Transcripts For MSNBCW Chris 20240703

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Just arrived at the central matter of this case. What did donald trump know about the Hush Money Payments to Stormy Daniels. Im Chris Jansing alongside my colleagues Andrea Mitchell and katy tur, along with her notes and Court Sketches. I wont show you the Court Sketches which are no good. Before the break, trumps Defense Attorney was most fired up, the most fired up we have ever seen him, and i had personally seen in person raising his voice while pressing Michael Cohen about whether he lied about a critical 2016 phone call to donald trump, and by the way, ladies, the jury was reacting. Im sure they were, it was during that call, that important call that Michael Cohen says he informed his former boss about the payment. But according to the defense, cohen only spoke to mr. Trumps body guard about a teenager who kept prank calling him and the call was only about 1 36. Yep. I want to bring back our panel, nbcs Vaughn Hillyard and also joining us the conversation, former u. S. Attorney and msnbc legal analyst, chuck rosenberg. There was two lines at the end of what was probably the most dramatic we have seen so far, this back and forth about this phone call, either ending it and saying the lunch break took the wind out of its sails and left the jury with the idea that hes Making Points now. How do you see it, and where is he going from here . I think juries look at this, chri holistically. What is the jury left with. My experience having done this for a while as a federal prosecutor, they really do look at it holistically. I think the tell will be how the government treats it when they have an opportunity to redirect. Do they see it as a problem, if they saw it as a problem, do they want mr. Cohen to address it, fix it, clean it up, if he can. And how both sides handle that issue in summation, in argument. Can i make one point, and if im being too simplistic, theyre not going to lunch and chatting about what they just saw. I think its important to point that out. Theyre not supposed to be. Theyre not supposed to be. The jury is told not to deliberate until the evidence has been submitted and they have been instructed on the law by the judge. What is your experience . Youve got two lawyers on this jury, and i dont know whether that has any kind of impact one way or the other. I was never allowed to have lunch with the jury, andrea and never allowed to talk to them. Have you ever served on a jury . I would love to. I dont think i would be selected. They dont strike us. I would love to. I was struck twice. We were not allowed to talk to the jury even after the verdict and the case has been resolved, finalized. Can i give you a little bit about what it was like in the room. We had spoken a few minutes earlier before the end of the morning session, and i wasnt expecting to get a john grisham moment. You asked if there would be an ahha moment where the defense said you lied, and i have to eat my hat. We had that moment pretty much after i walked back in. Todd blanche was questioning Michael Cohen and it was about this phone call in 2016 where he told the Stormy Daniels matter, told him it was taken care of. Todd blanche gets up and shows a whole new set of phone calls, logs, and this is between Michael Cohen and Keith Schiller, and also some Text Messages regarding Michael Cohen and the 14yearold who was harassing him. Hes laying this out. And i looked over at laura jarrett, where is he going with this. And he says you made a phone call to Keith Schiller in the moments after you were talking about this prank call you were getting from this 14yearold. Did you have a conversation with him or with trump about this 14yearold and Michael Cohen starts to waiver. And he says you know what, i dont remember these things. Its the first time that i have seen these Text Messages. Todd blanche raises his voice and says you lied about this. You didnt know that you had a conversation with donald trump, and Michael Cohen wavered and it was a moment that the jury really, i mean, they sat up in their chairs. Some of them looked like they were laughing. I mean, eyebrows raised. Todd blanche was really, like, very emotive. Michael cohen was on his heels. And it was hard to tell in that moment whether the jury was reacting to this moment that Michael Cohens caught in something or if they were reacting to todd blanche himself who had been so calm, and serene. He was theoretical, you lied, you were wrong about the call. Whether they were reacting to him suddenly becoming this theoretical lawyer that you would imagine from a john grisham novel. What does the prosecutor do . And thank Goodness Catherine is here too. It depends. Michael cohen could have been lying. Could have been forgetting. Could have been forgetting about being right, and could have been forgetting about being wrong. The prosecutors ostensibly know which it is, and you would look to redirect if this is something they feel they need to direct again. Can they say there were so many calls between you and Keith Schiller is it possible you confused this with that one, and maybe it was this call. And again, you know, these things, innocent failures of recollection happen all the time. By the way, so do lies. And a trial is a process to try and separate those two things. How does the d. A. Take this . When i was walking out, the consensus among the report ers and lawyers were that the prosecution was going to have a long night trying to figure out how to clean this up. As chuck said, they know the truth. Now, did they scrub, like, oh, we dont show that or is the prosecutor sitting there saying, you know you saw that. Why are you lying. So