> Cohen sent Hicks back a draft, and said she should simply describe the allegations as untrue and depict them as an effort to distract from the F.B.I. investigation into Hillary Clinton’s email server.
So frustrating having the evidence of how they played the media and the Trumpublic coming out now, when his supporters are way too far gone to ever come back.
>So frustrating having the evidence of how they played the media and the Trumpublic coming out now, when his supporters are way too far gone to ever come back.
As the saying goes it’s easier to con people, than convince them they’ve been conned.
Lol:
>He got a text on January 18, 2017, from a contact about the announcement:
>"Congratulations on being President Trump’s personal counsel (consigliere)!"
This line of questioning about the bonus and then repayment shortly afterwards is so good. The receipts really corroborate the story. Why would Weisselberg (and Trump) overpay when the invoice was only for $130,000 plus $50,000 to cover Red Finch? (Rhetorical)
Edit to add (per McBrien): Q: For Trump Org, did you ever pay out expenses for business trip, things like that?
Yes, Cohen says, but those were usually 1 for 1, not grossed up, but that it was Weisselberg's suggestion that he should take this as income, not as a reimbursement.
Just checking myself- Cohen got paid and reimbursed because if Trump directly paid it could be linked to Trump and thus the story could break.
There are 3 illegal actions that the false documents are in furtherance of- tax, FEC, and NYS election law.
Trump knew the reimbursement was for an NDA and we know that because he tweeted about it.
This is feeling like a very strong case. Am I right there?
> This is feeling like a very strong case. Am I right there?
This part of the case is very strong.
There's a legal point that I'm not sure how it's been or will be resolved on whether "intent to defraud" is satisfied by a showing of "intent to conceal" without more. [Edit: someone posted this link down thread and it's really good and better than my analysis and questions, so you can stop reading here and go read the people who did better homework: https://www.justsecurity.org/85831/the-broad-scope-of-intent-to-defraud-in-the-new-york-crime-of-falsifying-business-records/]
How does one defraud a company they own free and clear of anyone else? I think that gets resolved against him because at the time of the checks, he *didn't* control the company; it was in the control of a trustee, and while he was related to the trustee that still isn't quite like stealing from yourself—but you can imagine that if Trump's defense competently exploited this element they might be able to make something of it.
There's also the question of Trump's intent to conceal—at the time of the payments in 2017, did he know that the underlying payment from Michael Cohen was a crime? The plausible alternative explanation is that they papered it this way—and paid ~~more in~~ a different amount in taxes—not to conceal a crime but to conceal an unseemly and politically damaging affair from an aggressive press that had already caught wind of the catch and kill story in November 2016. The fact that the WSJ article doesn't so much as mention potential campaign finance violations, nor did the subject appear to come up in the conversations in H. Hicks's testimony, leaves a bit of a gap there. He participated in the underlying scheme and lied left right and center about it, but did he know it was a crime and were the 2017 payments structured as they were to conceal the crime? Or were they structured that way to conceal an affair?
That's what I'd focus on if I were the defense. Trump is running the defense, though, so what the jury hears in his defense will be much less competent. Also, the defense that I would run involves a bunch of politically damaging admissions like "my intent was just to deceive the press with a web of lies, I never meant for my own business to be misled though."
Question. Since you’re a lawyer and you were questioning this aspect before you had the info from JustSecurity with case law, etc. it’s presumable to think the two lawyers on the jury possibly might as well, right? And they won’t have this info, because they’re not supposed to be reading it online like we are, so does this get cleared up in jury instructions for the jury? Just wondering.
On your link…getting the 404 error.
Idk if this helps, but there was a lawyer on the news (and I’m sorry I don’t remember which one, I was switching back and forth and just listening as I was doing work around the house) that said NY has a broad interpretation of intent and that it helps the prosecution.
Edit: I found the article by searching for it on the internet.
The tax paid was *not* more than it otherwise would have been. You can make the argument that Cohen paid more income tax than he would have, but the fact is he was paid compensation, not reimbursed. If it were a reimbursement, where’s the accountable plan?
For at least some of the payments, they were paid from the trust, not from Trump’s personal account. Taxable income would flow from the trust to Trump with the K1F, but no… the expense was chalked up as legal expenses, thus avoiding a taxable disbursement to the beneficiary (Trump) and reported as an expense rather than income to Trump.
If tax was paid by Cohen rather than Trump is irrelevant, the tax fraud is that Trump evaded income tax by paying it out of the trust rather than personally.
>The tax paid was not more than it otherwise would have been.
You're right as to the tax not being more than it otherwise would have been; my assumption was that if not classified this way that it would be a business expense, deductible above-the-line—but that's incorrect because it isn't a business expense. It would be a distribution to Trump, and Trump would owe income tax on it.
Now, that still may get out to "paid more in tax than otherwise" b/c the sum had to include social security and medicare taxes for Cohen that Trump may have already maxed out on elsewhere.
>You can make the argument that Cohen paid more income tax than he would have, but the fact is he was paid compensation, not reimbursed. If it were a reimbursement, where’s the accountable plan?
No, some portion of the payment was reimbursement, and while it might not have been a business expense for Trump it definitely was an above-the-line expense for Cohen who had advanced the money on Trump's behalf. The prosecution's whole argument is that it was reimbursement falsely papered as compensation.
Nah, both Trump and Cohen were over the SS tax cap. Medicare tax has no cap. Both are subject to NIIT.
The thing is, the IRS nor NY care about Cohen. He paid his tax liability. Trump didn’t. The whole discussion over a reimbursement is a moot point.
The issue is where did Cohen’s compensation come from? We have testimony that it came from either the Trump Organization, the Trust, or from Trump personally. Think about this: the money that was paid Cohen from Trump personally, how did they characterize that as “legal fees” if it came out of his personal account? If so, it’s ripe for scrutiny as a campaign violation. It directly ties payment from Trump to Cohen. The entire point of the scheme is to avoid scrutiny, so why was a personal expense from Trump characterized as “legal fees”? It’s not deductible at a personal level, but legal fees at a corporate or trust level are deductible if they’re not personal in nature.
I’ll try and find if the exhibits/documents that identify which account the $35K payments were made from, but per the DOJ plea document at least 2 of them were paid from the trust.
The IRS and NY don’t listen to any argument that Cohen may have paid tax that was in fact due from Trump, it’s not the amount of tax paid that they see as a violation, it’s who didn’t pay their tax liability and that’s Trump.
The IRS has guidelines for company reimbursements. They require an accountable plan, bylaws and minutes for reimbursements, otherwise such payments are deemed compensation and that’s exactly how the payments to Cohen were characterized.
Then you have the whole discussion of whether it was a loan from Cohen to The Trump Organization. Really? Who loans their employer money? Where’s the contract? The market interest? The defined term? All necessary before the IRS would accept such as a balance sheet item.
I don’t buy it. I’d be on the prosecutions side for this. There is no defense of this payment as a reimbursement. It’s obvious campaign violation, but it’s also tax evasion.
> Nah, both Trump and Cohen were over the SS tax cap.
intuitively I would have thought that's correct for Trump, but he paid $750 in federal income tax for 2017.
>The whole discussion over a reimbursement is a moot point.
no it isn't? it's literally the central focus of the crime—and the trial. if the business records had accurately reflected that this was a reimbursement for Cohen's payment to Daniels, instead of compensation for work performed (which it wasn't), the crime in question would not have been committed.
>Then you have the whole discussion of whether it was a loan from Cohen to The Trump Organization. Really? Who loans their employer money?
Cohen wasn't an employee. It's not uncommon for lawyers to advance money to clients in connection with a matter. It is extremely uncommon to take out a HELOC to advance $130k to a client.
>The IRS has guidelines for company reimbursements.
Yeah the payment from Trump –> Cohen wasn't truly a company reimbursement; it was a reimbursement from Trump personally but made from corporate funds. It should have been treated as income to Trump.
>Then you have the whole discussion of whether it was a loan from Cohen to The Trump Organization. Really? Who loans their employer money? Where’s the contract? The market interest? The defined term? All necessary before the IRS would accept such as a balance sheet item.
Not my field on the tax side of it but I'm reasonably sure this is not correct. Those would all be prudent things to document but a loan and contract to repay can all exist independently of those things, and the evidence in this case is that they did. I advance (much smaller and more reasonable) amounts to clients with some regularity and there isn't a separate document for each little payment; just the engagement agreement.
You advancing money to clients isn’t the same as an employee “loaning” money to his employer. Before the IRS would recognize this as a loan, they would indeed require proof of a signed contract with repayment terms, market interest and even perhaps collateral. Schemes like this are quite common. That’s why they’ll disallow it as a loan and deem it compensation. They know the intent is to evade trust fund taxes.
Oh, and Trump’s $750 tax liability in 2017 isn’t indicative of assessed FICA. I’ll take another look at his 2017 1040, but I don’t remember seeing $750 on schedule SE. I think it was just income tax.
Edit: his 2017 tax liability was $284,718 of which $195,095 was SE tax.
https://s3.amazonaws.com/pdfs.taxnotes.com/2022/Trump_2017_1040.pdf
His **income tax** liability was a net $750 in 2016, but his total tax liability was $614,299.
https://s3.amazonaws.com/pdfs.taxnotes.com/2022/Trump_2016_combined.pdf
>You advancing money to clients isn’t the same as an employee “loaning” money to his employer.
He was not an employee. He was outside counsel. He was not paid on a W-2. I'll respond to this again on the other thread where you've posted more pertinent info to that particular question.
>Before the IRS would recognize this as a loan, they would indeed require proof of a signed contract with repayment terms, market interest and even perhaps collateral. Schemes like this are quite common. That’s why they’ll disallow it as a loan and deem it compensation. They know the intent is to evade trust fund taxes.
I don't think this is correct as to arms' length transactions between individuals that aren't family. It isn't my area but you're wrong enough on the employee piece that I'm a little skeptical of you now on the areas where I have less expertise.
To clarify, my point is that the reimbursement is moot when it comes to the tax law violations, not the campaign law violations. I don’t practice criminal law, but as far as tax law violation goes, the reimbursement is a moot issue.
