Joining us, msnbcs Yasmin Vossoughian outside the courthouse. Temidayo agangawilliams, a former prosecuor and Defense Attorney caroline pull lisi. Yasmin, Jury Instrekss under way right now. Whats going on . Jury instructions under way ahead of Opening Statements, jose and ana. 45 minutes for the prosecution, 25 minutes for the defense. Theyre doing that because theres going to be a lot of details, much of a timeline, a lot of dates and they dont want to overwhelm the jury in the Opening Statements process. Judgments made from the bench that i want to talk about with you quickly, first, when it comes to the evidence if, in fact, the former president decides to testify, judge juan merchan is allowing six various cases to be decided if donald trump it was. Talking about the trump payroll judgment, the trump civil fraud gag orders as well along with e. Jean carol assault case and the defamation case. A couple more things happening in court this morning. The former president spoke about ho
Carolines point that they didnt charge them, conspiracy is nevertheless the agreement to do something the law forbids. It did dont on for decades. It was a relatively short period of time. Theres 34 counts, but theres really a much more limited number of acts that led to those 34 false documents. So prosecutors have to make it simple, avoid the simplistic, keep it linear and chronological, not overpromise and make sure they have a witness that will back up everything they say in the opening. This is not an inordinately complex thing to do. I forget who made the point earlier, but theyre exactly right. I think it was maya. If theres a weakness in your case, you front it. You want do make sure that the jury hears from you, the prosecutor, where the weaknesses are, where the traps may be. Otherwise then the defense gets to tell them and it looks like you as the prosecutor is hiding something. Its not an inordinately complex