they know what happened. Now, because hes in the middle of crossexamination, they cant speak to him. They cant clean it up until the crossexamination is done. His lawyer can speak to them right . His lawyer can speak to him but the lawyer is not going to have the information that the prosecutor is going to have. Depending on what the truth is and susan harbinger knows what it is, then you can redirect and say, you saw so many texts so its easy, so we will find out on redirect. Were just five minutes away from the presumably the crossexamination continuing, but i want to bring in in the interim, the attorney representing Stormy Daniels, clark brewster, so good to have you with us. At the center of this is the question of whether or not this conversation happened about Stormy Daniels, what Michael Cohen says happened in this call is that mr. Trump, as he puts it, he spoke to him about Stormy Daniels the way it was wrapped up, he said based on the records that i reviewed and in light of everything going on, i believe i spoke to mr. Trump about the Stormy Daniels matter to which blanche says, we are not asking for your belief. The jury does not want to hear what you think happened. Theres an objection to that, by the way, which was sustained. Which was sustained, and we know its already there. And he rephrases it. Based on what i believe, i believe i was telling the truth. Is that as big a deal as maybe some folks make it out to be . What do you make of that moment . I would say that theres been so many different conversations from the fall of 16 leading to January Of 17 that cohen testified about in communications with the president at the time, President Trump, and theyre corroborated by so many details. The fact that on this one occasion he might be wrong about whether he spoke with trump or schiller i dont think is really a water shed moment. It might make a point for the cross. Looks like he got caught in the cross hairs of indecision or lack of memory or maybe an inconsistency of some type, but i dont really think that makes the day. Theres so much corroborative evidence that they were having this communication and that the actions taken to quiet Stormy Daniels was directly, you know, orchestrated by trump. He was a hands on, you know, Decision Maker from my perspective from what i have seen. I was hearing in my head, being in a store, clean up on aisle 6. Is there a clean up that needs to happen here, and how does it go . Ill tell you, these prosecutors are very sharp. I worked with them pretty closely with regard to stormy and her witness appearance. And theyre just very diligent, very careful. Very thorough. Are you surprised that they seem to not have been seen by Michael Cohen before, these exchanges, these Text Messages . I think they probably were, but were talking about years of messaging back and forth. And his phone was downloaded and given to the prosecution. I would imagine theres a tremendous amount of documentation with regard to not only the phone records, the communications, emails, and such that it might have been that day at that moment, he didnt recollect that particular communication. I will tell you this, confidently, the prosecution wont miss tricks here, they will come back and put in the proper context for that cross. How is your client doing after her testimony from last week . She has a great deal of fear about the unknown or what someone might do. Theres a lot of rhetoric out there. Shes concerned about her well being. But i think shes relieved that shes off the stand, and she was, you know, thoroughly examined, and i think theres just a feeling of relief that thats behind her now. Thats a good thing. In the documentary that was on peacock, we often saw her, at least several times, following the News Coverage of the story as it was developing. Is she following this trial now that shes no longer on the stand . Yeah, shes following it. I dont know if as closely as some. But i stay in close contact with her. If she has a question or two, and she has been following it. Shes well informed, and shes been following it. I know theres Attorney Client privilege. Are these questions of law that shes asking you about because she has watched the trial . You know, she hasnt really watched the trial. I mean, for the comforts of the trial, sorry. Yeah, no, im mixed. As long as i represented stormy more than five years now, theres a relationship of trust and communication. We just dont talk about just the trial. Theres a number of things in her life she might want to discuss. Theres a mix. Theres a little bit of instruction going on inside the courtroom right now, and to give you an idea of whats going on. There was a moment earlier in the morning where the defense was implying that there was some sort of misconduct between one of the prosecutors investigating this case and Michael Cohen in regards to the unsealing of an indictment. The prosecution really wanted the judge to cure it. She wanted the judge to give jury instructions. Merchan was not excited to do that. Thought maybe it could get cleaned up by todd blanche and redirect by the prosecution. Theres a bit of an argument about it. Merchan asked for the jury instructions, steinglass says the only relevance to this line of questioning about rosenberg, the prosecutor, and Michael Cohen is an improper leak that Michael Cohen or Jeremy Rosenberg engaged in misconduct. Theres no other reason to ask the questions, and respectfully this is not something that could be cleaned up. It should be cured by court. The court is giving numerous records, and clarify any suggestion that there was impropriety. Blanche says there were texts between cohen and the detective where the detective says they told the