Donald trumps lawyers trying to convince the jury that the x fixer is School Republicans joining forces white house all right, 6 00 a. M. Here in washington alive. Look at the white house on this misty wednesday morning here in washington. Good morning, everyone. Im kasie hunt. Its wonderful to have you with us Donald Trumps defense team had months to prepare for this particular moment in history. There chance to crossexamine Michael Cohen to try to attack his character, tear down his credibility, and convinced 12 jurors that he cant be trusted or believed. Trumps former lawyer and fixer faced intense scrutiny on the stand on tuesday. The defense tried to paint him as bidder filled with rage and motivated by Revenge Cohen was confronted with a string of insults that he has leveled at the former president in recent years, including calling him a cheetodusted cartoon villain. And dictator di bag in direct examination from prosecutors earlier in the day, cohen testified in detail about the 2018 fbi raid on his home tell room and office. As investigators sought evidence related to the hush money payment based on information that was uncovered in the molar probe. Here was how then President Trump reacted to learning about that raid so i just heard that they broke into the office of one of my personal attorneys good man and its a disgraceful situation. Its a total witch hunt that been second for a long time. Ive wanted to keep it down trump later called cohen. This is in this period to reassure cohen with cohen testifying, trump said, quote, dont worry, i am the president of the United States. There is no, there is nothing here everything is going to be okay. Stay tough. You are going to be okay cohen, of course, later flipped pled guilty, and here we are today our panels here, cnn chief National Affairs correspondent jeff zeleny, matt gorman, foreign, your former Senior Adviser to tim scotts president ial campaign and the former federal prosecutor elliot williams. Welcome all elliott fascinating day yesterday, this, this call that he gets what did it say to you . I mean, i had to sort of been turning it over and over in my head because it really does win the president of United States tells you that theyll take care of you. There are powers that the president has if there disposal we also learned about another apparent instance where i guess Jeff Sessions was said to be in President Trumps pocket, et cetera what did you see in the direct examination here and how do you consider this narrative and how its going to play with the jury, well, the most important thing that came out there was this question of loyalty for the former president. Its been a narrative through the trial. This is an individual that tries to keep people close, likes to keep people close, and ultimately punishes those who stray from the fold. Now, in terms of the evidence that was submitted, it wasnt the most Persuasive Evidence that we saw over the course of the day, there was quite damning document condition of, for instance, the payments to Michael Cohen and how they were structured all of the checks and then of course, other witnesses that corroborated much of the things Michael Cohen said, except for the meeting that he had with the president oneonone and we can talk about that, too. But yeah, this was more of the interesting color about the former president that weve learned over the course of the trial, that i think is news to many people at times. Yeah. I mean, its quite the specifics or near is of course, people knew what they got with the foreign reserve. I mean, the specifics of how the conversations played out. So what i meant yeah for sure. And some of these these insults, of course that cohen had levelled at the president. We can, we can put them up. This this is in the crossexamination on your first podcast, mea culpa, you referred to President Trump as a boorish cartoon misogynist, didnt you . Cohen says, it sounds like something i would say. You call the first one in 2020 as a cheetodusted cartoon villain, cohen that also sounds like something i said. You think you mightve said, quote, i truly nothing hope this mans and ends up in prison. Is that exact cohen, it sounds like my language on mea culpa geoff, this of course, the podcast that Michael Cohen has been hosting. He isnt necessarily done himself any favors in buttressing his own credibility, which they they tried to highlight here. Did they do it successfully . I mean, well see their hours and hours and hours of things that Michael Cohen has said about everything, but certainly about his former boss, donald trump. I think the question is, are jurors going to look beyond the di bag word that you said and other things that he has said and listen to the heart of the matter and what happened during the testimony is that for the first time he tied the former president directly to those payments. And that oval office meeting, i think its so interesting and when they showed the picture of Michael Cohen standing in what else Briefing Room, that was a Pretty Interesting De was back in february 2017, the former president had been president for only a couple of weeks, and we all remember Michael Cohen coming into the white house sort of like what are you doing here . That was interesting i think hes not believable necessarily or likable. I should say, hes not likable. See if hes believable. I think that Michael Cohen has given enough hes kept his cool, which weve all been watching to see if he would. I love this picture currently generated laughter in the courtroom. This is the him taking that time in the Briefing Room because were like okay, like, what are you doing . Well, you there that day i was there that day it was february. I believe it was february 8 there has been some testimonies. It was a february 5, but in any case, it was the first week of february in 2017. And the white house was still being filled up with staff. There was always a Revolving Door of staffers, but at that point, it was still unclear. Its like is this a new sean spicer . Whats Michael Cohen . I can spice are already been fired by the owner. Know youd not been fired, but i mean, certainly was coming at some point, no. He was still a press secretary, but anyway, the point is, are they going to believe Michael Cohen . I think so far, his credibility is pretty good in the sense that what does he have to lose at this point . I mean, hes been convicted and other things honestly, the only thing that is not finished, right . Right. Right. Thats going to continue on thursday. I mean, its felony is Michael Cohen be lives on the stand. He risks going back to prison. That doesnt seem like a motivator. Hes lived every other branch if i use like every branch of government, like hes been found to executive congressional subpoenas have