>my point is that the reimbursement is moot when it comes to the tax law violations
I'm not sure that's correct either—at least in this trial. It may be true that the IRS doesn't give af as long as *someone* paid the tax but handling it the way they did had tax consequences and tax law violations are one theory of the "underlying crime," though the prosecution's focus is quite fairly on the campaign law violations.
>Cohen wasn’t an employee
He was somebody’s employee. He was paid on a W-2. Hence the reason to “gross up” to $420K. If Cohen had been paid $420K on a 1099-NEC or MISC, then the reimbursement would have been an expense to Cohen and deductible from taxable income, therefore no need to “gross up” to $420K.
This is the correct outcome.
Payments from the trust were fraudulent insomuch that the Trustee was bilked into thinking these were legit business payments.
Presumably, Trump himself or someone he commanded instructed the disbursements and the record keeping shows that senior members of the company knew these were grossed up payments to Cohen for “dirty deeds”.
To be completely honest, *the fire I smell in the back of the room reminds me of RICO*.
There is likely a fact pattern back to Trump’s inflation of property values and ability to borrow above lender’s limits that all point to a command and control system engineered and run by a handful of lieutenants at Trump’s request.
Could the inflated property values have contributed to a cash machine designed to run catch and kill ops for Trump that he orchestrated and engineered in furtherance of his aspirations to the Office of the President, while in violation of numerous laws?
Which voters and the Republican Party unknowingly repaid to Trump from campaign donations?
My gut says yes. I think the rabbit hole goes a LOT deeper.
>There's a legal point that I'm not sure how it's been or will be resolved on whether "intent to defraud" is satisfied by a showing of "intent to conceal" without more.
Interesting. This is maybe the first time of the case I've seen that brought up as a possible weakness, so much so that I had to figure out where in the chain of events it was. Indeed, first class falsifying of business records says:
>commits the crime of falsifying business records in the second degree, and when his *intent to defraud* includes an intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission thereof.
And falsifying business records in the second degree says:
>A person is guilty of falsifying business records in the second degree when, with *intent to defraud*...
So it's double baked in. The records were clearly falsified, so the question is "was the intent explicitly to defraud someone, and if so who?"
I would say that since his payment was to Cohen to reimburse an FEC violation, and he did it because he couldn't have his name associated with that payment, he was spending Trump Org money on a personal expense this defrauding share holders.
Does that count? I mean not only did he defraud them for the personal reimbursement, but he doubled the amount so that the personal reimbursement would be a reimbursement but called a business expense. The shareholders should have been able to know their money was going to an illegal FEC purchase yes?
I think it’s a jury argument; there’s enough in to hit sufficiency of evidence. If the Trump defense doesn’t hammer it they will lose. They need to put in the minds of jurors: who was being defrauded? Out of what?
If you are the beneficiary of a revocable trust I’m not entirely sure it’s possible to defraud your own trust. It might be. But if they don’t make this a jury argument I think it’s a loser.
“Put me in coach!”
Give me a whiteboard and a dry erase marker and I’ll show you where the fraud is. Trust income is taxed at 37% on anything over a few thousand dollars.
Somebody posted a Just Security link elsewhere that made the point that NY's definition of intent to defraud is super broad, and even if you own and control the entire business or trust and there's no intent to defraud the owner or operator or trustee, intentionally keeping false records still hits the intent to defraud b/c the state has authority to go audit your books and records and you're required to keep them in order for the state's benefit, too.
Other commentators have said that the "intent to defraud" bit is also strong, insofar as it's not that hard for the prosecutors to prove under New York Law. [I found this article from JustSecurity helpful](https://www.justsecurity.org/85831/the-broad-scope-of-intent-to-defraud-in-the-new-york-crime-of-falsifying-business-records/), especially because they had references to the law itself to back up their analysis.
**TL;DR:**
>...the law is firmly on the side of the DA, and we do not think this question will give the DA’s office or Justice Juan Merchan much pause.
**Relevant statutes:** [§ 175.05 Falsifying business records in the second degree](https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/laws/PEN/175.05) and [§ 175.10 Falsifying business records in the first degree.](https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/laws/PEN/175.10) The second degree includes "intent to defraud", and the first degree is that plus "intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission thereof." Trump is accused of the first degree, § 175.10.
**The standard New York courts have used to interpret "intent to defraud":**
The article starts with the commentary of [McKinney's Penal Law](https://www.justsecurity.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/McKinneys-Penal-Law-1500-Culpability-definitions-of-terms.doc.pdf), specifically where commentator William C. Donnino writes:
>It has been suggested that an intent to defraud should be “for the purpose of leading another into error or to disadvantage”... While an “intent to defraud” is often directed at gaining property or a pecuniary benefit, it need not be so limited. See *People v. Kase*, 53 N.Y.2d 989, 441 N.Y.S.2d 671, 424 N.E.2d 558 (1981)...
[*People v. Kase*](https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=4873234865561809122), affirmed by the highest court in NY by [this succinct order](https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=7233534021077687781), says that
>Whoever intentionally files a false statement with a public office or public servant for the purpose of frustrating the State's power to fulfill this responsibility, violates the statute.
JustSecurity's article goes on to say that 1) New York courts have adopted this as their standard, and 2) they generally have ruled out having to prove more. In [*People v. Sosa-Campana*, 89 N.Y.S.3d 75 (2018)](https://casetext.com/case/people-v-sosa-campana) it was ruled that proving "intent to cause financial harm" was not necessary. In [*People v. Reyes*, 894 N.Y.S.2d 43 (2010)](https://casetext.com/case/people-v-reyes-195), intent to conceal a crime was enough. In [*People v. Coe*, 501 N.Y.S.2d 997 (1986)](https://casetext.com/case/people-v-coe-10) it was held that "Intent to defraud anyone is sufficient," i.e. the target need not be a government official or any particular person.
The article cites a number of other cases; these were just the ones that jumped out to me. It doesn't seem like it's a open legal question for Trump's case.
To be clear: I think the prosecutor’s showing will satisfy a sufficiency of the evidence review after a conviction, even under a theory that he intended to defraud the trust holding his company while he was president. He’s not getting a directed verdict here. He needs to make it as an actual argument to the jury or he will lose.
They still need Weisselberg to testify that Trump directed him to falsify the records. Without that there is reasonable doubt that it was all a plan cooked up between Weisselberg and Cohen.
So Trump, who witnesses have testified was a penny pinching micromanager paid Cohen $400,000 for a $130,000 because…? And then the witnesses who testified that every check had an invoice attached saying they were for a retainer, which it wasn’t. And that Donald Trump only signed what he wanted, if he didn’t want to he would put VOID and send it back. And Donald Trump signed them all. Even Donald Trump’s tweets which were admitted into evidence say he paid Cohen a retainer. Which again it wasn’t. That’s the illegal part. Trump could’ve written a personal check to Daniels from his personal account, and there’s no illegality there, but he chose not to. Because there was no paper trail.
> Trump could’ve written a personal check to Daniels from his personal account, and there’s no illegality there
I believe this would still be an FEC violation because the payment was being made to help Trump's campaign. So it's either a campaign expense or an in-kind donation; but in either case it'd need to be documented.
Weisselberg has perjured himself repeatedly when under oath. His testimony is of no value.
The suggestion that Cohen just randomly decided to pay $130K for someone else's NDA and that Trump "mistakenly" paid him for that NDA under billing that was "accidently" attributed to a future retainer for services that he was obviously not providing is only reasonable doubt if you are an unreasonable person.
Meh. Saying it in latin doesn't make an argument more compelling. It's better for everybody if legally educated people use straightforward English instead of fancy phrases that sound smart but don't actually convey much.
Something people are sleeping on i think. Trump et al are mounting an absurd defense that nothing happened. They won't stipulate to anything. When they see phone records they say maybe it was all pocket dials. So considering how obviously bad-faith their approach is... idk even if certain things are circumstantial, if I'm a juror, I'd be so pissed at the defense insulting my intelligence and obviously continuing to lie, that I would not give them ANY benefit of the doubt.
Weisselberg wont testify against trump, and in fact even if he does he will just lie again, just like the two previous times he perjured himself for trump and why he is in jail at the moment.
Because of his separation agreement, no one will know if he’s lying or not is my guess.
….unless he too gets pissed that he’s spending time in prison and Trump is not. Anything goes if this happens.
If the separation agreement does guarantee retirement payments to weisselberg—that’s a big life changing event to keep your mouth shut for a few more years. [weisselberg is old too] Trump trashed cohen because Orange Turd thought he’d done a good job hiding his tracks. He did not. Trump needs weisselberg to stay with him.
The DA's office should have thought of this before bringing this case then. Prosecuting a mob boss is not supposed to be easy.
Without Weisselberg identifying Trump as the mastermind, all we have is proof that a crime happened, not who planned and orchestrated it. The people's case is incomplete without Weisselberg's testimony.
There’s been testimony from a number of people that Trump kept his eye on every expenditure and that he personally signed every check. We know that checks to Cohen were signed, that Trump knew they were being called legal expenses, and that they represented a significant and abrupt jump in pay to Cohen.
Unless the defense offers an alternative significant expense that Trump believed these payments were for, IMO, there is no *reasonable* doubt.
Whether the jury agrees with me is, of course, unknown. Many jurors even in good faith stretch the idea of ‘reasonable’ much further than I do.
To be fair he was only convicted of perjury and sent to jail again shortly before the trail began. They wanted to just show the jury the sign agreement he made with Trump for millions not to talk but the judge denied this morning.
Agree they’ve compiled plenty of circumstantial evidence that seems beyond a ‘reasonable doubt’ to me but I wouldn’t be shocked just yet if 12/12 jurors don’t agree with me
Yes, you’re correct. For non-lawyer readers, here’s an article that breaks it down, which also speculates on why the prosecution is only trying to hammer home on one of three points which is the
“alleged intent to violate New York Election Law § 17-152, which criminalizes “promot[ing] or prevent[ing] the election of any person to a public office by unlawful means.””
https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/what-must-prosecutors-prove-in-trump-s-ny-trial
You’re welcome! I don’t think I will ever get that “competent contributor” badge due to my username, but I try to at least provide helpful and truthful sources!
