Of the case takes the stand. Tonight, the Michael Cohen testimony begins. The guy we saw was credible and calm if not a little freaked out. Donald trumps former fixer testifies that the candidate himself let the conspiracy. The most repeated line of Michael Cohens testimony was, just take care of it. Just take care of it. This is a disaster. Women will hate me. He was not thinking of melania but all about the candidate. Rachel maddow recaps the testimony with lawrence odonnell, lisa rubin, susan craig, and katie phang who were inside the court has. Nicolle wallace, chris hayes, ari melber, jen psaki, and catherine christian. Special Coverage Of Trump On Trial begins. Good evening and thank you for joining us for our msnbc prime time recap of the criminal trial of former President Trump. I am here along with my colleagues lawrence odonnell, katie phang, nicolle wallace, chris hayes. Todays proceedings, unexpectedly to me were like that helpful moment in the old Agatha Christie style british detective story. Youve been following along, more or less, and you know who most of the characters are. You can remember most of their names. You know the basic plot of the mystery, but then, there is this great health a moment in the story where the detective sits down under some stupid pretends with some other character. In their conversation, they give you all the answers. It is okay you have not been paying close attention along, they in this conversation will recap the whole story. Not only will they get to the big answer, the big whodunit, think of the solutions to all the other little mysteries and red herrings that popped up over the course of the story. That was michael Agatha Christie cohen today. For example, why did Michael Cohen make the Hush Money Payments to Stormy Daniels from those homeequity line of credit rather than from, i dont know, his bank account . We learned today it was because that account was paperless. No statements related to that homeequity line of credit were going to be mailed to his house. Michael cohens wife was never going to see some inexplicable 130,000 payment on a statement and question him as to what he was up to. Now we know. Also, why, when the reimbursement was made of Michael Cohen for him paying for Stormy Danielss house payment, why did that include not just the reimbursement, but a bunch of money for a bunch of other things . We learned today that this was going to be the less money Michael Cohen ever received from the Trump Organization. In these payments they included everything he was owed. They were zeroing him out. He was leaving the company. Why was he doing that . If Michael Cohen was still a Trump Organization employee like he had been, it wouldnt make sense for him to be getting checks as a retainer for Legal Services. He would be getting a salary like he had been for years before. Instead, cohen leaves a Trump Organization and becomes the personal attorney to the president which makes the legal retainer checks looks like thats how trumps was paying for his services as his personal attorney. In reality, cohen was never paid anything for being personal attorney to the president. That is what they called it and what they called him so it would not look weird that trump was paying him 35,000 checks every month. Now that make sense. Also, why do prosecutors go out of their way to point out that Ben Roethlisberger, the former Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback, had been at the golf event with donald trump at the time of the trump Stormy Daniels sex alleged sexual encounter . Now we know. Contrary to trumps denials that he had sex was Stormy Daniels, Michael Cohen testified today that when he asked donald trump if anything had happened between him and Stormy Daniels, trump dragged to Michael Cohen that yeah, even though he was there at this golf event with big Ben Roethlisberger, the women there, like Stormy Daniels, they wanted him more than they wanted big ben. All the little mysteries that have popped up over the course of us learning about the scandal, all the little mysteries that have popped up or inexplicable sidebars and detours we didnt necessarily understand as the prosecution has laid out the case thus far. Michael cohen today provided the all is reveal seen in this detective story. Tying up the loose ends of filling in the gaps. Bringing us to the main event, the big whodunit. Michael cohen , longtime lawyer, enforcer, bully, Quote Unquote Fixer For FormerPresident Trump. The man who in the mob analogy was not so much a hitman as the underboss. The man who testified today about telling supplies and contractors and suppliers that they would get 20 of what they invoice Trump University four or they would get nothing and they would like it. Michael cohen give Testimony Today that donald trump was in the room where it happened. In the worst possible way. The one piece of paper that has emerged