of the day and possibly for several days this week. Can i ask you to explain something going on right now, joyce, which is that we dont know whos testifying next. Even before the prosecution announced who that was, the defense is objecting to some of the exhibit, which are related to the next witness, so how will that play out . Right. So the judge makes these sort of rulings. Most of them were made on a preliminary basis in advance of trial. The Trump Lawyers have consistently been trying to get him to reconsider as they move in. This morning, they were some objections to exhibits with Defense Lawyers saying they hadnt had time sufficient time to prepare or examine items. This could be more of the same or something specific to the next witness. This morning, judge merchan was not sympathetic, though, to the defenses claims. All right. As they continue to work that out in the courtroom, everyone stay with me. In 90 seconds, new nbc news reporting on that major Breaking News for The Middle East that hamas has accepted a Cease Fire Deal from egypt and qatar. The latest exact details, including the number of Hostages Hamas says they will trailed for Palestinian Prisoners. Fection next. N next find a ted Eye Specialist at isitted. Com. Today, at americas beverage companies,. Our bottles might still look the same. But they can be remade in a whole new way. Thanks to you. Were getting bottles back. And weve developed a way to make new ones from 100 recycled plastic. New bottles made using no new plastic. Youll be seeing more of these bottles in more places. And when we get more of them back. We can use less new plastic. See how our bottles are made to be remade. With fastsigns, signage that gets you noticed turns hot lots into homes. Fastsigns. Make your statement. Any minute now, we are expecting a white house brief on the Cease Fire Deal between egypt and qatar. We are learning the details of what was accepted. This is according to a senior arab source. The deal stops Military Operations and includes three phases, that are each 42 days long. One israeli hostage will be traded for 33 Palestinian Prisoners based on detention. An official tells nbc news that its not the same deal they have reached with mediators. Now theyre examining that proposal. Nbcs chief Foreign Correspondent Richard Engel is in jerusalem. Allie raffa is covering the white house. Richard, whats the latest you have for us . Reporter it would involve the release of 33 hostages in exchange for a 40 day truce or a 42day truce, and be extended over multiple phases. As you say, this is something that hamas agreed to unilaterally. This is a pressure tactic. This is a way for hamas to bring secret negotiations out into the public away for hamas to say that it is not the one rejecting the terms of the deal, that it is willing to show flexibility. And to try and put some pressure on israeli Prime Minister benjamin netanyahu. So what we saw hamas do a short while ago was accept terms, its own terms that were based on a document that israel had proposed, a document that the United States has endorsed but it is not exactly the same document. Now, what the negotiators and hamas hope this will lead to a resumption of direct negotiations with israel involved, so they can get a deal potentially over the line. It is a negotiating tactic. It is complex. Ive never seen anything exactly like this. But that is what is playing out now where the secret negotiations are being put out into the public in order to try and move them along and potentially avoid a major israeli operation in the city of rafah in southern gaza. Ali, are we getting any word from the white house on this. Are we waiting for that White House Briefing . Reporter yeah, chris, the only reaction weve gotten from the white house is from a Senior Administration official who says that the white house is reviewing hamass response to the proposal, the State Department as well, saying that the Biden Administration is expected to discuss this proposal and hamass response to it with leaders in The Middle East in the coming hours. We still havent heard or seen any reaction from President Biden himself, who we know is meeting right now with King Abdullah of jordan at the white house. No doubt this part of their conversation. We do expect to learn a lot more about this when the White House Press briefing begins momentarily, if it hasnt already begun already, what we do know so far about what the president has been doing and how hes been involved in this effort to get the Cease Fire Deal sealed is we know that really these Hostage Talks were ongoing as the president spoke with Prime Minister netanyahu in that hastily planned phone call this morning. Among the topics, the white house says that these two discussed were these ongoing Hostage Talks and the president stressed his position on israels Ground Invasion on rafah. No doubt the Evacuation Order is impacting an estimated 100,000 palestinians in rafah, adding to the president s urgency to get this deal across the finish line. For months now, the