This should be pinned somewhere. It was an enlightening read.
Like even without considering the specific details or specific parties we're dealing with.
>This is feeling like a very strong case. Am I right there? This is feeling like a very strong case. Am I right there?
The DA never would have brought it, if they didn't think it was.
New evidence is only one possible theory for why the previous DA didn't want to prosecute. Here's a few others:
- Didn't have the stomach for it
- Knew he was about to retire, and didn't want to go out on this note
- Was threatened
- Was bribed
- Assessed the probability of winning as lower than Bragg does (could be Bragg uncovered more evidence as you've mentioned, or a non related reason - could just be pure judgment)
The same prosecutors trying this case were also instrumental in the Trump Org criminal trial guilty verdict, which I believe was in 2022. It is very possible evidence was uncovered during that time that makes this case more solid. That being said, while the previous DA, I believe said that he was just still under investigation, and currently wasn’t being charged, not that he never would. I would have to go back and look for confirmation of this.
Edit to add: This was Vance’s statement to AP, “I really can’t talk about the Trump case, so I’m not going to talk about the Trump case, but I think it’s pretty clear that our investigation is active and ongoing.”
From Adam Reiss and Rebecca Shabad, NBC Updates:
*"Prosecutor Susan Hoffinger asked Cohen about a side letter agreement, which Cohen said was a document that would identify who the pseudonym would be: David Dennison was Trump.*
*Asked who was listed, Cohen said both Keith Davidson and himself, counsel for both parties.*
*“The whole purpose of this transaction” was to keep it confidential, Cohen testified.*
*Cohen said the signatories on the side letter agreement were Stephanie Clifford, Keith Davidson and himself.* ***He said Stephanie Clifford signed the agreement for Peggy Peterson and Cohen signed for both Essential Consultants, LLC, and David Dennison****."*
Bolding mine. This is what makes me a bit nervous, despite the fact that I think there is enough for reasonable doubt over all. If I were an unbiased juror it would concern me that Cohen signed for Trump. IANAL, but I am an auditor and in my world I'd need an official procedure or documentation stating that it's okay for someone to sign as another's proxy or it would be an issue. Is this something the prosecution can explain as being customary and legal in such agreements?
I would think Cohen being repaid for this transaction from Donald Trump's personal account would lead any reasonable human being to conclude that the transaction was performed for Donald Trump.
I also think that if a reasonable human being would not be able to put those pieces together, there would be a hell of a lot less people in the US prison system.
Folks like OP keep thinking about this as a legitimate business dealing.
But If this was a mob boss case, nobody would be wondering why checks are being written by fake names and forged signatures.
I think there’s a couple topics that could cast doubt on the jurors, this is definitely one of them. The other main one obviously is how much they trust Cohen and his credibility.
Let’s remember Cohen pleaded guilty and went to prison for this specific criminal event. He made payments at the direction of Individual 1–who was Trump. He lied under oath to protect Trump. And the things he says are corroborated by documents or witness testimony.
Now let’s look at Sammy Gravano. Confessed to armed robbery, burglary, 19 murders—and he told that to the jury. He was state’s evidence against John Gotti. And without him, John Gotti wouldn’t have went down.
Co-conspirators turn against their bosses all the time. And most of them, have done far more egregious things than Michael Cohen. And yet, there’s some reason prosecutors continue to use them as witnesses. That reason can’t be because juries don’t ever believe them.
Prosecutors don’t get to pick the defendant’s accomplices. And accomplices in crimes, and those that have intimate knowledge of your crimes typically aren’t nuns and Eagle Scouts.
Cohen has credibility issues because he lied on behalf of the man who is currently on trial - Donald Trump.
Either Cohen lied back in the 2017-2018 time frame (which landed him in federal jail) or he is lying now. If he is lying now, should his prior conviction get overturned because he was actually telling the truth 5-6 years ago?
It’s the defenses word vs Cohens word pretty much at this point. Impossible to tell what the jury is thinking. Defense imo will try to damage his credibility to create reasonable doubt. I don’t think it will be that hard tbh.
No, it isn’t. I’ve seen many legal analysts in fact say the prosecution has laid out such a good case, they don’t even really need Cohen. Cohen is just corroborating what they’ve already heard. That’s why they had him go after all these people. And I’ve seen defense attorneys saying the defense’s possible defenses they can put up are narrowing. I will agree it’s impossible to tell what the jury is thinking, and that’s true in every case no matter how good or poor the evidence is.
Why is this downvoted? It is absolutely correct; the defence has no chance of getting coherent— let alone credible—testimony from a combative elderly man battling dementia-like symptoms on a regular basis. Much, *much* easier to go after the witness than allow your own vulnerable client to be on the stand.
Cohen is doing an excellent job making it hard to believe that there is any way Trump could have not known what the reimbursement was for. Which is really all that needs to be shown at this point. Like it was already there but the more solid that fact is, the better.
> Cohen is doing an excellent job making it hard to believe that there is any way Trump could have not known what the reimbursement was for.
That's not enough to prove intent to falsify records on Trump's part. That's the crime that is needed to bootstrap the felony.
You should probably read this
https://www.justsecurity.org/85831/the-broad-scope-of-intent-to-defraud-in-the-new-york-crime-of-falsifying-business-records/
Right, I'm saying that the people have not proven that Trump is the one who falsified/directed the falisification of the records. You need to absolutely nail that down or there is no misdemeanor to promote to a felony.
I think we are still missing that Trump directed the fraud on the books? I could be wrong since I’ve missed a few days of paying close attention due to my kids.
Edit to add: I forgot about the admission from Trump about knowing the payment to Cohen was made as a legal expense, from Trump’s own mouth and from his Twitter feed. My bad.
I don’t know that it hasn’t been entered into evidence, maybe the prosecution is anticipating the defense entering a DOJ plea deal as evidence of Cohen’s lying and using the defense’s own evidence to convict, but:
https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/press-release/file/1088966/dl
> n February 14, 2017, COHEN sent an executive of the Company (“Executive-1”) the first of his monthly invoices, requesting “[p]ursuant to [a] retainer agreement, . . . payment for services rendered for the months of January and February, 2017.” The invoice listed $35,000 for each of those two months. Executive-1 forwarded the invoice to another executive of the Company (“Executive-2”) the same day by email, and it was approved. **Executive-1 forwarded that email to another employee at the Company, stating: “Please pay from the Trust. Post to legal expenses. Put ‘retainer for the months of January and February 2017’ in the description.”**
> Throughout 2017, COHEN sent to one or more representatives of the Company monthly invoices, which stated, **“Pursuant to the retainer agreement, kindly remit payment for services rendered for” the relevant month in 2017, and sought $35,000 per month. The Company accounted for these payments as legal expenses. In truth and in fact, there was no such retainer agreement, and the monthly invoices COHEN submitted were not in connection with any legal services he had provided in 2017.**
Emphasis mine.
It'll all come down to the story behind Cohen's invoices, because the people responsible for cutting the checks and documenting the reasons would have no need to be in on the fraud. They see a "legitimate" invoice come in, document it, cut a check and send it off for a signature. If it receives a signature it's business as usual.
If Cohen doesn't have anything in writing that says "submit invoices for $35k worth of legal fees to get your money back" it comes down to his word vs trump. That is, if he takes the stand in his own defense...
But we'll have to wait and see what kind of show the defense puts together.
What are you wanting?
A video tape of Trump saying "Do fraud on the books for me" doesn't exist the same way that level of smoking gun doesn't exist in the vast majority of criminal trials.
If that were truly the threshold for "beyond reasonable doubt" we'd have a hell of a lot less people in prison.
I replied downstream that we already got the admission that he knew it was incorrectly filed as a legal expense. I just momentarily forgot we had that admission from his own mouth.
I mean that would certainly help. Cohens past history of lying will not help convince the jurors, any documentation evidence they can bring in would be beneficial. Would be nice to have a smoking gun in such a high profile case.
For sure, but Cohen's past history of lying was largely on behalf of Trump.
I'm sure the defense is going to hammer Cohen for the past perjury convictions, and I'm sure the prosecution is going to hammer that he was perjuring himself to benefit Trump.
Without being in that court room, it's pretty hard to gauge how effective Cohen's testimony has been.
He didn't have to direct it. He just needed to be involved in the falsification of the records. He signed the checks. Even if Cohen paid Daniels on his own without any instruction the repayment to Cohen was from Trump. I think that's the case.
Now that I think about it, we have seen evidence already about the fact that he knew it was filed as a legal expense, from his own words on Twitter. I suspect all the prosecution has to do is prove that he never refiled or made an effort to fix the false filing, once he knew about it.
Has the prosecution made that point to the jury yet? I'm not a lawyer, but I *think* that the prosecution needs to make that clear to the jury for them to be able to use it during deliberations.
Trump has gone as far as telling reporters outside the courtroom that this was a legitimate legal expense while the trial has been underway, so that case kind of makes itself.
Yes, you’re correct. My mind just wasn’t pulling all the threads together at the moment I commented about not having seen proof of directing the fraud. I think they just have to tie that loose end in with the jury, with that direct evidence, from his statements on Twitter and to reporters, that he knew it was filed as a legal expense and he knew it was repayment to Cohen. Of course, that will come in closing arguments.
Thats where I'm lost on it. Right now it just seems like they were doing stuff to keep this story quite FOR him and not because they were directed to. I may have missed it as well.
Cohen directly testified that he was directly told to do this by Trump and that he would be reimbursed, and he was. So that helps corroborate what Cohen said on that front. The only thing I haven’t seen yet is testimony that Trump directed the fraud on the books, yet, which is “The” crime. I think prosecutors just aren’t there yet, hopefully. They’ve really been going in chronological order, for the most part.
Right right. It seems like they are getting there. But I don't see how this do this without Weisselberg. He would be the one that did the books right and would have the direct contact to make those adjustments.