in the case that has the most important piece of paper of all is this one. This document, peoples exhibit 35, is the Smoking Gun Document in this firstever criminal trial of an american president. Its a Bank Statement showing the Wire Transfer of 130,000 to the representative for Stormy Daniels. It is the Bank Record Showing that the Hush Money Payment was in fact made. On the bottom of the statement, on the right, you see what we know is Michael Cohens handwriting showing Something Else he wants to be reimbursed for since we now understand, he is leaving the Trump Organization at this point. He wants to make sure in this last payment coming to him, this other money the Trump Organization owes him will be included. Thats on the bottom right side of this piece of paper. On the bottom left side of this piece of paper, you see different handwriting. Its from the Trump Organization cfo Allen Weisselberg. It is him doing the math. This is how much Michael Cohen is owed since we will lie and say its income for him instead of the reimbursement that it actually is. That means he will have to pay taxes on it. Here is how much we will add to what we are paying to account for the taxes he is going to have to pay. Add additional bonus line because he said he was owed money on the annual bonus and he will never get another one because he is leaving. Here is the part at the bottom, we will pay it over 12 months. 420,000 over 12 months, thats 35,000 a month. Thats Allen Weisselberg doing the math. Peoples exhibit 35 what prosecutors have laid out is that is the Smoking Gun Document that shows the crime. It shows what the payment was really for and how it was disguised as Something Else in the Business Records of the Trump Organization. It was disguised to conceal its true nature because the true nature as it was a campaign expenditure. That is the prosecutions case. That document shows the crime. We have seen this document before in this trial. Today, Michael Cohen testified for the first time that trump was there for it. That he, Michael Cohen, and Allen Weisselberg, the trump cfo, talked it over during which time they made those notes on the piece of paper. That is why theres two different sets of handwriting on the paper. After the two of the marked up the piece of paper the way i described, they then took that piece of paper and marched it down to Donald Trumps office, 26 floor and with that paper in hand, the three of them had a discussion about what they were doing and why they were doing it and he said, do it. Prosecutor. Following the meeting with weisel bergen both of you heading the handwriting to peoples exhibit 35, what did you do and where did the two of you go . We went to mr. Trumps office to speak to him about this. One was is approximately . Right before the before mr. Trump left for the inauguration. He was still a trump tower . Yes. What did you understand he was engaged in at that time . Being president elect. Was he at meetings a trump tower . Yes. What happen when you win a Trumps Office to have this discussion . We were talking about this, what we are going to do is pay you over 12 months. I think the indication from the transcript is Cohen Rebutted that. Was probably better if i get it in one lump sum. No, no, why dont you do it over 12 months and it will be paid out to you monthly. Did he say anything about how would be paid out as something . Yeah, its like a Legal Service rendered since i was then being given the title is personal attorney to the president. So was his conversation you had with mr. Weisel bergen mr. Trumps office . With mr. Trump . Yes. Did mr. Weisselberg have with him this document, peoples exhibit 35 . He did. Did he show the document to mr. Trump . Yes. Did mr. Weisselberg say in front of trump how much you would be paid in total . Was going to be divided by 12, 35,000 a month, and they would mark the payments in february and the january because there was a lot going on with mr. Trump moving to d. C. So was it stated, did mr. Weisselberg state in front of mr. Trump that you would receive 420,000 over the course of 12 months . Yes. And what if anything did trump say at the time . He approved it. He also said it will be one heck of a ride in d. C. Did mr. Weisselberg say in front of mr. Trump that the Monthly Payments would be, you know, like a retainer for Legal Services . Yes. You mentions of the before and i want to question you. Did you Say Something to the effect that you had a sense that spoken about this previously . Yes. Why do you say that . Because they played that Game Of Frick and phrack type game. I and around that office enough to realize the conversation had already taken place between the two. When i asked for the 420, mr. Trump said no, its better to do it over 12 months. Trump defense counsel, objection to that its and moved to strike. The judge, overruled. When Allen Weisselberg laid out the plan of how much you