New York Times before they told you, nevertheless, its done. Blanche adds the detective assigned to the case it was appropriate it was done. Im happy to clean it up. It shouldnt been an instruction from the court. Merchan says we know you left the jury with a mistaken impression. Im going to give mr. Blanche the opportunity, and if im not satisfied, i will take care of it. That sounds like a judge being judicious. Hes giving the party an opportunity to fix something that he the judge believes was wrong. Thats actually quite generous of the judge. And take him at his word. If its not fixed to his liking, hell fix it. From a jurys perspective, the judges words carry great weight in a courtroom. When the judge says something, they listen. When a litigant says something, a party, listen, not with the same intensity. What about if the defense and blanche gets up and says, i want to clarify something that i was asking about before. What if he says, might have been a little bit misleading, and i want to set the record straight. And i have done that. Ive made mistakes in the courtroom. Im sure catherine has made mistakes in the courtroom. You tell the judge, and if necessary, you tell the jury. I said something earlier that was wrong. I apologize. And thchs was the issue of how the New York Times got the indictment. Michael cohen is coming back in. He is passing people like matt gaetz. Can i just tell you about a moment with matt gaetz and lauren boebert. They walk in, and they turn to each other, and there was a moment where they both looked back, and then the two rows of the defense lawyers, and guests turned back, and theyre just looking at George Conway. Basically saying to each other, it seems, what is he doing here, and then a little bit later on. Gaetz wasnt in the courtroom any longer and neither was boebert, they were doing a press conference outside, but alina habba, and she and eric trump both looked back and saw George Conway, and said something to each other, and smirked and kind of made gestures to one another. And then for the lunch break, they walk out, and alina habba just struts over and just gives this glare to George Conway, right in his face. He has been so aggressively critical. But it was so aggressive in the room, at least on her side of things, and George Conway was just sitting there, and the rest of the Press Gallery were stunned to see what was happening. It was just such a surprising moment. The sort of thing you only see in the courtroom. Was it you who described it as a mean girls moment. You just had this crowd behind donald trump who, you know i dont know if youre looking over at the lunch table. These people have past complex prior relationships. They have a long history between each other. George conway, kellyanne conway, wanted to be part of the administration. Michael cohen going back decades with the trump team, and allen garten, they have long and complicated histories. And to the extent the jurors can recognize. When alina habba was passing George Conway, the jurors were out of the room. These people who have such intertwined histories, i mean, Donald Trumps future could be on the line. Definitely. Definitely. Its been really remarkable to see in person, and i will say, the jury was paying close attention. Thats all you can ask for in a moment like this. Sitting there as the prosecution or defense, are you singling out jurors in your mind . Can you read their mind based on their facial expressions . No and no. Im watching the jury because i want to make sure theyre listening. If im losing the jury, i want to know that. But trying to guess what the jury will do or what an individual juror is thinking, katy, i think thats hazardous. Its tea leaves. And so ive never tried to do that and i would have gotten it wrong. Danny cevallos, you are a Defense Attorney, and the moment from todd blanche before the lunch break where he raised his voice and said that was a lie. It got the attention of the jury. But from my perspective, e couldnt tell if the jury was amused at the circumstances, the catching of Michael Cohen in a misremembering of facts or if they were chuckling at todd blanche and his performance. Two may have been related. Todd blanche may have planned it in a way so it would be timed with this moment of high drama as hes asking a question that he thinks is important that he wants the jury to listen to. Lawyers never, we talk about it a lot, like we can figure out jurors. The reality is none of us ever know what a juror is truly thinking. If you ever talk to them after the trial, youre shocked at what they focused on or what direction they were heading. I cant tell you how many lawyers thought they had juror number five in the bag, and find out juror number five couldnt stand them. If lawyers could predict what lawyers do with accuracy, you wouldnt have a world where 90 plus percent of criminal cases end in guilty pleas because what were doing with the guilty plea is taking uncertainty of our lives. 