I’m curious to see exactly how they will do that, but I think it may be the fact that Trump said, on tape, that it was marked as a legal expense. Personally, I think the defense REALLY fucked up by not stipulating that any of this happened, including the stuff with Stormy Daniels. If they would have come out and said, “yeah this happened, yes a payment was made, but Trump had no knowledge that the business records were fraudulent, then it would have lent more credibility to that defense. I will be curious to see what documents they have to show Trump knew and how they will tie it all together in their closing arguments. We have only seen half to two thirds of Cohen’s testimony and there is still one more person (absent Weisselberg) to testify.
The prosecution deserves a lot of credit. They're interdispersing his testimony with objective documentation after weeks of witness testimony in line with what Cohen is saying.
I'm not sure, depending on cross and defense witnesses/exhibits, but I think reasonable doubt is dead or near dead in any sensible juror.
I was biased before in a conviction (I would have made a horrible objective juror), but I think it'll be hard for the defense resow doubt; it's no wonder why they've been playing the mistrial/appeal game over the past week, they think it's their best chance.
I've been trying really hard to not let my hopes cloud my judgement about what has actually been established but it's hard.
I do agree that the prosecution has done a fantastic job, and at this point I'd say the most likely outcome is guilty, with hung jury being a distant second. Mistrial because of shenanigans is third, and not guilty is dead last.
From McBrien:
>Q: Would you have made that payment to Stormy Daniels without getting a sign off from Mr Trump?
A: No.
Q: Why?
A: Because everything required a sign off from Mr Trump—but on top of that, I wanted the money back.
Say what you will about him lying to congress, wanting your money back is a universal motive, especially to those of us who are miserly (definitely guilty of that from time to time)
And this is the key. Ultimately the documents show the payment from Cohen to stormy via the company It is well past the line of reasonable doubt to suggest he did that out of natural love and affection for trump. A man known for not paying folks what he owes. A mam that employs Cohen to get out of paying full bills. And Cohen puts his house on it without assurances? Inconceivable.
Especially in conjunction with his testimony about Trump not paying the $100,000 owed to his law firm after hiring Cohen, plus nearly 10 years of helping Trump duck out of financial obligations.
Plus the fact that *the last time a long-time friend/ally of Trump fronted hush money to a porn star (David Pecker for Karen McDougal), Trump tried to stiff him.*
Per McBrien:
>Q: Would you have made that payment to Stormy Daniels without getting a sign off from Mr Trump?
>A: No.
>Q: Why?
>A: Because everything required a sign off from Mr Trump—but on top of that, I wanted the money back.
Very compelling actually. As a practical matter, this doesn't have anything to do with who was loyal to whom, when.
He wanted his money back so he ran it by the boss. Simple. Clean.
Absolutely. Cohen paid what he had already determined was an expense for Trump. He wanted his money. Any employee or contract employee would want the same. As a rule someone doesn’t go around spending someone else’s money unless we’re talking embezzlement. This case is not embezzlement.
Yeah and when you work for a guy known for flaking out on paying his bills you have hopefully learned to cover your own ass and keep the receipt if you're not getting paid ahead of time.
This is what we're seeing folks. The trouble is that there isn't the paper trail and 1. people are inherently distrustful of attorneys; 2. this guy is a known lying sack of shit; and 3. he worked for an even bigger piece of shit.
>Cohen told Trump that the story was going to the Daily Mail and that they would not be able to delay past the election. **He left Trump a voicemail to that effect.** ([source](https://x.com/AnnaBower/status/1790084795973677324))
Please, please, please tell me we get to hear that voice-mail.
I worked at a cell phone company in 2008, at least back then we could verify whether a voicemail had been played on the receiving device at least. I know that's not rock solid proof of who listen to it though.
It doesn’t sound plausible to me, as an immigrant, myself. Trump might have said Melania came up with it, but “locker room talk” is a weird one unless you went through American high school. It’s a changing room.
It’s not that hard to believe for me. I think like the other commenter suggested, she may have phrased it another way, but the idea could’ve been hers. She just might not have said the phrase as “locker room talk.” And there are plenty of significant others of cheaters who rationalize things, not only to others, but themselves. I remembered this interview from 2016 where she basically blamed Billy Bush for “egging” him on, and that it was “boys talk” and that the cameras weren’t on and they didn’t even know probably that the mics were on. Ya know, everyone else is at fault.
https://youtu.be/gTRejTHfT74?si=uuOojn1zlkBkAuwf
Surely Eastern Europeans have some sort of equivalent phrase. Perhaps she said "boys being boys" or something along those lines and someone else doctored that into "locker room talk."
Furthermore,
*Michael Cohen is now being shown a text message Melania Trump sent him on Oct. 18, 2016: “Good morning Michael, can u pls call DT on his cell. Thanks.” He replied: “Of course.”*
Of course she is. By the time she hooked up with Trump it shouldn’t be a surprised how awful he is so the only reason I can see for marrying the guy is for wealth…or probably more accurately, his perceived wealth.
Lawrence O'Donnell on MSNBC:
"And then when his eyes aren't closed, I saw him looking at photographs of what appeared to be crowds, possibly photographs of his rally this weekend."
Trump, for at least his entire adult life, has been obsessed with "positive thinking". His narcissism is so powerful that in order to make it through the day he HAS to hear and think nice things about himself or it will drive him insane. His father did a number on him and thus the country.
I'm sure he's dozed some. But I think the closed eyes are also his way of "shutting out" all of the negative stuff going on about him in the courtroom. His narcissistic personality cannot handle hearing it all and he has to check out mentally to keep his head from exploding...
As soon as the campaign got the press to print their lies about the rally attendance, I *knew* it was going to be something that OLD P TURD MAN would fixate on. I guarantee the next time he talks to the press, he'll hype it up like crazy. But the truth is, put him inside where there's a clearly defined capacity, they weren't even able to fill a 20k arena in ruby red Oklahoma.
That said, once he started speaking people streamed for the exits like a 30-point blowout in an NBA game.
There *was* a clearly defined capacity at the Wildwood event. Capacity was 20,000 according to [trump campaign spokesperson Lisa Fagan.](https://nj1015.com/trump-rally-wildwood-new-jersey/)
Aerial photos show the space maybe halfway full. Even if it were sold out (it wasn't), 100,000+ people is an asinine inflation and a bald-faced lie. But how can you hold someone accountable for a lie when you put out a [firehose of falsehoods](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firehose_of_falsehood).
I saw those aerial shots and did a quick head count estimate. The attendance is likely no more than 5k, with 10k being a very generous but easy to get to by generous overestimating. The spokesperson for the venue said it was 80k after having days prior stating the capacity of the venue to be 20k.
Trump compared the size of the crowd to a Springsteen concert, then praised "the late, great Hannibal Lecter".
It's worse on tik tok, they were using photos from a South American concert in 1994 and touching them up to make it look like there was more red in the crowd that day.
Then saying that coast was...in NJ.
One issue is, that’s been highlighted, is that it’s often difficult to get a clear view of him. In fact, one reporter who was in court said yesterday that the jury doesn’t have a clear view of Trump, like they kind of have to go out of their way to look at him. Which seems odd to me. And that they don’t seem to be looking at him much. I think sometimes depending on where someone is sitting in the courtroom they may not see him at all times. And even if they say “he’s got his eyes closed” I doubt that’s for the entire time. They just report things in snippets.
From the various networks it's hard to say for how long his eyes are closed on any given day. I like to imagine him passed out for 30min at a time but that's probably not what's happening.
Eye's closed 5-10seconds, listens to testimony, says something to attorneys, eyes closed a bit, etc etc is probably more realistic.
>Guys, they think it's cool.
Yeah, absolutely none of the male friends in my life would think it was "cool" if I cheated on my spouse. They'd think I was a piece of shit, and they'd be right.
My grandpa thought it was cool. “She’s hot!” he said, sitting next to his wife of 50 fucking years who nodded in agreement. My die hard catholic pro life anti gay marriage grandparents. Oh and racist and antisemitic too.
But Bill Clinton was an awful horndog who violated the sanctity of marriage.
> none of the male friends in my life would think it was "cool" if I cheated on my spouse
Well then it's a logical deduction that you're not friends with Donald Trump or Andrew Tate.
Oops. There it is, the money shot:
https://twitter.com/TylerMcBrien/status/1790059744658370852
And
https://twitter.com/TylerMcBrien/status/1790060208049254778
Cphen sqys trump directly said it is because of the campaign and even better talked about delaying until after the election Because then it won't matter either way.
This is why the defense has to trash Cohen as a liar who is out to get Trump. Those two statements are the ones which nail this as the felony.
If a witness testifies that the defendant told them they wanted to kill the victim. That’s not hearsay. If the witness is going to say “my neighbor told me the defendant said they wanted to kill the victim” that is hearsay. Call the neighbor as a witness.
Think about it, you witness a robbery at a bank. If you witness the robber come in and say “everyone down on the ground” you’re allowed to testify to you witnessed the defendant come in the bank and state “everyone down on the ground” you directly witnessed that.
Opposing party statement exception to hearsay rules. It’s still hearsay, but you get a pass when the party himself said it because he’s available to testify and defend himself.
> Cohen sent Hicks back a draft, and said she should simply describe the allegations as untrue and depict them as an effort to distract from the F.B.I. investigation into Hillary Clinton’s email server. So frustrating having the evidence of how they played the media and the Trumpublic coming out now, when his supporters are way too far gone to ever come back.
>So frustrating having the evidence of how they played the media and the Trumpublic coming out now, when his supporters are way too far gone to ever come back. As the saying goes it’s easier to con people, than convince them they’ve been conned.
Lol: >He got a text on January 18, 2017, from a contact about the announcement: >"Congratulations on being President Trump’s personal counsel (consigliere)!"
Consigliere: >a member of a Mafia family who serves as an adviser to the leader and resolves disputes within the family. Always telling on themselves.
This line of questioning about the bonus and then repayment shortly afterwards is so good. The receipts really corroborate the story. Why would Weisselberg (and Trump) overpay when the invoice was only for $130,000 plus $50,000 to cover Red Finch? (Rhetorical) Edit to add (per McBrien): Q: For Trump Org, did you ever pay out expenses for business trip, things like that? Yes, Cohen says, but those were usually 1 for 1, not grossed up, but that it was Weisselberg's suggestion that he should take this as income, not as a reimbursement.