with like a stretch for you get a prize at your third branch really trying to pull posing. I can intern at the at the prep oh, and just correct me if im wrong, that looks boring. White house. They dont typically allow people photograph behind the lectern typically, right . Its usually doesnt necessarily germany if you come in as a an appointment to the west wing and he had a meeting in the oval office. So you do and certainly after hours, you can yeah. I mean, ive ive a lot of friends who have small kids and theyll its not, its not really considered terribly anyway. Look, look, i think the jury obviously is one thing also i guess i struggle also to kind of take it, take to step back and see how much voters are actually following the ins and outs of this and whether its gonna be persuasive to them as of right now it doesnt seem to be according to a lot of the polls, but specifically asking the question, where do you fall in this trial will get affect it . Doesnt seem to be in certainly with the aggregate in terms of poles in the states, doesnt seem to be, seems to be very tribal. But certainly cohen is giving the defense a lot to crossexamine here. Im sure well see more mat were going to dig into the republicans who stood by trump it a little bit later in the show but theyre there was one question i had for you off the top which is that these people are making this calculation, that what theyre, what they wanna do right now is is what they need for their own political futures right now, it doesnt seem to have a ton of regard at, for the future. I mean, are probably my colleague Stephen Collins wrote these republicans desperation to move into the former president s inner circle is ironic since cohen has offered a cautionary tale in describing himself how he turned himself into a Bullying Lying Clone of trump to grab a piece the power and his efforts ended with him in prison, right what did we see from that yesterday . I think its a fair point. I think stepping back right. Take all the all the pagans tree out of it. Weve seen consistently as republicans rushing to tv to either talk to Trump Campaign for the nomination independent the nomination. Yeah. And so look, youre going to go where the cameras are right now. They are stationed outside the courthouse in manhattan. And so in terms of communication, you realize what theyre doing. I mean, its like he is on trial and what if he gets convicted and i but again, but theyre also making the calculation the right now hes leading in the polls for presidency the electrodes today its likely he would win. So theres another calculation there and theyre going to where the cameras are i think. Yeah. Sorry, interrupt. I think Eagle Incident of people who arent feeling like like Lindsey Graham said, im not going to go to new york several senator said im not doing up there. So thats kind of an interesting split because hes been very close to the former. I mean, normal the normal rules of politics would say that you should not go to a courthouse and defend someone without knowing if theyre going to be guilty or not. Of course, we feel those out in my gouache for so long mid here we are. Lets just not lose sight of that coming up. We will talk to one of the people to win. Did this Congressman Cory Mills well but well ask him what the calculation is. And why he did go to that courthouse to Support Trump. Plus will also get to this Secretary Of State. Blinken is in ukraine with a message of hope at a desperate time for them and a Security Guard training in an Amazon Warehouse tries to shoot his supervisor at Point Blank Range. Oh, my god, this is one of five things you have to see this morning. Cnn this morning is brought to you by vip guard. 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Those who are still with us, yes. Grandpa whats this . Your wings. Light em up gentlemen, its a beautiful. Day to fly. And spinning. Take back control its lipo flavanoid adrenaline, just like every turn migrant play on words, please jot of adrenaline right to the Heart Secretary StateAntony Blinken is in key for a second day trying to reform us support for ukraine after the us recently greenlit more than 60 billion in Military Support but that aides pretty late and it comes just as russia launched another round of ground and air attacks on northern kharkiv this morning. Officials say about 8,000 people have been evacuated from the area. The ukrainian president volodymyr zelenskyy, thanking the us, but pleading for even more help its er defense the biggest deficit for us really we need today two petros for kharkiv, for Kharkiv Region because they are people are under attack all right, cnns Nick Paton Walsh joins us now, live from that region of ukraine. Nick, good morning to you. Were just learning thats a lenski is also postponing his participation in all International Events in the coming days because of the situation on the ground there in kharkiv, what can you tell us . Yeah. I mean, that is just the reflection frankly, of how grave is getting north of kharkiv, part of his job as you were saying, to go round allies and make the urgent case for more better aid quickly now, what were seeing, author of kharkiv, let me make sure people understand the context of this is not another active front line where the russians are seeing success. Theyve been seeing success and moving forwards in the east quite dramatically over the past weeks, what they did on friday is launch a significant new invasion, frankly from their territory into parts of ukraine that theyd been kicked out two years ago. And its frankly okay. The pressing to be back here. This is the front line, two years ago that we worked around to see. Now this potentially under threat again, now the russians have come at this with force resources. Theyve not found ukrainians ready. Weve not driven past significant Going Forward for cations on the way to hear two places with there being urgently bont. We did see and key to all of this as a town called vovchansk. Now that is on the border we were there when they were kicked out two years ago, but now the russians are back. It seems a local police chief talking about Hearing Gunfire are in and around the city. So it seems that most generous took care of the russians are certainly on the outskirts and ukraines military talking about how theyd moved to fake more favorable positions over the last 24 hours. Thats sort of their euphemism for a form of retreats. So clearly on russia, on the forefoot there, they have other key settlement once in their sights, two, one of which lyptsi might potentially enable them to shell kharkiv ukraines second biggest city. Or member place of millions that have felt for a while com, the ability to get back to normal life and is now facing the possibility of continued shelling