90 of civil cases settle because of uncertainty. If there was a science, if we could figure it out, believe me, we would have by now. So many in the civil and criminal context buy out that risk. By either pleading guilty or settling and putting money on a case. Sometimes, by the way, i think youre looking for a juror who might be an advocate in the jury room. Even that is a form of astrology. All the reads you may have on that juror, and sometimes based on all manner of things, nodding or looking like theyre on your side by their body language, all of that is just astrology. Its just guess work, and like i said, you find out when and if you interview the jurors afterwards, you find out that all of your presumptions, all of your thoughts were way off. And let me take us back inside the courtroom, danny. The jury is back in. Michael cohen is on the stand, and now todd blanche is doing what the judge said he needed to do on the side bar, clean up the implication there was Improper Conduct between the detective. Hes saying at the beginning of the day, i showed you a text message between you and detective rosenberg, you dont have evidence, no, sir, says cohen. Around march 30th, the court unsealed the indictment, correct, says cohen. Around march 30th it was public and unsealed. Correct says cohen. The judge says please approach. Theres a bench meeting. He apparently has not cleaned it up adequately to satisfy the judge. Todd blanche said i asked you questions about appearing on tv on that day, i think that was joy reid, and blanch says, to be clearly when you did the interviews the the indictment was unsealed. Cohen says i read it through the New York Times article. Blanche says you were not supposed to talk about it. By the time you went on cnn, it was public. Yes, says cohen. Theres a series of messages between cohen and the 14yearold with the phone number redacted. The 14yearold harassing him. The number you are communicating with, these are the texts we spoke about before lunch. Cohen says the number has been sent to Secret Service. So thats Keith Schiller apparently responding to that theyre basically going back to some evidence they introduced right before they broke for lunch, and this is a series of Text Messages. That is text from cohen to the 14yearold saying to him your number is going to be sent to Secret Service, and, you know, warning him. And this was harassment. Its a rehash. Why he was calling Keith Schiller according to the defense, the crossexamination. Theyre resetting the table from where they left off. The fact that we saw, again, another bench and i dont have the numbers in front of me either. There have been a lot of Bench Conferences. Let me go back to you, because you were in during the time Stormy Daniels was giving her testimony. We talked about the importance of the relationship between the judge and jurors and the affection for some judges. How important is it what they might read into how the judge treats one piece of evidence or one attempt by a lawyer or another . I found this judge to be very in control of his courtroom, very astute. He was liberal in allowing the lawyers to come to Bench Conferences, and once we saw the dialogue, and the transcript, and the Bench Conferences, hes really giving a lot of latitude to the defense even imploring them to make objections at various times that he would sustain. Said if you dont make them, he actually made a couple of his own objections during the examination by Susan Hoffinger of stormy, where he went sustained. And he employed them as to why they werent making objections. I think this is a judge that is very cautious about a record that will viewed on appeal as being correct and in accordance with the law, and i believe hes gone out of his way to communicate with both sides and give them at least cues on what he expects. My perception was this is a very good looking it bright young professional looking jury, and from my perspective, they have a lot of respect. This judge was conducting this court. It was very impressive. So were back into the time line, the whole time line beginning in 2011. And in fact, todd blanche says as much. What i would like to do is go through the time line of what you testified on monday in 2011 you came across a poll that suggested trump should run for president. Cohen, thats correct. That poll was actually late 2010. Yes, sir. At the time is it fair to say that the press regarded this as a stunt by President Trump. Yes, sir. For Michael Cohen, he was one of the most early supporters, convincers, at some point later in 16, i think it was, fundraisers of, and there goes the can of hair spray, fundraisers for donald trump. Yeah, definitely. I mean, listen, donald trump had been flirting with this idea of running for office for a few decades, 2000 when hes being interviewed about what his platform would be. He was technically sort of running at the time, even though he never got to the official act of it. So 2011 is National Enquirer poll where they sort of, you know, juice the respondents to try to get donald trump to wade in. Cohen was by his side for decades and cohen looked up to him, and cohen believed that being close to him made him important. And he wanted to push trump as far as he could get. I mean, what was so interesting is Michael Cohen was a democrat forever, registered democrat. And donald trump is running as a republican, not running as a typical republican, but also not a democrat. How do you feel being part of this operation, and there was never any question for Michael Cohen. It wasnt about being a democrat any longer. It was about being a supporter of donald trump, and he did what he could during the 2016 campaign to remain close to him, but also to expand Donald Trumps appeal. The trump team was going from state to state. They were trying to get voters who were disillusioned. White Working Class specifically. And also when they started the birthers. Michael cohen was trying to get them the support among black people. He wanted he approached a well known passer out of ohio and tried to do Diversity Events with him. He was always trying to convince donald trump to take part in this Diversity Counsel that Michael Cohen had been trying to set up so he wasnt a part of the official campaign team. He was working in conjunction to try to find more voters for him. Documenting what blanche is taking him through. He says, how do you go about doing that, getting reporters to write