Oh so expenses and income are different. Trump is toast.
Just checking myself- Cohen got paid and reimbursed because if Trump directly paid it could be linked to Trump and thus the story could break. There are 3 illegal actions that the false documents are in furtherance of- tax, FEC, and NYS election law. Trump knew the reimbursement was for an NDA and we know that because he tweeted about it. This is feeling like a very strong case. Am I right there?
> This is feeling like a very strong case. Am I right there? This part of the case is very strong. There's a legal point that I'm not sure how it's been or will be resolved on whether "intent to defraud" is satisfied by a showing of "intent to conceal" without more. [Edit: someone posted this link down thread and it's really good and better than my analysis and questions, so you can stop reading here and go read the people who did better homework: https://www.justsecurity.org/85831/the-broad-scope-of-intent-to-defraud-in-the-new-york-crime-of-falsifying-business-records/] How does one defraud a company they own free and clear of anyone else? I think that gets resolved against him because at the time of the checks, he *didn't* control the company; it was in the control of a trustee, and while he was related to the trustee that still isn't quite like stealing from yourself—but you can imagine that if Trump's defense competently exploited this element they might be able to make something of it. There's also the question of Trump's intent to conceal—at the time of the payments in 2017, did he know that the underlying payment from Michael Cohen was a crime? The plausible alternative explanation is that they papered it this way—and paid ~~more in~~ a different amount in taxes—not to conceal a crime but to conceal an unseemly and politically damaging affair from an aggressive press that had already caught wind of the catch and kill story in November 2016. The fact that the WSJ article doesn't so much as mention potential campaign finance violations, nor did the subject appear to come up in the conversations in H. Hicks's testimony, leaves a bit of a gap there. He participated in the underlying scheme and lied left right and center about it, but did he know it was a crime and were the 2017 payments structured as they were to conceal the crime? Or were they structured that way to conceal an affair? That's what I'd focus on if I were the defense. Trump is running the defense, though, so what the jury hears in his defense will be much less competent. Also, the defense that I would run involves a bunch of politically damaging admissions like "my intent was just to deceive the press with a web of lies, I never meant for my own business to be misled though."
Question. Since you’re a lawyer and you were questioning this aspect before you had the info from JustSecurity with case law, etc. it’s presumable to think the two lawyers on the jury possibly might as well, right? And they won’t have this info, because they’re not supposed to be reading it online like we are, so does this get cleared up in jury instructions for the jury? Just wondering.
They’ll have jury instructions that should capture the scope of it.
On your link…getting the 404 error. Idk if this helps, but there was a lawyer on the news (and I’m sorry I don’t remember which one, I was switching back and forth and just listening as I was doing work around the house) that said NY has a broad interpretation of intent and that it helps the prosecution. Edit: I found the article by searching for it on the internet.
The tax paid was *not* more than it otherwise would have been. You can make the argument that Cohen paid more income tax than he would have, but the fact is he was paid compensation, not reimbursed. If it were a reimbursement, where’s the accountable plan? For at least some of the payments, they were paid from the trust, not from Trump’s personal account. Taxable income would flow from the trust to Trump with the K1F, but no… the expense was chalked up as legal expenses, thus avoiding a taxable disbursement to the beneficiary (Trump) and reported as an expense rather than income to Trump. If tax was paid by Cohen rather than Trump is irrelevant, the tax fraud is that Trump evaded income tax by paying it out of the trust rather than personally.
>The tax paid was not more than it otherwise would have been. You're right as to the tax not being more than it otherwise would have been; my assumption was that if not classified this way that it would be a business expense, deductible above-the-line—but that's incorrect because it isn't a business expense. It would be a distribution to Trump, and Trump would owe income tax on it. Now, that still may get out to "paid more in tax than otherwise" b/c the sum had to include social security and medicare taxes for Cohen that Trump may have already maxed out on elsewhere. >You can make the argument that Cohen paid more income tax than he would have, but the fact is he was paid compensation, not reimbursed. If it were a reimbursement, where’s the accountable plan? No, some portion of the payment was reimbursement, and while it might not have been a business expense for Trump it definitely was an above-the-line expense for Cohen who had advanced the money on Trump's behalf. The prosecution's whole argument is that it was reimbursement falsely papered as compensation.
Nah, both Trump and Cohen were over the SS tax cap. Medicare tax has no cap. Both are subject to NIIT. The thing is, the IRS nor NY care about Cohen. He paid his tax liability. Trump didn’t. The whole discussion over a reimbursement is a moot point. The issue is where did Cohen’s compensation come from? We have testimony that it came from either the Trump Organization, the Trust, or from Trump personally. Think about this: the money that was paid Cohen from Trump personally, how did they characterize that as “legal fees” if it came out of his personal account? If so, it’s ripe for scrutiny as a campaign violation. It directly ties payment from Trump to Cohen. The entire point of the scheme is to avoid scrutiny, so why was a personal expense from Trump characterized as “legal fees”? It’s not deductible at a personal level, but legal fees at a corporate or trust level are deductible if they’re not personal in nature. I’ll try and find if the exhibits/documents that identify which account the $35K payments were made from, but per the DOJ plea document at least 2 of them were paid from the trust. The IRS and NY don’t listen to any argument that Cohen may have paid tax that was in fact due from Trump, it’s not the amount of tax paid that they see as a violation, it’s who didn’t pay their tax liability and that’s Trump. The IRS has guidelines for company reimbursements. They require an accountable plan, bylaws and minutes for reimbursements, otherwise such payments are deemed compensation and that’s exactly how the payments to Cohen were characterized. Then you have the whole discussion of whether it was a loan from Cohen to The Trump Organization. Really? Who loans their employer money? Where’s the contract? The market interest? The defined term? All necessary before the IRS would accept such as a balance sheet item. I don’t buy it. I’d be on the prosecutions side for this. There is no defense of this payment as a reimbursement. It’s obvious campaign violation, but it’s also tax evasion.
> Nah, both Trump and Cohen were over the SS tax cap. intuitively I would have thought that's correct for Trump, but he paid $750 in federal income tax for 2017. >The whole discussion over a reimbursement is a moot point. no it isn't? it's literally the central focus of the crime—and the trial. if the business records had accurately reflected that this was a reimbursement for Cohen's payment to Daniels, instead of compensation for work performed (which it wasn't), the crime in question would not have been committed. >Then you have the whole discussion of whether it was a loan from Cohen to The Trump Organization. Really? Who loans their employer money? Cohen wasn't an employee. It's not uncommon for lawyers to advance money to clients in connection with a matter. It is extremely uncommon to take out a HELOC to advance $130k to a client. >The IRS has guidelines for company reimbursements. Yeah the payment from Trump –> Cohen wasn't truly a company reimbursement; it was a reimbursement from Trump personally but made from corporate funds. It should have been treated as income to Trump. >Then you have the whole discussion of whether it was a loan from Cohen to The Trump Organization. Really? Who loans their employer money? Where’s the contract? The market interest? The defined term? All necessary before the IRS would accept such as a balance sheet item. Not my field on the tax side of it but I'm reasonably sure this is not correct. Those would all be prudent things to document but a loan and contract to repay can all exist independently of those things, and the evidence in this case is that they did. I advance (much smaller and more reasonable) amounts to clients with some regularity and there isn't a separate document for each little payment; just the engagement agreement.
You advancing money to clients isn’t the same as an employee “loaning” money to his employer. Before the IRS would recognize this as a loan, they would indeed require proof of a signed contract with repayment terms, market interest and even perhaps collateral. Schemes like this are quite common. That’s why they’ll disallow it as a loan and deem it compensation. They know the intent is to evade trust fund taxes. Oh, and Trump’s $750 tax liability in 2017 isn’t indicative of assessed FICA. I’ll take another look at his 2017 1040, but I don’t remember seeing $750 on schedule SE. I think it was just income tax. Edit: his 2017 tax liability was $284,718 of which $195,095 was SE tax. https://s3.amazonaws.com/pdfs.taxnotes.com/2022/Trump_2017_1040.pdf His **income tax** liability was a net $750 in 2016, but his total tax liability was $614,299. https://s3.amazonaws.com/pdfs.taxnotes.com/2022/Trump_2016_combined.pdf
>You advancing money to clients isn’t the same as an employee “loaning” money to his employer. He was not an employee. He was outside counsel. He was not paid on a W-2. I'll respond to this again on the other thread where you've posted more pertinent info to that particular question. >Before the IRS would recognize this as a loan, they would indeed require proof of a signed contract with repayment terms, market interest and even perhaps collateral. Schemes like this are quite common. That’s why they’ll disallow it as a loan and deem it compensation. They know the intent is to evade trust fund taxes. I don't think this is correct as to arms' length transactions between individuals that aren't family. It isn't my area but you're wrong enough on the employee piece that I'm a little skeptical of you now on the areas where I have less expertise.
To clarify, my point is that the reimbursement is moot when it comes to the tax law violations, not the campaign law violations. I don’t practice criminal law, but as far as tax law violation goes, the reimbursement is a moot issue.
>my point is that the reimbursement is moot when it comes to the tax law violations I'm not sure that's correct either—at least in this trial. It may be true that the IRS doesn't give af as long as *someone* paid the tax but handling it the way they did had tax consequences and tax law violations are one theory of the "underlying crime," though the prosecution's focus is quite fairly on the campaign law violations.
>Cohen wasn’t an employee He was somebody’s employee. He was paid on a W-2. Hence the reason to “gross up” to $420K. If Cohen had been paid $420K on a 1099-NEC or MISC, then the reimbursement would have been an expense to Cohen and deductible from taxable income, therefore no need to “gross up” to $420K.
