Hi, everyone, its 4 00 in new york. The expresident today on the verge of snatching jail time from the jaws of civil liability. Donald trump taking The Stand Today in His Civil Fraud Trial in new york after being ordered by the judge to testify about comments he made regarding a court clerk. Now, you all know this. We dont normally air his remarks for fear of amplifying them, particularly when they are so clearly tied to threats of violence and intimidation. Were going to play them for you right now, because they led to near immediate liability for the expresident. This judge well, because this judge is a very partisan judge with a person whos sitting very partisan, sitting alongside of him, perhaps even more partisan than he is. On the stand for just one minute after saying that, trump claimed that he wasnt talking about the person sitting next to the judge. He was actually talking about Michael Cohen. Who at the time was in the middle of his second day of testimony. The judge was not
Its not am here and then agnez, we are now entering the final phase of the first criminal trial of a former President Donald Trump is inside that courtroom there on the right side of your screen as the prosecution spinal and maybe most important witness, Michael Cohen is about to retake the stan moments ago, the judge we are warmer. Shawn, just informed the court that he does expect Closing Arguments will not happen this week, but he does expect them to happen next tuesday because there is no chance of a verdict this week come to see it as a special live cover. On Kaitlan Collins in new york. An object Saverin Washington in minutes testimony resumes with a third day of crossexamination from Michael Cohen, the former trump you would all fix her turn witness for the prosecution. Todd blanche trumps attorney will again ask the questions. The trump attorney landed several notable blows on cohen underlining seeming inconsistencies and cohens memory at one point, Blanche Accused Cohen of inv
Under oath. Cohen is the last prosecution witness and the question that remains this morning, what, if anything defense will trumps legal team mount . Nbcs Yasmin Vossoughian is outside that courthouse. I also want to bring in our legal panel, former u. S. Attorney and former senior fbi official Chuck Rosenberg, new York Law School professor and director of the schools criminal defense clinic. Ana coe min ski and criminal Defense Attorney and former federal prosecutor duncan levins. There was a little bit of uncertainty this morning in court, a long Bench Meeting before the Cross Examination got underway. Bring us up to speed on all of it. Reporter the last day week five of this trial, a 19minute Bench Meeting at the start of court before the jury was brought in. We dont know what they talked about. Once we get the partial transcript out this morning, were going to figure that out and let you know. A couple of things that have come out so far even just in the last 30 minutes or so, the
Right . You would have a pretty good sense of what he was going to be asked and a pretty good sense of how he was going to answer it. None of this goes perfectly from a prosecutors perspective. Danny will tell you, none of this goes perfectly from the Defense Attorneys perspective. This is why you have redirect. This is why you have final arguments, this is why as danny said earlier, you keep a list of defenses and some fall out along the way and some get better. As much as you plan, you have to be flexible. Is the prosecution happy with the cross . If i were the prosecutor here and they wanted to spent 3 1 2 days saying the same thing, my view would be let him have it. Keep doing it. I think at some point, jose, youre losing your jury. I take anas point, sometimes you lose your jury, but you never try to. My goal is to never lose my jury. And if youre saying the same thing over and over for days on end, i think youre losing your jury. There is an agony in a crossexamining of a witness
continued special coverage of today s unanimous guilty on all counts verdict in the new york criminal trial of former president donald trump. i am rachel maddow joined by nicole wallace and joy reid and katie phang and chris hayes. also lawrence o donnell is with us. we re about to be joined by the star witness for the prosecution in this trial. michael cohen is going to speak with us exclusively giving us his first reaction to this verdict tonight. michael cohen will be joining us here in just one moment. he ll be with us live here on set. the jury sent a note to judge juan merchan, it said, quote, we, the jury, have reached a verdict. 45 minutes later at 5:05 p.m. the jury was back in the courtroom and seated. defendant donald trump was there and seated as well. judge merchan then addressed the foreperson of the jury. it went like this. the judge, mr. foreperson, without telling me the verdict, has the jury, in fact, reached a verdict. juror number one, yes, they have. the