were going to get paid and over what months and showed mr. Trump this document, did mr. Trump try to renegotiate . No. So he approved the . Yes. At some point, did mr. Trump confirm he would give you the total personal attorney or personal counsel to the president . Yes. When was that . Around the same time. Spirit was the 420,000 that you were going to receive back from mr. Trump going to be payment for future Legal Services as personal counsel . That was what it was designed to be. What was it actually . Reimbursement of my money. It was repayment of which monies . It was a repayment of the Stormy Daniels payment. You said you believe this occurred a trump tower some days before mr. Trump left for washington . Correct. Did mr. Weisselberg have with him this document, peoples exhibit 35 . Heated. 80 show it to mr. Trump . Yes. Michael cohen testified for the first time that just before leaving to be inaugurated as president of the United States, donald trump review the Smoking Gun Document that laid out the crime. He then talked in detail about the crime with his cfo and with Michael Cohen, and he said, quote, do it. He approved it. If theres anything in this case that isnt plainly blackletter proven by the documents and the records, if theres anything as we have been waiting for and testimony from witnesses, this is probably it. It certainly was not all. Theres a lot to say what happened today. Lets start there. Lawrence odonnell, you are there. Yeah. The one other bit that we got that is important is donald trump, at the time in october 2016, the final day of the president s campaign, directing Michael Cohen to make the payment to Stormy Daniels. He said he directed me to do it. We remember Michael Cohens federal indictment that everything he did was at the direction of, individual one who turns out to be donald trump. You have both pieces here. You have in todays testimony, Michael Cohen saying he directed me to do this, to pay Stormy Daniels. Then you have the payback which occurs after the election, the agreement to the payback. I have to say, we were sitting there as this testimony was coming out, and weve seen the document already, and Michael Cohen was able to confirm thats my handwriting on the other side of the page. Which technically on the record had not been confirmed. The previous witness identified Allen Weisselbergs handwriting saying i been reading Allen Weisselbergs handwriting for 35 years. Thats at the handwriting got in. It also got in today when Michael Cohen said, i can identify that is Allen Weisselbergs handwriting because i saw him write it. Thats about as good as handwriting i. D. Gets. Then Michael Cohen explains that is my writing over there. I explained what i needed and what we did not know was the next thing that was going to happen in the testimony is Allen Weisselberg and Michael Cohen were going to take that document down the hall. We were going to be in Donald Trumps office, and Michael Cohen was then telling us what donald trump said about this and how he approved it. As you put it, it was all there. That is where the final elements of what become the criminal charges all get put together is in that room. You for there. It was elegant because the prosecution did such an effective job of getting evidence entered into the record because, remember, if its not in the record it cannot be used. We saw this exhibit before. It had import through jeff mccarney, the former comptroller of the Trump Organization, but to have the nuance added for Michael Cohens testimonies were good Trial Lawyers to. You saw a well executed plan from the Manhattan Das Office to allow the introduction of certain cell phone records, text messages, emails. Bank statements. It was a Corroborating Evidence that allowed Michael Cohen to stand on his own on his own testimony and not have to worry that there was nothing underneath them in terms of a foundation to talk about what happened. s credibility is going to be an issue. We did not hear we heard few objections today. That was interesting. No sidebars for incredibly defense. What was the import . It was a freeflowing, well paced, clean, sussing direct examination. Michael cohen was afforded the opportunity to drive the narrative for the with the das office wanted him to do. The jury was taking notes intensely. There were at least three who were feverishly taking notes and looking. Thats the last thing i would say. The visual aid of having the exhibit displayed on the screen in addition to when the audiotape was played of the famous, secretly recorded donald trump thing accompanied by the transcript, its so effective. Jurors sit and sit and then they see something and feel the engagement. When they go into the jury room to deliberate, peoples 35 is something they will tangibly have and they will look at the handwriting. They will see, mass matches with the consultant and the 135 and the wire to Keith Davidson