or say positive stories about you, so he was doing exactly what you described. He said, you work hard to get positive stories in the press about President Trump and all the things he was doing in this time period, thats correct. Thats also what everybody on a Campaign Trail does. Although a little earlier they brought it specifically back to the National Enquirer. They brought it back to the National Enquirer, to the fact that there were stories he was working to get into the National Enquirer. How do you go about saying that, getting writers to write positive stories. That is typical, and cohen is saying i knew journalists in different newspapers had long standing relationships with them. Depending on the acquisition, various businesses under umbrella, the Trump Organization i reached out and asked if they wanted to do a story on the specific topic and would give them the exclusive, and that was one example. And this seems to be drawing cohen into saying too much. Getting back into the Tabloid Journalism because blanche said if you learn that a reporter or newspaper magazine was going to write something negative about the trump org, what steps would you take, it was a little bit different. One of the journalist calls me, instead of me calling the journalist, we have a deadline of 5 00 p. M. We would like you to comment on the topic. I would immediately go to mr. Trumps office and discuss that specific topic with him. Craft a response and take it back to the journalists, and you did that a lot. What are they doing here . He says you always check, blanche says you always check with trump before reaching out to a reporter. It was my plan to check with trump, you know. He says, it was my practice to check with trump because, one, it would cause him to blow up at me, and two, it would probably be the end of my job if you didnt. I wonder if hes trying to build. Look, i think there are three main topics for crossexamination, chris, that mr. Cohen has been biassed, is biassed, that he has been inconsistent, made lots of statements all over the place about different topics at different times, and that hes a liar, hes a convicted liar, a perjurer, a felon. If your questions dont fit into one of those three categories, im not sure why youre asking them. With this caveat, its much easier to do a crossexamination from a tv studio that in the well of a courtroom. But having a Witness Repeat on crossexamination their direct testimony, that helps the government. That doesnt help the defendant. And so one of the hardest things to do as a prosecutor, and im sure as a defense lawyer, but i know this from a prosecutors perspective, is to say what you have to say, sit down and be quiet. Usually youre better off when you do that. If you have points to make, make them. But i would take, i would be very careful to make sure that any question i ask on cross fits into one of my themes, bias, inconsistency or the fact that hes a convicted perjurer. Blanche was saying there were plenty of times in 2015 and 2016, that you would comment on stories without speak to go mr. Trump. Isnt that true. No, sir. I would always get in line with a conversation we had on a specific topic, and if he didnt like the response, it would probably cost me my job. Blanche, campaign, did it ever get upset with you because you had gone off message . Cohen said i heard about it. So it does feel like theyre building to something, where cohen frequents. They have some instance where they can say, like before lunch, that. If not, then i agree with chuck, youre not going to make points. Dont they coach to not say things about always . You can spend lots of time prepping your witnesses. Its like a bird, when it gets to the nest, it does its own thing. And you cant talk to them, by the way, while theyre on the stand, and by that i mean from the time theyre sworn in until the time they are dismissed as a witness. You cant sort of reprep them. Im sure thats the rule here. You cant. Im watching this cross as its going off on google doc. I see open ended questions. The prosecution has asked more leading questions than defense has asked leading questions of Michael Cohen. Theyre just so critical because everything about crossexamination is control, and the way you control a conversation with a question and answer session is by leading questions, essentially the attorney is doing the testifying and just asking the witness to confirm it at the end. Thats usually with a yes or no. But even about questions like how did you get journalists or how did you get newspapers to do favorable stories. Cohen has a chance to discuss it. Im pretty sure theyre heading in the direction of people in the Campaign Scolding him for going off message. That will probably fit into the whole he went rogue message. I was surprised, after the break, i thought that with all the emotion that todd blanche put into the cross, i thought they were going to have more of those instances, those kind of got you moments that were related to that line of questioning. But they relatively quickly moved on, and i think, by the way, for me at least, this was the first time i heard about this back and forth with cohen, and a 14yearold, and hes threatening the 14yearold with Secret Service involvement. Again, Michael Cohen gets hit with a lot of Morality Shrapnel throughout this trial. It doesnt actually hurt the prosecution that much because its consistent with what theyre going to say in their closing, which is essentially some variation of hes not perfect. What he says matches up with the documents and witnesses. If you want to end with Michael Cohen with all of this. There was so much work done in the beginning to shore up the Story Independent of Michael