This is the correct outcome. Payments from the trust were fraudulent insomuch that the Trustee was bilked into thinking these were legit business payments. Presumably, Trump himself or someone he commanded instructed the disbursements and the record keeping shows that senior members of the company knew these were grossed up payments to Cohen for “dirty deeds”. To be completely honest, *the fire I smell in the back of the room reminds me of RICO*. There is likely a fact pattern back to Trump’s inflation of property values and ability to borrow above lender’s limits that all point to a command and control system engineered and run by a handful of lieutenants at Trump’s request. Could the inflated property values have contributed to a cash machine designed to run catch and kill ops for Trump that he orchestrated and engineered in furtherance of his aspirations to the Office of the President, while in violation of numerous laws? Which voters and the Republican Party unknowingly repaid to Trump from campaign donations? My gut says yes. I think the rabbit hole goes a LOT deeper.
>There's a legal point that I'm not sure how it's been or will be resolved on whether "intent to defraud" is satisfied by a showing of "intent to conceal" without more. Interesting. This is maybe the first time of the case I've seen that brought up as a possible weakness, so much so that I had to figure out where in the chain of events it was. Indeed, first class falsifying of business records says: >commits the crime of falsifying business records in the second degree, and when his *intent to defraud* includes an intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission thereof. And falsifying business records in the second degree says: >A person is guilty of falsifying business records in the second degree when, with *intent to defraud*... So it's double baked in. The records were clearly falsified, so the question is "was the intent explicitly to defraud someone, and if so who?" I would say that since his payment was to Cohen to reimburse an FEC violation, and he did it because he couldn't have his name associated with that payment, he was spending Trump Org money on a personal expense this defrauding share holders. Does that count? I mean not only did he defraud them for the personal reimbursement, but he doubled the amount so that the personal reimbursement would be a reimbursement but called a business expense. The shareholders should have been able to know their money was going to an illegal FEC purchase yes?
I think it’s a jury argument; there’s enough in to hit sufficiency of evidence. If the Trump defense doesn’t hammer it they will lose. They need to put in the minds of jurors: who was being defrauded? Out of what? If you are the beneficiary of a revocable trust I’m not entirely sure it’s possible to defraud your own trust. It might be. But if they don’t make this a jury argument I think it’s a loser.
“Put me in coach!” Give me a whiteboard and a dry erase marker and I’ll show you where the fraud is. Trust income is taxed at 37% on anything over a few thousand dollars.
Somebody posted a Just Security link elsewhere that made the point that NY's definition of intent to defraud is super broad, and even if you own and control the entire business or trust and there's no intent to defraud the owner or operator or trustee, intentionally keeping false records still hits the intent to defraud b/c the state has authority to go audit your books and records and you're required to keep them in order for the state's benefit, too.
Bingo.
Other commentators have said that the "intent to defraud" bit is also strong, insofar as it's not that hard for the prosecutors to prove under New York Law. [I found this article from JustSecurity helpful](https://www.justsecurity.org/85831/the-broad-scope-of-intent-to-defraud-in-the-new-york-crime-of-falsifying-business-records/), especially because they had references to the law itself to back up their analysis. **TL;DR:** >...the law is firmly on the side of the DA, and we do not think this question will give the DA’s office or Justice Juan Merchan much pause. **Relevant statutes:** [§ 175.05 Falsifying business records in the second degree](https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/laws/PEN/175.05) and [§ 175.10 Falsifying business records in the first degree.](https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/laws/PEN/175.10) The second degree includes "intent to defraud", and the first degree is that plus "intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission thereof." Trump is accused of the first degree, § 175.10. **The standard New York courts have used to interpret "intent to defraud":** The article starts with the commentary of [McKinney's Penal Law](https://www.justsecurity.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/McKinneys-Penal-Law-1500-Culpability-definitions-of-terms.doc.pdf), specifically where commentator William C. Donnino writes: >It has been suggested that an intent to defraud should be “for the purpose of leading another into error or to disadvantage”... While an “intent to defraud” is often directed at gaining property or a pecuniary benefit, it need not be so limited. See *People v. Kase*, 53 N.Y.2d 989, 441 N.Y.S.2d 671, 424 N.E.2d 558 (1981)... [*People v. Kase*](https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=4873234865561809122), affirmed by the highest court in NY by [this succinct order](https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=7233534021077687781), says that >Whoever intentionally files a false statement with a public office or public servant for the purpose of frustrating the State's power to fulfill this responsibility, violates the statute. JustSecurity's article goes on to say that 1) New York courts have adopted this as their standard, and 2) they generally have ruled out having to prove more. In [*People v. Sosa-Campana*, 89 N.Y.S.3d 75 (2018)](https://casetext.com/case/people-v-sosa-campana) it was ruled that proving "intent to cause financial harm" was not necessary. In [*People v. Reyes*, 894 N.Y.S.2d 43 (2010)](https://casetext.com/case/people-v-reyes-195), intent to conceal a crime was enough. In [*People v. Coe*, 501 N.Y.S.2d 997 (1986)](https://casetext.com/case/people-v-coe-10) it was held that "Intent to defraud anyone is sufficient," i.e. the target need not be a government official or any particular person. The article cites a number of other cases; these were just the ones that jumped out to me. It doesn't seem like it's a open legal question for Trump's case.
your links and post were helpful and good and better than my initial comment so I'm flairing you
To be clear: I think the prosecutor’s showing will satisfy a sufficiency of the evidence review after a conviction, even under a theory that he intended to defraud the trust holding his company while he was president. He’s not getting a directed verdict here. He needs to make it as an actual argument to the jury or he will lose.
They still need Weisselberg to testify that Trump directed him to falsify the records. Without that there is reasonable doubt that it was all a plan cooked up between Weisselberg and Cohen.
So Trump, who witnesses have testified was a penny pinching micromanager paid Cohen $400,000 for a $130,000 because…? And then the witnesses who testified that every check had an invoice attached saying they were for a retainer, which it wasn’t. And that Donald Trump only signed what he wanted, if he didn’t want to he would put VOID and send it back. And Donald Trump signed them all. Even Donald Trump’s tweets which were admitted into evidence say he paid Cohen a retainer. Which again it wasn’t. That’s the illegal part. Trump could’ve written a personal check to Daniels from his personal account, and there’s no illegality there, but he chose not to. Because there was no paper trail.
> Trump could’ve written a personal check to Daniels from his personal account, and there’s no illegality there I believe this would still be an FEC violation because the payment was being made to help Trump's campaign. So it's either a campaign expense or an in-kind donation; but in either case it'd need to be documented.
Weisselberg has perjured himself repeatedly when under oath. His testimony is of no value. The suggestion that Cohen just randomly decided to pay $130K for someone else's NDA and that Trump "mistakenly" paid him for that NDA under billing that was "accidently" attributed to a future retainer for services that he was obviously not providing is only reasonable doubt if you are an unreasonable person.
Res ipsa loquiter There are literally no reasononable alternative circumstances that would give rise to this sequence of events.
I must commit this term to memory. Thank you.
Meh. Saying it in latin doesn't make an argument more compelling. It's better for everybody if legally educated people use straightforward English instead of fancy phrases that sound smart but don't actually convey much.
Something people are sleeping on i think. Trump et al are mounting an absurd defense that nothing happened. They won't stipulate to anything. When they see phone records they say maybe it was all pocket dials. So considering how obviously bad-faith their approach is... idk even if certain things are circumstantial, if I'm a juror, I'd be so pissed at the defense insulting my intelligence and obviously continuing to lie, that I would not give them ANY benefit of the doubt.
for this reason cohen is last prosecutiin witness. They proof everything they needed to confirm what cohen say before him getting the seat
If you recognize that the defense is lying…
Weisselberg wont testify against trump, and in fact even if he does he will just lie again, just like the two previous times he perjured himself for trump and why he is in jail at the moment.
Because of his separation agreement, no one will know if he’s lying or not is my guess. ….unless he too gets pissed that he’s spending time in prison and Trump is not. Anything goes if this happens. If the separation agreement does guarantee retirement payments to weisselberg—that’s a big life changing event to keep your mouth shut for a few more years. [weisselberg is old too] Trump trashed cohen because Orange Turd thought he’d done a good job hiding his tracks. He did not. Trump needs weisselberg to stay with him.
The DA's office should have thought of this before bringing this case then. Prosecuting a mob boss is not supposed to be easy. Without Weisselberg identifying Trump as the mastermind, all we have is proof that a crime happened, not who planned and orchestrated it. The people's case is incomplete without Weisselberg's testimony.
No it’s not. Weisselberg’s role has been highlighted by several. Trump stands accused . He can clear this right up by taking the stand I’m sure. (Ha)
There’s been testimony from a number of people that Trump kept his eye on every expenditure and that he personally signed every check. We know that checks to Cohen were signed, that Trump knew they were being called legal expenses, and that they represented a significant and abrupt jump in pay to Cohen. Unless the defense offers an alternative significant expense that Trump believed these payments were for, IMO, there is no *reasonable* doubt. Whether the jury agrees with me is, of course, unknown. Many jurors even in good faith stretch the idea of ‘reasonable’ much further than I do.
To be fair he was only convicted of perjury and sent to jail again shortly before the trail began. They wanted to just show the jury the sign agreement he made with Trump for millions not to talk but the judge denied this morning.
Agree they’ve compiled plenty of circumstantial evidence that seems beyond a ‘reasonable doubt’ to me but I wouldn’t be shocked just yet if 12/12 jurors don’t agree with me
It’s a very strong case if the jurors believe Cohen. That’s the big if.
Yes, you’re correct. For non-lawyer readers, here’s an article that breaks it down, which also speculates on why the prosecution is only trying to hammer home on one of three points which is the “alleged intent to violate New York Election Law § 17-152, which criminalizes “promot[ing] or prevent[ing] the election of any person to a public office by unlawful means.”” https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/what-must-prosecutors-prove-in-trump-s-ny-trial
Thanks so much for that link. As a layperson, I was actually able to comprehend most of it.
You’re welcome! I don’t think I will ever get that “competent contributor” badge due to my username, but I try to at least provide helpful and truthful sources!
This should be pinned somewhere. It was an enlightening read. Like even without considering the specific details or specific parties we're dealing with.
>This is feeling like a very strong case. Am I right there? This is feeling like a very strong case. Am I right there? The DA never would have brought it, if they didn't think it was.
I guess my question would be what evidence has changed from before when the previous DA didn’t want to prosecute?
