Michael Cohen testimony could begin Monday, reports say
Fran Lawther
Michael Cohen is expected to begin testifying in the hush-money trial on Monday, according to NBC News reports.
Cohen was once a lawyer for Trump and one of the former presidentâs most loyal lieutenants and enforcers. He facilitated the payment to Daniels, funnelling the $130,000 to her through a shell company called Essential Consultants LLC. Trump later arranged to pay him back in monthly payment installments of $35,000.
Key events
Trump attorney Susan Necheles is trying to suggest there were things happening in the process of mail sent to Donald Trump that would have been out of Madeleine Westerhoutâs view.
Necheles asks Westerhout if she knows how Trump or his wife, Melania, got personal items. Westerhout replies in the negative.
Necheles, through cross, elicited testimony that getting important mail to Trump and Melania at the White House got held up in moving through various layers.
âPresident Trump told you that friends of his felt he was being disrespectful of them?â Necheles asked.
Wasnât that a problem, getting mail to President Trump through the White House?
Westerhout responds: âYes.â
President Trump liked to return calls promptly, you testified yesterday.
âYes.â
And you testified yesterday that President Trump thought it was disrespectful not to return calls promptly?
Westerhout responds in the affirmative.
Was this the same mail issue with Trumpâs daughter, Ivanka? Westerhout said she didnât have direct knowledge but, âprobably.â
Maya Yang
As Madeleine Westerhout is testifying on the stand, Donald Trump can be seen scowling and looking annoyed.
It also looks as if he closed his eyes for a bit and seemed to be dozing off for a few minutes.
Trump attorney Susan Necheles then tried to use Donald Trumpâs request for news clippings, and the fact that he or his underlings sent them any or all of the contacts on his list, to suggest that correspondence with former Trump Organization CFO, Allen Weisselberg, was not indicative of wrongdoing.
âThat was something that President Trump did a lot ⦠sending newspaper clippings?â Necheles asked.
You saw him probably do this thousands of times?
Madeleine Westerhout said âyes.â
So, once he sent one to Allen Weisselberg, right?
Again, Westerhout answered in the affirmative.
Trump attorney Susan Necheles asks Madeleine Westerhout about a list of contacts that Donald Trumpâs former longtime assistant, Rhona Graff, had furnished to her.
Sheâs now showing an email to Graff from January 2017, asking for a newspaper clipping. Necheles shows the clipping in question: Itâs a New York Times front page with a photo of Trump saluting military members en route to Air Force One.
Westerhout said:
Itâs a picture of the president boarding Air Force One for the first time.
âHe was proud?â Necheles asked. Westerhout said:
He was proud, yeah.
It was an exciting moment, Trump boarding Air Force One for the first time? Westerhout answered in the affirmative.
Trump attorney Susan Necheles asks Madeleine Westerhout if the Republican National Committee (RNC) and Trumpâs campaign were âbasically one unitâ. Westerhout says âyes.â
Necheles asks:
Am I correct that everyday, the RNC and the campaign would jointly create a travel schedule, a document that was a travel schedule?
Westerhout responds:
Whenever the president-elect was traveling, yes.
Madeleine Westerhout was working at the Republican National Committee (RNC) when Donald Trumpâs infamous Access Hollywood tape leaked right before the 2016 presidential election.
Westerhout, who went on to serve as Trumpâs personal secretary, told jurors on Thursday that the release of the Access Hollywood tape rattled RNC leadership so much that âthere were conversations about how it would be possible to replace him as the candidate, if it came to thatâ.
Former White House aide Madeleine Westerhout back on the stand
The jury is seated. The trial resumes with continued testimony from Madeleine Westerhout.
Trump attorney Susan Necheles is asking Westerhout about the RNC and Trump campaignâs work together.
A new pool report suggests that Donald Trumpâs demeanor is a bit sour.
Trump walked into the hallway outside Juan Merchanâs courtroom at 9.22am and spoke for six minutes. He stood next to defense lawyer Todd Blanche, with the rest of his lawyers hanging back down the hall, per a pool report.
Trump ignored questions about whether heâd take up Stormy Daniels on her challenge to take the stand.
And, once again, Trump played the victim, complaining about a gag order that bars him from commenting about witnesses. âCertain words Iâm not allowed to read,â Trump said, reading from news articles, the pool report said.
âIf I put one wrong word in, theyâre gonna put me on jail,â Trump said, reading from a Byron York piece.
âThey donât like it when I talk during the day because they donât want me talking at all,â he claimed, also saying Thursday was âincredibleâ and that the proceedings were âso horribleâ. He reportedly also said:
Iâll go now sit in that freezing courtroom for eight or nine hours and think about being on the campaign all day.
Trump enters courtroom
Donald Trump arrived to the courtroom for his hush-money criminal trial about 9.30am ET on Friday, with apparent frustration, after sitting through two days of testimony from adult film actor Stormy Daniels, who provided a salacious account of an alleged sexual liaison with him some 20 years ago.
He carried a thin stack of papers in his hand and, after getting to the defense table, dropped them on to the table, so that they landed with a clack that reverberated into the gallery.
Juan Merchan also declined on Thursday to modify a gag order that prohibits Donald Trump from attacking witnesses, including Stormy Daniels, and jurors.
Trump attorney Todd Blanche said it was unfair that Trump was not going to be given a chance to respond to attacks against him. Blanche said:
As weâve said repeatedly, he needs an opportunity to respond to the American people.
But the judge denied that request, saying that even if he lifted the gag order with respect to Daniels, who has now finished testifying, he was concerned about the message it would send to other witnesses.
âOther witnesses, including not only Michael Cohen, will see your client doing whatever it is he intends to do,â he said.
The reason the gag order is in place to begin with is precisely because of the nature of these attacks. The nature, the vitriol ⦠your clientâs track record speaks for itself here.
Juan Merchan castigated Donald Trumpâs lawyers on Thursday and denied their second request for a mistrial this week.
The judge indicated that the former presidentâs lawyers were to blame for allowing Stormy Daniels to describe lurid details about her alleged sexual encounter with Trump in 2006, including testimony that Daniels nearly blacked out and that Trump did not wear a condom.
Trumpâs attorneys have now twice used the testimony to request a mistrial, saying it biases the jury and is irrelevant to whether Trump committed the felony of falsifying business records. âItâs a dog-whistle for rape,â Trump attorney Todd Blanche said on Thursday.
But Merchan said Blanche and Trumpâs legal team had invited the salacious details to be made public in the case. In his opening statement, Blanche had said the sexual affair never happened, effectively asking the jury to believe either Trump or Daniels, Merchan said. The details Daniels could offer, Merchan said, spoke to the credibility. Merchan said:
Your denial puts the jury in a position of having to choose who they believe: Donald Trump, who denies there was an encounter, or Stormy Daniels, who says that there was ⦠These details add a sense of credibility if the jury chooses to believe them.
Merchan also criticized Trump attorney Susan Necheles for not objecting when Daniels was asked whether Trump used a condom.
Why on earth she wouldnât object to the mention of a condom, I donât understand.