Cohen. They have the documents from weisselberg, where he list in his own handwriting how to pay back Michael Cohen. David pecker talking about the meeting, the Stormy Daniels side of things. Theres all of this evidence built that separates the case from Michael Cohen, and buttresses it and all the problems he has. Is it a good idea for the prosecution to end with somebody who can be as problematic as cohen . I dont know why they made that choice. I wouldnt have started with him or ended with him. Say theres no defense case. The last view of the whole case is Michael Cohen. Maybe it will end on a crescendo, which is good for the prosecution or maybe it wont. But i dont know why they made that choice. I would have ended with a custodian of documents to get their mind off of Michael Cohen. They could still call one more witness after Michael Cohen. They have said that he will be the last witness. Until they say the people rest, they can say judge merchan, we actually have one more witness. All right. Lets keep going. Katy, you have been named. Some of the reporters you have a strong relationship with, chris, katy tur, Maggie Haberman with the New York Times. You met in the early 2000s, you have a very strong relationship. In talking about the relationship that he had with reporters. Theyve also set up, you know, katy and chris and all of you, you know, theyre playing to his ego, blanche is, and he starts going into great detail about how well he knew reporters and how he handled these stories. You know, he seems to be almost puffing up with pride in what he did. Hold on, everybody in this campaign had a strong relationship with a variety of reporters. But this is not unusual. I that you talk to the press a lot. You were always freelancing. This was part and partial with any Political Campaign. Anyone whos a surrogate to a Political Campaign has relationships with reporters, republican or democrat, that they build up over in some cases decades or at least in the period of the campaign. But i assume what theyre trying to say is you tell me, what are they trying to say . I think catherine was getting at it, hes a freelancer. He went rogue. To the extent that there are false documents. This was a function of cohen and or weisselberg. And trump didnt have anything to do with it. With all the other stuff going on in this trial, it really devolves to the fact that you have false documents, someone made it and someone made it for a reason, and i think the most logical defense, and catherine, please correct me if im wrong is that it wasnt trump who did it. He was president of the United States. He also runs a corporation, and he has underlings, and they were freelancing, and some of them mike Michael Cohen had gone rogue. That strikes me as a credible defense. This all happened his first year of the presidency. The falsification, the checks are written. Thats the built in defense. I was running the country. And you can argue whether he was or not but he was the president of the United States at the time the crimes occurred. It takes us back to an earlier cross, a mistake, that of Stormy Daniels. When they had sex, if they had sex, where they had sex, how they had sex, who cares. I mean, the question i think of Stormy Daniels on cross is you have no knowledge of how the books and records of the Trump Organization were made or kept. You never talked to anyone about that. Youve never seen them, youve never done that. Right . If you want to make her irrelevant, make her irrelevant with respect to the heart of the case. Now, i imagine that they had a different reason for crossing her as they did, it might have been that the client insisted on it, and i think that led them into some difficulty. Pick your theme and stick to your theme, and i think that was a glaring issue with the cross of Stormy Daniels. Now blanche is getting into the fact, hes asking you recorded a lot of conversations with reporters. Lot. Uldnt characterize it as a it was probably a handful over ten years. Blanche says why do row record conversations with reporters. For note taking so i could go back and listen to it, especially when it involved campaign and use conversations to see best time when i was on television. This is what i thought trump would want. Blanche said did this come a time you stopped recording conversations with the reporters. After the election. Do you recall sharing with ms. Haberman, the lead reporter on the campaign for the New York Times to help her write a story. I remember sharing her reporting. I dont remember the nature of it. And theyre introducing an exhibit. This is presumably recordings without notification to the person on the other side. Its a one Party Consent state. Thats legal in new york. We should explain that. Some states require if katherine and i were having a telephone conversation, we would have to agree it was being recorded. New york is a one Party Consent state. Either catherine or i could record it without the others knowledge or permission. Lawful under New York State Law. Unlawful in some other state. When theyre talking about how he records people, hes on the record recording donald trump, obviously recording reporters, is this all helping, the defense hopes, paint a picture of Michael Cohen as somebody whos sneaky . Im getting a little lost in the crossexamination, frankly. Katy. Yes, possibly. I know if i were the prosecutor in this case, my view would be if this is what they want to spend time asking him about it, have at it. I dont see how its hurt the governments case. If youre a juror, the expectation was that todd blanche was going to go after Michael Cohen and call him a liar and paint him as negatively as possible. If youre the jury and hearing this, god