#Trump faces 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in connection w/a #HushMoney payment made to a porn star to influence the 2016 election. The case could be in the jury’s hands as early as Wed.
#Steinglass shows the jurors video clips of #Trump himself acknowledging that the “#AccessHollywood” tape & its aftermath could swing a very tight election. “If 5% of the people think it’s true, & maybe 10%,” Trump says in one clip, “we don’t win.”
Steinglass takes jurors through testimony from #HopeHicks describing what a disaster Trump understood the “Access Hollywood” tape to be, because she was “in the room where it happened.”
“During the exact same month that the defendant was desperately trying to sell the distinction between words & actions, he was negotiating to muzzle a porn star who was preparing to go public,” Steinglass says.
“This is damning, right?” #Steinglass says, using conversational language as he highlights the records.
He argues that Cohen was getting the final sign-off from Trump before he initiated the sequence of financial transactions that would conclude w/him wiring $130k.
“As part of this process, yet another false business record is created,” #Steinglass says, leaving a trail of potential #UnlawfulMeans that jurors could draw on during deliberations as they seek to determine whether #Trump unlawfully influenced his election victory.
On 27 Oct 2016, the money was sent, & on 28 Oct, just 11 days before the #election, #StormyDaniels signed the NDA.
#Steinglass lands his argument by saying that while the sex between #StormyDaniels & #Trump took place in 2006, the payoff wasn’t until 2016 because his concern was NOT his family, as his lawyers have suggested, but the #election.
Though many of Trump’s family members have been staring at their phones throughout this summation, all of them looked up when Steinglass said that.
Justice #Merchan thanks the #jurors for their patience & flexibility as he dismisses them for a 20-min break. Then, after they leave the room, he tells the lawyers, “they look pretty alert to me” & says that he will seek to finish closing arguments today — likely sometime in the evening, people are saying 7PM-ish. (My fingers are not thrilled)
#Steinglass discusses Jan 2017, the month #Trump was inaugurated. He describes a meeting between #MichaelCohen & #AllenWeisselberg who Cohen testified had made the arrangements to reimburse Cohen for the #HushMoney. “Right on the bank statement, Weisselberg & Cohen calculated all the money that was owed to Cohen,” Steinglass says.
Steinglass refers to these exhibits as “the smoking guns” of the prosecution’s argument, saying they “completely blow out of the water the claim the money paid to Cohen” was for legal services.
#Steinglass is now focused on the“gross-up” of the amount that #MichaelCohen was paid for tax purposes. Legitimate legal fees are not “grossed up.”
Steinglass reminds the jury that #JeffreyMcConney, the fmr controller of the #TrumpOrganization, testified that in 50 yrs he was never aware of a payment being doubled for taxes. He then argues that this gross-up was made because the reimbursement was disguised as income.
#Steinglass acknowledges that nearly every relevant piece of evidence in the trial suggests that #Trump would be reluctant to overpay for anything. But, Steinglass says, “it was worth it” to the newly elected president. “It was worth it to hide the truth about what this money was really for.”
Also you gotta think the #MichaelCohen extra costs were factored into the agreed upon figure to #StormyDaniels.
If that logic held, no charge of falsifying business records would ever be successful because “The existence of the false business record in the first place would prove there was no intent to defraud.” Then, #Steinglass asks, concluding his point, “doesn’t that seem a little bit circular to you?”
#Blanche tried to make the fact that #MichaelCohen didn’t remember how much he was owed each month for the reimbursements into a suspicious thing. But #Steinglass says it demonstrates that there was no retainer agreement, & that the knowledge & the math was then in the hands of #Trump’s employees.
#Steinglass notes that #Trump himself has, several times in several places, “admitted” that the payments to #MichaelCohen were reimbursements, not payments for #legal services. This might not be a devastating argument for the defense if they’d proposed an alternative theory of the case. But instead they argued the $420k sent to Cohen was in fact a payment for legal services, so these admissions from Trump himself are not good for him.
Prosecutors have argued that a lawyer named #RobertCostello was dispatched to keep #MichaelCohen loyal. Costello was the only substantive witness called by the defense, & his appearance was nutso 🦇💩
#Steinglass: “Ask yourselves, why did the defendant lie about this & why did he do it while the grand jury was considering charges in this case?”
Steinglass asks why, if #Trump simply had a business relationship w/ #StormyDaniels, he attacked her in March 2023 when she made public that she had appeared before the grand jury.
With the jury out of the room, the prosecution & defense argue about whether #Steinglass can talk about #StormyDaniels’s state of mind.
Justice #Merchan hears the lawyers out & sides w/the defense, telling Steinglass that he’s gone as far as he needs to go in talking about Daniels being #intimidated by Trump, & that no further argument to that effect need be made.
Break over. Justice #Merchan thanks the jurors for their flexibility & calls #Steinglass back to the lectern. Before they returned, the judge told Steinglass that he needed to wrap up — at least for the day — by 8PM (wuh?). If he does not conclude by then, it sounded as if it was possible that Steinglass would have to conclude tomorrow.
He reviews the evidence from that month that corroborates Cohen’s testimony, including his calls w/Trump.
Steinglass rhetorically asks, “Is this timing just all a coincidence, every single one of these things?” Then says, “Mr. Trump is being kept abreast of every development.”
#Steinglass highlights other key testimony, including #HopeHicks's remarks that it would have been “out of character” for #MichaelCohen to have made that payment out of the kindness of his heart — meaning, without approval from #Trump.
Steinglass is linking Trump to each & every action that prosecutors say led to the #crime, the falsification of 34 business records related to the #HushMoney payment to #StormyDaniels.
#Steinglass reviews the case for what may be the final time, starting w/the #Trump Tower meeting. So this is an abridged version of his already abridged timeline, reducing the case down to its key elements.
Steinglass presents the very many moments at which Trump spoke to key players in this series of events around the #StormyDaniels payment.
#Steinglass makes a specific argument — that #MichaelCohen wasn’t just freelancing, as the #Trump lawyers have suggested repeatedly trying to distance Trump from the events in the case. It’s a microcosm of scenarios we’ve seen over & over w/Trump for decades. #SEC investigators are told that staffers made mistakes, or reporters are told Trump was never really involved in specific controversies & aides actually had.
#Steinglass says that #MichaelCohen just wanted to be reimbursed & had no reason to push for creating false business records. “The defendant was the beneficiary of this entire scheme,” Steinglass says. “He was the one trying to get elected.”
Also there’s #Exhibit36, in which #JeffMcConney describes in McConney’s own handwritten notes based on a conversation he had w/ #AllenWeisselberg. He testified #Exhibit35 contains on the left-hand side, Allen Weisselberg’s handwriting. McConney said, I know it’s his handwriting because I’ve worked w/him for 35 yrs.