white house has seen this Ground Invasion of rafah as essentially the deadline to get the hostage deal done, to not only allow for the release of hostages and also allow more humanitarian aid in gaza, and to lay the foundation for what the white house says are longterm peace talks as far as a twostate solution. Thats been a heavy focus for the white house. We expect to learn more about this as the Press Briefing begins in just a few minutes. We have continued particularly over the past weekend to hear the escalating concern which is already pretty high about the humanitarian conditions on the ground. What could this mean for conditions in gaza . Theyre already celebrating in gaza, news of this unilateral announcement by hamas, it was presented to the people of gaza. It was presented by hamas, as hamas has agreed to the terms, hamas has agreed to a cease fire agreement. People went on to the streets, shouting, singings dancing, they were hoping this would stop an offensive against all of the gaza strip, but particularly rafah, where 1. 4 million palestinians are sheltering. Israel insists, the Israeli Government of Prime Minister netanyahu because theres not universal consensus on this subject, that the operation must go ahead, regardless of negotiations. That a Military Operation against rafah must take place in order to destroy hamas, to eliminate the last place in the gaza strip where hamas still has a comfortable amount of control because that city, unlike other cities in gaza has not been attacked with a full frontal assault by the israeli military. The u. S. And the u. N. And humanitarian organizations are warning that an assault on rafah would be particularly bloody, would be particularly violent because that is where the civilian population has gathered. That is where they have congregated from all other parts in gaza. That is why it is so densely packed. We had a crew in rafah filming today, and after the israelis began issuing the Evacuation Order, and that is all part of all of this. Theres the Rafah Operation. Theres the negotiations, theres the hostage release negotiations. Cease fire release negotiations. They are all overlapping. So as these Cease Fire Negotiations were taking place, israel, this morning, issued an order to roughly 100,000 people to get out of a part of rafah because the operations were about to begin and israel began bombing. And israel said that one of the reasons it was bombing was because the Cease Fire Talks had collapsed and they were already blaming hamas for the collapse of those talks. So then in the midst of all of this in realtime, were talking a couple of hours ago, if not less, hamas came out and said, we didnt were not the rejecters here. Were not the problem. We agreed to the terms. The issue is the terms they agreed to are not exactly the same terms that israel had put forward. So the idea is that will this now lead to more facetoface conversations and potentially avoiding that Rafah Operation. But israel insists that the Rafah Operation will go ahead. I think it is unfortunately for those people in rafah who are celebrating too early to do so. Richard angle and allie raffa. Were keeping an eye on the White House Briefing as well. Were standing by for the brand new witness to be called in trumps Hush Money Trial. She is Deborah Tarasoff. She worked in accounts payable, and according to the indictment, she is the one who basically processed the invoices involved in the Hush Money Payment. Joining me now two reporters whose investigative work has been in the trial. David fahrenthold, and Michael Rothfeld who reported that trump played a central role until the Hush Money Payments to Karen Mcdougal and Stormy Daniels and author of the fixers. Joyce vance, tristan snell, Charles Coleman, and Susan Del Percio are back with me as well. Charles, help us put this in perspective. Again, this can all sound very dry. Were connecting the dots, right, from our last witness to this one, who actually prepared the invoices. Sure. And so one of the things that people need to understand big picture wise is that last week, and everything leading up to today, there has been a certain amount of distance between donald trump and actual transactions. And thats not by design. Thats not an accident. Thats by design. Donald trump keeps himself in terms of his operations as close enough as he needs to to be able to see and manage everything thats going on. But far away enough to sort of engage this notion of plausible deniability. What these witnesses are doing is theyre getting closer and closer and closer and connecting donald trump to the actual action. The defense in this case, would try and paint Michael Cohen as some sort of lone actor who did all of this without the approval or the instruction of donald trump, and now that you have the people who know where the money was coming from and how it was being paid, stepping on to the witness stand, those get eliminated in a way that donald trump becomes connected. Its critical to the prosecution. Its exciting to watch the case come