this guy is arguing with a 14yearold. Hes confused about the phone call and whether he talked to donald trump, hes recording people. How do you take that in . If i may. Mr. Cohen is a bad human being. I dont think theres any question about that. Hes deeply flawed and hes a convicted felon. But lots of our cases as prosecutors turn on the testimony of deeply flawed human beings. This is how it works because these are the people that are around when crimes are committed. And you know, it may sound weird to your viewers, but i think for prosecutors, this is kind of this is our menu, sometimes. Theyll make the argument, of course in closing that the prosecutors didnt pick mr. Cohen as a witness. Mr. Trump picked mr. Cohen as a witness because he included him in his blot. Let me go back to clark brewster, and your client was named something maybe that could have been a little more impactful in terms of the crossexamination of Stormy Daniels, i wonder your thought about that and if there are parallels to what youre seeing now. Stormy did great on cross. I thought the cross was effective. Start off with documents that they had not really nailed down that she had seen. It was an Ambling Cross that stormy had control all the way through. I want to address the issue about trumps knowledge, an earlier comment was made. There was an interesting thing that happened in the Central District of california case, the litigation involving the nondisclosure agreement. At some point in time, depositions were going to be taken of trump and others. They wanted to bail on that lawsuit, so they filed a suit telling the court theyre not going to enforce the nda, and judge otero, then pinned down the trump lawyer, and said, i need to know whether you have the authority, are you speaking on behalf of the president. And he puts him right on the spot. Its in the transcript, and he said, yes, it is him. Is he the one that has this agreement. Yes, its him. Judge otero puts that in his order. I think it was really significant that this judge required them to own that document before they would let them file a covenant not to sue. And i really, nobody has really brought that up yet. There was some bleakly referred to during stormys direct testimony. I think thats a significant issue. One more thing thats kind of interesting for people who have been around new york for a fair number of years is trump always brags about roy cohn and how tough he was and what a bulldog he was. I can only speculate but i believe that probably was ingrained in Michael Cohen every time there was a tough lawyer conversation, and Michael Cohen patterned himself after roy cohn and how he went after people, and hes a shadow of roy cohn that i think he was inspired to do so by virtue of trumps idolation of roy cohn. Someone we know he admired. A screen shot of a number of articles that was written. Day after day, month after month. You want the exact number . 510 delays. Theyre were getting to it. As recently as two weeks ago, does 38 articles sound about right. I participated in them. This is to give you an opportunity to respond. To push info to reporters, and shape an article to make articles come out that is favorable to you. Correct. With reporters, you communicate over text, signal, whatsapp sometimes. Phone . Yes, sir. You distinguish between those types of communications . It depends on what i was using with the reporters, but if its private or unusual, i would go to an encrypted app. There were 95 secret recordings. Who else were you recording . This gentleman you showed me. Off the top of my head, i cant tell you, a series of recordings he names here. Mr. Trump, i guess he recorded everybody. Wheres the Tape Recording of Trump Talking about Stormy Daniels, you recorded that about karen mcdougal. Where are the recordings about you and weisselberg and this whole deal and thats the only thing im thinking why hes going down the whole long string about the recordings. If jurors arent thinking of that, hes going to put it in their minds. Yeah, why dont you have that . The recordings that involve the crimes in this case. Good point, very possible. If youre recording all the time, you have that fragment of a recording of donald Trump Talking about a payment, why would you not have something that would be as important to you as this, especially if you were doing something to cover up a crime on behalf of donald trump. Although, mr. Cohen doesnt appear to be a very good or careful lawyer. There may be no rhyme or reason to what he does and doesnt do. To catherines point, the absence of evidence, and particularly the absence of, you know, critical phone calls, at least recordings of them, you cant trust mr. Cohen, and you have to consider the fact that stuff is missing. Maybe recordings are missing. Maybe they point to the fact that mr. Weisselberg is missing. Although i think thats a far more complex and nuanced question. But the absence of evidence is something that can help the defense. And, chuck, blanche has gotten him to confirm that he surreptitiously recorded your client so tucked play a privileged recording between you and your client with a third party, thats what you did, right, thats correct. Blanche, you certainly didnt tell President Trump you were recording, did you. I did says cohen, you spoke about it in 2015 when President Trump comes down the escalator. In june he announced you testified. You had a specific recollection about a meeting at trump tower with yourself, trump and pecker and discusses the National Enquirer and how that could help President Trump. Correct, says cohen. The National Enquirer is its placement in supermarkets but you never said that to the grand jury. Blanche. You understand