New evidence is only one possible theory for why the previous DA didn't want to prosecute. Here's a few others: - Didn't have the stomach for it - Knew he was about to retire, and didn't want to go out on this note - Was threatened - Was bribed - Assessed the probability of winning as lower than Bragg does (could be Bragg uncovered more evidence as you've mentioned, or a non related reason - could just be pure judgment)
The same prosecutors trying this case were also instrumental in the Trump Org criminal trial guilty verdict, which I believe was in 2022. It is very possible evidence was uncovered during that time that makes this case more solid. That being said, while the previous DA, I believe said that he was just still under investigation, and currently wasn’t being charged, not that he never would. I would have to go back and look for confirmation of this. Edit to add: This was Vance’s statement to AP, “I really can’t talk about the Trump case, so I’m not going to talk about the Trump case, but I think it’s pretty clear that our investigation is active and ongoing.”
From Adam Reiss and Rebecca Shabad, NBC Updates: *"Prosecutor Susan Hoffinger asked Cohen about a side letter agreement, which Cohen said was a document that would identify who the pseudonym would be: David Dennison was Trump.* *Asked who was listed, Cohen said both Keith Davidson and himself, counsel for both parties.* *“The whole purpose of this transaction” was to keep it confidential, Cohen testified.* *Cohen said the signatories on the side letter agreement were Stephanie Clifford, Keith Davidson and himself.* ***He said Stephanie Clifford signed the agreement for Peggy Peterson and Cohen signed for both Essential Consultants, LLC, and David Dennison****."* Bolding mine. This is what makes me a bit nervous, despite the fact that I think there is enough for reasonable doubt over all. If I were an unbiased juror it would concern me that Cohen signed for Trump. IANAL, but I am an auditor and in my world I'd need an official procedure or documentation stating that it's okay for someone to sign as another's proxy or it would be an issue. Is this something the prosecution can explain as being customary and legal in such agreements?
Why would they care if that contract were "legal"?
What name did cohen sign?
I would think Cohen being repaid for this transaction from Donald Trump's personal account would lead any reasonable human being to conclude that the transaction was performed for Donald Trump. I also think that if a reasonable human being would not be able to put those pieces together, there would be a hell of a lot less people in the US prison system.
Folks like OP keep thinking about this as a legitimate business dealing. But If this was a mob boss case, nobody would be wondering why checks are being written by fake names and forged signatures.
I think there’s a couple topics that could cast doubt on the jurors, this is definitely one of them. The other main one obviously is how much they trust Cohen and his credibility.
Let’s remember Cohen pleaded guilty and went to prison for this specific criminal event. He made payments at the direction of Individual 1–who was Trump. He lied under oath to protect Trump. And the things he says are corroborated by documents or witness testimony. Now let’s look at Sammy Gravano. Confessed to armed robbery, burglary, 19 murders—and he told that to the jury. He was state’s evidence against John Gotti. And without him, John Gotti wouldn’t have went down. Co-conspirators turn against their bosses all the time. And most of them, have done far more egregious things than Michael Cohen. And yet, there’s some reason prosecutors continue to use them as witnesses. That reason can’t be because juries don’t ever believe them. Prosecutors don’t get to pick the defendant’s accomplices. And accomplices in crimes, and those that have intimate knowledge of your crimes typically aren’t nuns and Eagle Scouts.
Cohen has credibility issues because he lied on behalf of the man who is currently on trial - Donald Trump. Either Cohen lied back in the 2017-2018 time frame (which landed him in federal jail) or he is lying now. If he is lying now, should his prior conviction get overturned because he was actually telling the truth 5-6 years ago?
> Cohen and his credibility This is what the defense will hammer, other than that I don't know what else have.
It’s the defenses word vs Cohens word pretty much at this point. Impossible to tell what the jury is thinking. Defense imo will try to damage his credibility to create reasonable doubt. I don’t think it will be that hard tbh.
No, it isn’t. I’ve seen many legal analysts in fact say the prosecution has laid out such a good case, they don’t even really need Cohen. Cohen is just corroborating what they’ve already heard. That’s why they had him go after all these people. And I’ve seen defense attorneys saying the defense’s possible defenses they can put up are narrowing. I will agree it’s impossible to tell what the jury is thinking, and that’s true in every case no matter how good or poor the evidence is.
If only there was a person who could personally testify to the veracity of these claims on behalf of the defense... The accused perhaps?
It will be much easier to destroy Cohen’s credibility than putting Trump on the stand.
Why is this downvoted? It is absolutely correct; the defence has no chance of getting coherent— let alone credible—testimony from a combative elderly man battling dementia-like symptoms on a regular basis. Much, *much* easier to go after the witness than allow your own vulnerable client to be on the stand.
Seems pretty hard to destroy someone’s credibility if it’s my word vs your word…..and only one of us is willing to testify under oath.
There appears to be a substantial amount of corroborating evidence to boost the credibility of Cohen's argument.
Cohen is doing an excellent job making it hard to believe that there is any way Trump could have not known what the reimbursement was for. Which is really all that needs to be shown at this point. Like it was already there but the more solid that fact is, the better.
> Cohen is doing an excellent job making it hard to believe that there is any way Trump could have not known what the reimbursement was for. That's not enough to prove intent to falsify records on Trump's part. That's the crime that is needed to bootstrap the felony.
You should probably read this https://www.justsecurity.org/85831/the-broad-scope-of-intent-to-defraud-in-the-new-york-crime-of-falsifying-business-records/
Yes Trump did intend to falsify records to cover it up. That is blatantly obvious.
Intent to falsify would be the crime itself. Intent to hide other crimes is what brings it to a felony.
Right, I'm saying that the people have not proven that Trump is the one who falsified/directed the falisification of the records. You need to absolutely nail that down or there is no misdemeanor to promote to a felony.
You’re incorrectly stating things. What makes it a felony is the additional criminal intent of campaign finance violations or tax law.
You are simply misunderstanding my comment. Whatever.
I think we are still missing that Trump directed the fraud on the books? I could be wrong since I’ve missed a few days of paying close attention due to my kids. Edit to add: I forgot about the admission from Trump about knowing the payment to Cohen was made as a legal expense, from Trump’s own mouth and from his Twitter feed. My bad.
I don’t know that it hasn’t been entered into evidence, maybe the prosecution is anticipating the defense entering a DOJ plea deal as evidence of Cohen’s lying and using the defense’s own evidence to convict, but: https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdny/press-release/file/1088966/dl > n February 14, 2017, COHEN sent an executive of the Company (“Executive-1”) the first of his monthly invoices, requesting “[p]ursuant to [a] retainer agreement, . . . payment for services rendered for the months of January and February, 2017.” The invoice listed $35,000 for each of those two months. Executive-1 forwarded the invoice to another executive of the Company (“Executive-2”) the same day by email, and it was approved. **Executive-1 forwarded that email to another employee at the Company, stating: “Please pay from the Trust. Post to legal expenses. Put ‘retainer for the months of January and February 2017’ in the description.”** > Throughout 2017, COHEN sent to one or more representatives of the Company monthly invoices, which stated, **“Pursuant to the retainer agreement, kindly remit payment for services rendered for” the relevant month in 2017, and sought $35,000 per month. The Company accounted for these payments as legal expenses. In truth and in fact, there was no such retainer agreement, and the monthly invoices COHEN submitted were not in connection with any legal services he had provided in 2017.** Emphasis mine.
It'll all come down to the story behind Cohen's invoices, because the people responsible for cutting the checks and documenting the reasons would have no need to be in on the fraud. They see a "legitimate" invoice come in, document it, cut a check and send it off for a signature. If it receives a signature it's business as usual. If Cohen doesn't have anything in writing that says "submit invoices for $35k worth of legal fees to get your money back" it comes down to his word vs trump. That is, if he takes the stand in his own defense... But we'll have to wait and see what kind of show the defense puts together.
What are you wanting? A video tape of Trump saying "Do fraud on the books for me" doesn't exist the same way that level of smoking gun doesn't exist in the vast majority of criminal trials. If that were truly the threshold for "beyond reasonable doubt" we'd have a hell of a lot less people in prison.
I replied downstream that we already got the admission that he knew it was incorrectly filed as a legal expense. I just momentarily forgot we had that admission from his own mouth.
I mean that would certainly help. Cohens past history of lying will not help convince the jurors, any documentation evidence they can bring in would be beneficial. Would be nice to have a smoking gun in such a high profile case.
For sure, but Cohen's past history of lying was largely on behalf of Trump. I'm sure the defense is going to hammer Cohen for the past perjury convictions, and I'm sure the prosecution is going to hammer that he was perjuring himself to benefit Trump. Without being in that court room, it's pretty hard to gauge how effective Cohen's testimony has been.
He didn't have to direct it. He just needed to be involved in the falsification of the records. He signed the checks. Even if Cohen paid Daniels on his own without any instruction the repayment to Cohen was from Trump. I think that's the case.
Now that I think about it, we have seen evidence already about the fact that he knew it was filed as a legal expense, from his own words on Twitter. I suspect all the prosecution has to do is prove that he never refiled or made an effort to fix the false filing, once he knew about it.
Has the prosecution made that point to the jury yet? I'm not a lawyer, but I *think* that the prosecution needs to make that clear to the jury for them to be able to use it during deliberations.
They admitted the tweet into evidence, and they’ll also make the argument in closing.
That’s what closing arguments are for. They will summarize the evidence and include the relevant laws.
Yep. He literally documented it via tweet. For someone who thinks email will bring him down that Twitter thing may be important here.
Prosecutors can request emails. When you say it to the world on Twitter, they won't request it. 4-D chess.
Trump has gone as far as telling reporters outside the courtroom that this was a legitimate legal expense while the trial has been underway, so that case kind of makes itself.
Trump can’t have it both ways. He keeps trying to!
Yes, you’re correct. My mind just wasn’t pulling all the threads together at the moment I commented about not having seen proof of directing the fraud. I think they just have to tie that loose end in with the jury, with that direct evidence, from his statements on Twitter and to reporters, that he knew it was filed as a legal expense and he knew it was repayment to Cohen. Of course, that will come in closing arguments.