together. Its almost like the lawyers are building a lego set and things are starting to click. Its the furthest thing from being boring, simply because this is what the prosecution needs in order to establish their actual case against the defendant here who is donald trump. Michael, youre the guy who knows so much about the money. You have followed the Hush Money Payments. You have written extensively about it. Charles obviously is getting excited. All of us who follow this closely are excited about this. As you know whats unfolding today and folks that are insiders and might have kind of boring jobs inside the financial world of a company, what are the pieces of the puzzle you have been watching that you think may resonate with jurors and not just those of us who are so deeply involved in the trial . I think the key points here are twofold. One is theyre sort of connecting this to allen weisselberg, who is not testifying. Hes mr. Trumps long time cfo. He did authorize these payments. He was very close to donald trump, that mr. Trump signed the checks, that they came from his personal bank account, and that basically, he was very tight with his money, and he was very careful about what sorts of transactions happened at the Trump Organization. So all of that is an effort to show that trump would have been certainly aware of what this was for. Yeah, so this isnt a situation where the defense can come on and credibly say, for example, he had tons of checks put in front of him, and he just signed them one after the other after the other. They are trying to say that, yes, i mean, they definitely have tried to elicit that sort of testimony last week when his assistant testified, said, you know, didnt he sign checks on the phone, and theyre going to certainly say that Michael Cohen is the only one who can actually connect him into conversations about this reimbursement deal, and thats true. In this trial. So, you know, they are going to definitely argue that he was distanced from it. Its just a question of what the jurors end up believing. Yeah, i guess that is really the question, and we were talking about this earlier, david, but once of the most interesting things of this trial is the people who are giving at this point, we havent had the defense yet, but at least at this point seems like critical information are people who were very very loyal to donald trump and many of whom still are. Thats right. Michael made a good point about this. The Trump Organization sounds big, and donald trump spent a lot of time making it seem very big. It was a small, very provincial office, people who came in in the 80s and 90. This was not the kind of business where people came and went. You stay ld. People around trump would be like allen weisselberg. They would be so loyal, they were willing to go to jail twice for their boss. What were seeing now is the end game of that. Prosecutors trying to bring those very loyal long time people in and make them tell their piece of the story. So far, as you said, for prosecutors, with the exception of weisselberg, Everybody Else has sort of been willing to come and tell what they know. Theyre not telling as much as cohen, but not shying from telling their piece of the story, and slowly connecting the dots to donald trump. David farrenfeld, and michael, we have to go to the briefing because right now we are hearing about the deal to potentially have a cease fire in the gaza war, but the parameters of the deal we heard from john kirby, the National Security Communications Advisers are not going to be revealed right now. Lets listen to what he is saying. Again, without speaking about the details of the response by hamas, i think its safe to conclude that that response came as a result or at the end of these continued discussions that Director Burns was part of. Our sense of whats happening when we get a readout from Director Burns leader today or tomorrow . I dont know, the president has been briefed on the response. Hes aware of where the situation and where the process is. What youre asking me is when are we going to get like a final table slap here. Theres a process that has been worked in the past and will be worked this time. You get a response by hamas, were going to have to evaluate that, see whats in it. Certainly the israelis must have a chance to look at this, and to evaluate it. And Director Burns, as we speak, literally as you and i are talking, are having these conversations with partners in the region. You know, it would be great, im sure we would all like to have an answer as soon as possible. I just dont want to get ahead of that process. Reporter when do you expect the to reopen . It should be open very very soon. Prime minister netanyahu committed to opening it on the call this morning. At 2 30, is it open . I dont know. But he assured the president it would be reopened. It had been closed for several days. Reporter cindy mccain, the executive director of the World Food Program said over the weekend that Northern Gaza is in a full pledged abandon. Is that the