its not ethical to record a conversation with your client. Theres a lot of new york bar opinions on this. Are they playing to the two lawyers on the jury . I think this to my Michael Cohen is a deeply flawed human being bucket. Its hard to imagine why an attorney surreptitiously, even if a one Party Consent state, why they would record their own client. That strikes me as something that mr. Cohen did for mr. Cohen. His obligation as an attorney is to do things on behalf of his client. Lets get back to the case here and what exactly the prosecution is trying to prove. I think its always a good reminder because you can get lost in a lot of this testimony, and to remind us, chuck, what exactly is the prosecution trying to prove . Two pieces. Piece number one. 34 counts of Falsifying Books and records, ledgers and invoices that were kept by the Trump Organization. It is a misdemeanor under New York State Law to make false business records. Thats the reimbursement for the hush money. Correct. Part two. If you make those false records in order to commit some other crime and here its alleged that the other crime would be a violation of State Election Law or federal election law or tax law, if those underlying false records, chris, are done for some other purpose and that misdemeanor can become a felony, the government would have to prove all of that, the underlying falsification and the rationale for the falsification, converts misdemeanors, in this case, allegedly for felonies. Could it actually be the defense case . Dont believe cohen. You may argue, they dont need cohen if you believe the other evidence. Why cold call him. You do have to rely on cohen because cohen said i met with him in the white house. Thumbs up, do you believe that or did Allen Weisselberg and cohen come up with it themselves. Can i ask you about how judge merchan is doing right now. Chuck rosenberg was telling me in his district, judges will move quickly. Youre taking too long, get on to your next point. How do you feel about how judge merchan is overseeing this case . I think hes been efficient. He has moved the lawyers along during the Bench Conferences you can tell, and hes expressed, for example, the stormy direct examination, he had some pretty firm posts with regard to the detail of the sexual event, if youll call it that, and he really has tried to move the prosecution and defense along from what i can see. So i think hes conscientious about the jurors, you know, time as well. I think clark obviously knows these new york courts and new york judges far better than i. I grew up in the Eastern District of virginia, the so called rocket docket. I had entire trials that didnt last two days, katy, let alone a single crossexamination. I think it really is what are you used to. How do juries take it when it goes this long . Again, this is my bias because i was a prosecutor in a place that moved quickly. My sense is juries and jurors appreciate judges that move with some dispatch. This is fast for new york, and remember the judge says june 3rd. Unless some catastrophe happens, this case will be over next week or right after memorial day, which is before june 3rd. You may find this odd, in our district, you were discouraged from or prohibited from doing redirects. That doesnt happen in new york. Different courts and judges have different models of moving cases along. We could see a situation where when Michael Cohen ends, thats it. We dont know if the defense is going to mount a defense which was really my question about would they have an expert witness. People say they rest, the judge is going to ask blanche or whoever east going to be the lead attorney or the defense putting on a case and they have to say yes. This will probably be done at the bench, yes, your honor, but my witness cant come until monday or no. Could there be expert witnesses about phone calls, about records to try to back up i feel the defense shouldnt put on an expert unless the prosecution was also putting on an expert. And it appears the prosecution isnt doing that. They may not call a witness. I dont believe theyre going to call someone else said earlier, costello because hes an attorney. An Election Law Effort would end up being dueling experts. You cannot call someone whos an expert on the law. In a courtroom, the expert on the law is the judge. The judge instructs the jury on the law. You cant typically have other so called experts come in and explain the law. You can have an expert come in and talk about dna evidence or tire tracks or ballistics or some science thats beyond the knowledge of the average jurors. Thats fine. Id be curious the judge in the pretrial said it would be limited if they were allowed to call. How long would you expect at this Point Redirect be to clean up whatever they think has to be cleaned up . It depends on what they think has to be cleaned up. If they feel cohen handled himself well, ive always found it powerful as a prosecutor to be able to say no redirect. I agree. Jury, theres nothing that just happened that i am the least bit concerned about, putting aside the fact that i wasnt allowed to do redirect. It is theater inside the courtroom, and projected confidence. Clark brewster, we want to thank you for your time this hour, a lawyer for Stormy Daniels. The rest of the panel is sticking around. Theres much more from court on the other side of a quick break. Well keep reading and bring you the latest moments from the trial. Keep it right here. Trial. Keep it right here lass damage, but he was busy working from home. So he scheduled with safelite in just a few clicks. We came to his house. Then we got to work. We replaced his windshield. 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