welcome to a special two hour edition of the beat. you know, we are nearing the end of the first criminal trial of the former u.s. president, donald trump. by next week the case could be in the hands of the 12 member jury. but before that happens, trumps former fixer and personal attorney will be back on the stand monday for a third day of cross-examination. the defense is focused so far on trying to portray the state s key witness as a serial liar, someone who cannot be trusted, and who is only out for revenge against his former boss. the word lie was used more than 60 times in court yesterday. and through what felt at times like a meandering cross- examination, they had been able to poke a hole in credibility during questioning about one of the phone calls from october 2016. that netanyahu testified he had made with trump, allegedly telling him the payoff to stormy daniels was being handled. yesterday netanyahu admitted he was having trouble recalling his telephone calls on
the fault is not in our stars, but in ourselves, that we are underlings. if you love shakespeare, that passage might be on your mind because this week, we saw maga faithful republicans make the latest trump pilgrimage, showing felty at the trial of a man accused of making hush money payments to stormy daniels, former adult film star actress, to stop her from going public with their alleged affair in the 2016 election era. we saw these republicans, indoctrinated by trump, do this not once, not twice, but three times. three times point monday, tuesday, and yesterday, three groups of the red tie brigade, most, members of the legislative branch of our federal government, skipped out on their day jobs to do donald trump s beatings and attacked this nation s criminal justice system. we ve never seen anything like this. while this performative display of devotion to trump is a lot of things, unethical, antidemocratic, demoralizing, and karen g, is also, and this isn t exactly a jour
hope to see you tomorrow. that s tonight s last word. the 11th hour with stephanie ruhle begins right now. former president donald trump s new york hush money trial is off today as the former president attends his youngest son s high school graduation in florida. for a moment it looked like the house republicans might lose control of the floor because so many republicans have been going up to see donald trump at his criminal trial. there are things we could say that president trump is unjustly not allowed to say. the judicial system in our country has been westernized against president trump. this is a scam, it is a sham, it is a show. that courtroom is depressing. one of the most depressing places i have been in my life. i m sitting here. michael is the prosecution s star witness. he s the only one who has testified before the president had advanced knowledge of the plan to pay off daniels. does any reasonable, sensible person believe anything that michae
starts now. welcome to this two-hour the beat. michael cohen is donald trump s self-described fixer. as defendant he was rolling deep today. trump not only arriving with top republican figures but also one of his own co-defendants from a different one where he s charged. jeffrey clark was in the courtroom. i saw him myself and briefly greeted him. it was in that courtroom that we continued that group coverage of the defenses, the witness, the lawyers. that was a few hours ago when i was in front of the new york criminal courthouse. i am, of course, a member of our whole wide-ranging team reporting on this historic trial for you. while the d.a. has been on offense for weeks, with damning receipts, strong witnesses we ve told you about. today s continued heat on michael cohen is certainly slowing the prosecutor s momentum in this trial. trump s lawyers conducting a winding relentless cross-examination that has the d.a. s case wobbling. the worse news for the d.a. is that th
under oath. cohen is the last prosecution witness and the question that remains this morning, what, if anything defense will trump s legal team mount? nbc s 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 school s 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 19-minute bench meeting at the start of court before the jury was brought in. we don t know what they talked about. once we get the partial transcript out this morning, we re 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