assessment of the u. S. Government as well . The u. N. Government has not declared a famine in gaza writ large but i dont want to underrate the degree of need, particularly with respect to food and water. It is not a great situation. Clearly. And thats why, again, were working so hard to get this deal in place so we can keep that humanitarian assistance up at a higher level. Reporter i understand you dont want to get into the specifics here. Is it your understanding this this is hamass final offer. Is there room to negotiate here . I think its going to depend on our evaluation and the israeli evaluation of the response and where we go from here. Reporter the israelis are warning people to evacuate gaza. If they do go through with this operation, is the u. S. Willing to consider putting limits or conditions aid to israel . I wont get ahead of where we are right now in the process, and im certainly not going to speak to hypothetical operations. I think we just have to see what transpires. The president was very direct. And consistently so this morning. We dont want to see major Ground Operations in rafah that put these people at risk. Reporter a month ago they made clear, israel didnt take significant steps for the humanitarian crisis. Is it possible that the u. S. Could change course if the humanitarian process isnt improved . We always have the right to adjust our policies as appropriate, and that has not changed. Reporter an operation in rafah would jeopardize steps all i can say is we have been very direct and very consistent in our views about concerns about operations in rafah. Reporter does the u. S. Currently have any sense of whether israel is inclined or not inclined to accept this deal . I wont speak for the israelis. Reporter the president and the Prime Minister spoke earlier today. Was this specific framework discussed and did the president encourage, put pressure on the Prime Minister to accept this framework . Youre talking about what hamas says they responded to. And just so you have the tiktok here, when they were talking this morning, we did not have news that hamas had responded. So that news broke after the call. That said, as i mentioned in my opening statement, of course they talked about getting it secure. When the two leaders spoke hamas had not this framework, asked the Prime Minister to potentially correct. It would be wrong for you to conclude that the call this morning was about having the israelis accept the hamas response, the hamas response hadnt happened yet. Did he broadly encourage the Prime Minister to yet to some sort of deal . As he has consistently with Prime Minister netanyahu urged that we get this deal secured. It wasnt a pressure call. It wasnt about twisting his arm towards a certain set of parameters. Director burns is in the region having these conversations with the israelis, the qataris, the egyptians, again, as we sfeek, and speak, and thats the forum for working out the parameters, but the president clearly talked about the importance of getting a deal done. Reporter what is the president s position on a limited operation into rafah . I dont think i can answer any differently than i did with mary. We have been very clear that we dont we dont support a major Ground Operation that put at risk the millions of people that are sheltering there. The question right now a hypothetical. Were aware they dropped leaflets. Were aware that theyre wanting people to evacuate. I let them speak to their operations and to their intentions. Nothings changed about where we are with respect to operations in rafah that could put those people at greater risk. Reporter you know theyre asking people in the area to evacuate and the possibility of a limited Rafah Operation is on the table so im asking does the president believe israel can execute a limited operation into rafah while adequately protecting the lives of civilians there. The president doesnt want to see operations in rafah that put at greater risk the more than a Million People that are seeking refuge there. Reporter he wouldnt support a limited operation into rafah. I think i have answered the question. Reporter picking up on the time line, so prior to hamas saying that they accepted this proposal, what, as you understood that to be were the sticking points for either hamas or the israelis in the deal that had been on the disable. Im not going to get into that. Reporter did it involve rafah in any way . Im not going to talk about the parameters of the proposal that was worked before this hamas response, and im certainly not going to talk about the response right now. I understand the curiosity, and you are all asking exactly the right questions, all very fair, but i hope you understand that the last thing i would ever want to do from this podium is Say Something that puts this sensitive process at greater risk. We are at a critical stage. We got a response from hamas, now Director Burns is working through that, trying to assess it, working with the israelis, my goodness, i dont know that it gets any more sensitive right now and the worst thing we can do is start speculating about whats in it. Reporter what was your understanding why the israelis were only evacuating part of rafah at this time . You have to talk to the israelis. Youve previously said several times that the ball is in the court with hamas previous stages of negotiations. Would it be fair to say that the ball is in israels court . Its going to depend what response says, and the conversations that we have with the israelis about where we go from here . Reporter do you have any sense that israel is currently using this threat or the start of an operation in rafah as a means of putting pressure on hamas. You have to talk to the israelis about their intentions. You said that you did not know the news during the call. Were you surprised by was the white house surprised by hamas saying that they have reached a deal or agreeing to the agreement . It wasnt like we had a heads up about it. We knew that, as i said publicly, they had a proposal in front of them, and as i was just reminded the fact that i said many times, it was ball was in hamass court. We certainly knew if they had it before then, we were waiting on word. We had hoped that there would be word very very soon. We certainly hope that there could be word today, but did we know the exact moment that al jazeera was able to break the news that hamas had a response, no, we didnt break that particular moment. Reporter are you encouraged that you are at this sensitive point . Well be encouraged when we get a deal in place, and we can see hostages back with their families. That will be encouraging. Reporter if i can, what role, if any, do you feel like the leaflets or pressure of evacuation, or the announcement of evacuating, do you think that had any role in triggering hamas . Can you talk about the time line as the administration understands it. How much time do people have to long beach . Putting demands on the israelis in terms of how the evacuations are to take place, under the parameters youre talking about. Were asking questions about what their intentions are here, and what the largest purpose of this evacuation is, and sort of where theyre wanting to go. I think to answer your question, though, you have to go to the israelis and speak to the Military Operations or plans. Im not going to get ahead of that. Are we curious about the timing and the intent and where theyre going, yes, absolutely. And the president expressed our curiosity on the call today. Were going to continue to listen to john kirby, who acknowledges this critical phase in these negotiations, trying to get a cease fire proposal, the white house is reviewing it now. Israel is reviewing it now. They dont think its the same deal that they agreed to that hamas changed it and then signed off on it. It is against the backdrop of a critical situation on the ground, right, a catastrophic humanitarian situation. War planes continue to pound targets in rafah, while people are being told to evacuate. Were going to keep our eye on this fast developing situation. Up next, though, were going to go back to the testimony in trumps Hush Money Trial where for the first time, we are actually hearing from a current employee of the Trump Organization. What does she know about the payments to Michael Cohen . Our panel is standing by. N . Our panel is standing by. Gritty eyes could be more than a rough patch. 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For a limited time, ask how to save up to 830 off an eligible 5g phone when you switch to comcast Business Mobile. Dont wait call, click or visit an xfinity store today. We have to go back to the trump Hush Money Trial because right now, Deborah Tarasoff is on the stand, the accounts payable supervisor at Trump Organization. The first current employee to testify at this trial. Prosecutors have been questioning her about several other people, including Michael Cohen and about her specific role in the company. Joyce vance, tristan snell, Charles Coleman and Susan Del Percio are back with me. This is where we keep talking about theyre getting to the meat of things, and boy are we. Okay. So theyre talking about checks that were written right to reimburse Michael Cohen. Anything over 10,000 had to be approved. So who could do that according to Deborah Tarasoff, eric, don jr. Or mr. Trump. One of the trumps had to do it, and she replied yes. So they were trying to differentiate or they did differentiate between sort of a larger fund or at least a more familiar fund, which was called the trust and mr. Trumps personal account. They call it the djt account to which she is asked, who signed checks for the djt account in 2016 and 2017. Deborah tarasoff, only mr. Trump. Why is that so important . Its key. All of this is about, as we were talking about earlier, tying all of these different bits of the case to donald trump directly because he is the defendant here. We need to show that he had the intent to commit these cover up offenses, that the prosecution is alleging. His signature and approval is key here. To be clear, he did not sign hardly any checks in terms of the trump org. Most of it was signed by allen weisselberg, and this was coming from the djt account that only he signed for, so it really ties it back to him. Where the scope is narrowing closer and closer on donald trump. And to the point we were making earlier, where he could have checks put in front of him, and could he sign them, heres the question, did mr. Trump have to sign a check because mr. Weisselberg approved it. No. Did you ever see a situation where he didnt sign checks . In other words, he takes a look, decides im not going to give it my signature, and she said yes. Thats critical because what you cant do now if youre Donald Trumps Defense Attorneys is say that, look, his signature had to go on everything so he became a rubber stamp for anything and everything in front of him. Its important to understand that now were getting closer and closer to the actual legality. Everything we have heard so far, its been exciting and salacious. Now talking about the actual crime, were really getting to it. Theres the falsification o. Of the Business Records. Donald trump can no longer say i was paying Michael Cohen for Legal Services. Youre paying out of your own personal account. That was a big part of the it. Its going to come out as more documents are presented, and also the why, to conceal another crime, and thats also what the prosecution has been doing during the testimony of other witnesses and what its been putting out. It will continue to do so to basically explain, all of this was motivated by trying to ultimately influence the outcome of the election in violation of the law. So for as much as we have heard very interesting testimony, this is where were getting to the question of, well, what about it was illegal. Were starting to have the Prosecution Cement that for the jury. She is, joyce, the account supervisor, so she is the one, correct, who say say those 11 payments to mr. Cohen were actually marked as a Legal Expense whereas the argument being made by the prosecution is that that characterization is, in fact, illegal, that it is in fact essentially a donation to a campaign, right . Thats right, she can do that, and, chris, she does even more because the real issue in this case is proving what donald trump knew, and she has testified that the checks are stapled to invoices, and thats how it goes to donald trump for approval. And, you know, as tristan and charles were saying, trump was not a rubber stamp, he was carefully scrutinizing these things. There was testimony earlier in the trial that he always wanted his accounts negotiated to get the best deal he possibly could. Here he was paying these increments to Michael Cohen, without question, and the fact that theyre stapled to the invoices, theyre for legal work, and trump knows full wen cohen isnt doing that amount of legal work for him during this period of time, this is the kind of testimony the prosecution has to elicit to they can argue their case to the jury successfully. To argue their case successfully, they have to get in these documents, right . And right now for the last several minutes, they have been very busy, the defense objecting. They objected to exhibits 1 to 34. 41 and 42, saying those are all trump records. Our objection, says todd blanche, 11, 14, 17, 23, 26, 29, 32, 42. Whats happening there. I dont know if thats some sort of code. Those are the numbers of exhibits, but theyre all different documents, right . Those are all exhibit numbers. The key is im curious what everyone else thinks. I dont think thats a good look. To object that much, it just makes it look like youre back on your heels and that you possibly have something to hide. He stole my question. How does a jury read that . Well, i think that thats absolutely right. Look, they have been making this argument all along, these are hearsay, theres writing on the side of documents that cant come in through these witnesses, and judge merchan has said to them, the documents are coming in. So it does give a little bit of a sense that theyre deeply concerned about these exhibits. I dont know, it reads as though all of this is going on in front of the jury, and perhaps this will have some impact on them, but at the end of the day, what will matter to the jury is all of these documents coming in, and like we discussed earlier, these documents really are the star witness in this case. They bear Donald Trumps signature. They claim to be for Legal Services provided by Michael Cohen, and, in fact, all of the testimony in this case is what cohen provided was a Hush Money Payment to Stormy Daniels. Susan del percio, is ying to get in on this. By weve run out of time. Tristan and joyce, thank you as well. Thats going to do it only for this hour. Our breaking News Coverage will continue with ana cabrera on katy tur reports, thats next. ella we now get more control of production, efficiencies, and greater agility. marquis with a custom private 5g network. 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