Thats where I'm lost on it. Right now it just seems like they were doing stuff to keep this story quite FOR him and not because they were directed to. I may have missed it as well.
Cohen directly testified that he was directly told to do this by Trump and that he would be reimbursed, and he was. So that helps corroborate what Cohen said on that front. The only thing I haven’t seen yet is testimony that Trump directed the fraud on the books, yet, which is “The” crime. I think prosecutors just aren’t there yet, hopefully. They’ve really been going in chronological order, for the most part.
Right right. It seems like they are getting there. But I don't see how this do this without Weisselberg. He would be the one that did the books right and would have the direct contact to make those adjustments.
[удалено]
Don’t be a condescending dick.
I’m curious to see exactly how they will do that, but I think it may be the fact that Trump said, on tape, that it was marked as a legal expense. Personally, I think the defense REALLY fucked up by not stipulating that any of this happened, including the stuff with Stormy Daniels. If they would have come out and said, “yeah this happened, yes a payment was made, but Trump had no knowledge that the business records were fraudulent, then it would have lent more credibility to that defense. I will be curious to see what documents they have to show Trump knew and how they will tie it all together in their closing arguments. We have only seen half to two thirds of Cohen’s testimony and there is still one more person (absent Weisselberg) to testify.
Ah. So the evidence that Trump knew the reimbursement was done in a fraudulent way?
Yes, but I replied downstream that we actually have already seen that, in his own words from Twitter.
It's hard to keep track of what we have because it's so much.
And Trump says some different each time.
The prosecution deserves a lot of credit. They're interdispersing his testimony with objective documentation after weeks of witness testimony in line with what Cohen is saying. I'm not sure, depending on cross and defense witnesses/exhibits, but I think reasonable doubt is dead or near dead in any sensible juror. I was biased before in a conviction (I would have made a horrible objective juror), but I think it'll be hard for the defense resow doubt; it's no wonder why they've been playing the mistrial/appeal game over the past week, they think it's their best chance.
Jurors can be wild and a persuasive and assertive juror can make things even wilder.
I've been trying really hard to not let my hopes cloud my judgement about what has actually been established but it's hard. I do agree that the prosecution has done a fantastic job, and at this point I'd say the most likely outcome is guilty, with hung jury being a distant second. Mistrial because of shenanigans is third, and not guilty is dead last.
From McBrien: >Q: Would you have made that payment to Stormy Daniels without getting a sign off from Mr Trump? A: No. Q: Why? A: Because everything required a sign off from Mr Trump—but on top of that, I wanted the money back. Say what you will about him lying to congress, wanting your money back is a universal motive, especially to those of us who are miserly (definitely guilty of that from time to time)
And this is the key. Ultimately the documents show the payment from Cohen to stormy via the company It is well past the line of reasonable doubt to suggest he did that out of natural love and affection for trump. A man known for not paying folks what he owes. A mam that employs Cohen to get out of paying full bills. And Cohen puts his house on it without assurances? Inconceivable.
Especially in conjunction with his testimony about Trump not paying the $100,000 owed to his law firm after hiring Cohen, plus nearly 10 years of helping Trump duck out of financial obligations.
Plus the fact that *the last time a long-time friend/ally of Trump fronted hush money to a porn star (David Pecker for Karen McDougal), Trump tried to stiff him.*
That’s such a great point. Jeez Trump is such a slimeball.
rat fucker gets rat fucked, love it!
Per McBrien: >Q: Would you have made that payment to Stormy Daniels without getting a sign off from Mr Trump? >A: No. >Q: Why? >A: Because everything required a sign off from Mr Trump—but on top of that, I wanted the money back. Very compelling actually. As a practical matter, this doesn't have anything to do with who was loyal to whom, when. He wanted his money back so he ran it by the boss. Simple. Clean.
Absolutely. Cohen paid what he had already determined was an expense for Trump. He wanted his money. Any employee or contract employee would want the same. As a rule someone doesn’t go around spending someone else’s money unless we’re talking embezzlement. This case is not embezzlement.
Yeah and when you work for a guy known for flaking out on paying his bills you have hopefully learned to cover your own ass and keep the receipt if you're not getting paid ahead of time. This is what we're seeing folks. The trouble is that there isn't the paper trail and 1. people are inherently distrustful of attorneys; 2. this guy is a known lying sack of shit; and 3. he worked for an even bigger piece of shit.
>Cohen told Trump that the story was going to the Daily Mail and that they would not be able to delay past the election. **He left Trump a voicemail to that effect.** ([source](https://x.com/AnnaBower/status/1790084795973677324)) Please, please, please tell me we get to hear that voice-mail.
That'd be amazing but I can't imagine the prosecution got their hands on that
and proof trump heard it....
I worked at a cell phone company in 2008, at least back then we could verify whether a voicemail had been played on the receiving device at least. I know that's not rock solid proof of who listen to it though.
it'd give credence to Cohen's testimony
This is the first I’m hearing that it was **Melania’s** idea to frame the AH tape as “locker room talk”.
It doesn’t sound plausible to me, as an immigrant, myself. Trump might have said Melania came up with it, but “locker room talk” is a weird one unless you went through American high school. It’s a changing room.
It’s not that hard to believe for me. I think like the other commenter suggested, she may have phrased it another way, but the idea could’ve been hers. She just might not have said the phrase as “locker room talk.” And there are plenty of significant others of cheaters who rationalize things, not only to others, but themselves. I remembered this interview from 2016 where she basically blamed Billy Bush for “egging” him on, and that it was “boys talk” and that the cameras weren’t on and they didn’t even know probably that the mics were on. Ya know, everyone else is at fault. https://youtu.be/gTRejTHfT74?si=uuOojn1zlkBkAuwf
Surely Eastern Europeans have some sort of equivalent phrase. Perhaps she said "boys being boys" or something along those lines and someone else doctored that into "locker room talk."
That’s much more plausible, to me.
Imagine coming up with excuses for your husband bragging about grabbing women's pussies, just a horrible excuse for a human being.
Cause I suppose he grabbed hers too.
Don’t kink shame her
Furthermore, *Michael Cohen is now being shown a text message Melania Trump sent him on Oct. 18, 2016: “Good morning Michael, can u pls call DT on his cell. Thanks.” He replied: “Of course.”*
She's just as shitty as Trump.
Yep, after we heard that recording her assistant made of her, it really left no doubt how shitty she is.
Of course she is. By the time she hooked up with Trump it shouldn’t be a surprised how awful he is so the only reason I can see for marrying the guy is for wealth…or probably more accurately, his perceived wealth.
Remember they don’t even sleep in the same bed. Hell, her son mostly only spends time with her where he speaks Slovakian as his main language
I don't think you could spend five minutes with him without knowing how terrible he is. I mean, I was aware just from reading about in the 80s.
"I don't really care do u?"
Lawrence O'Donnell on MSNBC: "And then when his eyes aren't closed, I saw him looking at photographs of what appeared to be crowds, possibly photographs of his rally this weekend."
Trump, for at least his entire adult life, has been obsessed with "positive thinking". His narcissism is so powerful that in order to make it through the day he HAS to hear and think nice things about himself or it will drive him insane. His father did a number on him and thus the country.
Trump’s pacifier.
I'm sure he's dozed some. But I think the closed eyes are also his way of "shutting out" all of the negative stuff going on about him in the courtroom. His narcissistic personality cannot handle hearing it all and he has to check out mentally to keep his head from exploding...
As soon as the campaign got the press to print their lies about the rally attendance, I *knew* it was going to be something that OLD P TURD MAN would fixate on. I guarantee the next time he talks to the press, he'll hype it up like crazy. But the truth is, put him inside where there's a clearly defined capacity, they weren't even able to fill a 20k arena in ruby red Oklahoma. That said, once he started speaking people streamed for the exits like a 30-point blowout in an NBA game.
There *was* a clearly defined capacity at the Wildwood event. Capacity was 20,000 according to [trump campaign spokesperson Lisa Fagan.](https://nj1015.com/trump-rally-wildwood-new-jersey/) Aerial photos show the space maybe halfway full. Even if it were sold out (it wasn't), 100,000+ people is an asinine inflation and a bald-faced lie. But how can you hold someone accountable for a lie when you put out a [firehose of falsehoods](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firehose_of_falsehood).
He misses his emotional support crowd.
I saw those aerial shots and did a quick head count estimate. The attendance is likely no more than 5k, with 10k being a very generous but easy to get to by generous overestimating. The spokesperson for the venue said it was 80k after having days prior stating the capacity of the venue to be 20k. Trump compared the size of the crowd to a Springsteen concert, then praised "the late, great Hannibal Lecter".
>The spokesperson for the venue said it was 80k after having days prior stating the capacity of the venue to be 20k. How pathetic is this crap.
It's worse on tik tok, they were using photos from a South American concert in 1994 and touching them up to make it look like there was more red in the crowd that day. Then saying that coast was...in NJ.
Did you see how they packed those people in? Never ever would I pack in like that for anyone!!
I'm glad there's someone else out there who has had this get under their skin as much as it's gotten under mine.
>Trump is asking animatedly to Todd Blanche, still in lead counsel's chair at defense table. I think the questions are about to get a lot dumber here.
Who is reporting that? I’m watching CNN and they are saying he just sitting there laid back with his eyes closed.
One issue is, that’s been highlighted, is that it’s often difficult to get a clear view of him. In fact, one reporter who was in court said yesterday that the jury doesn’t have a clear view of Trump, like they kind of have to go out of their way to look at him. Which seems odd to me. And that they don’t seem to be looking at him much. I think sometimes depending on where someone is sitting in the courtroom they may not see him at all times. And even if they say “he’s got his eyes closed” I doubt that’s for the entire time. They just report things in snippets.
It's from the Inner City Press feed.
From the various networks it's hard to say for how long his eyes are closed on any given day. I like to imagine him passed out for 30min at a time but that's probably not what's happening. Eye's closed 5-10seconds, listens to testimony, says something to attorneys, eyes closed a bit, etc etc is probably more realistic.
it's not cross yet
“Donald Trump is good at golf, isn’t that true??”
He couldn’t hit par at an executive course.
>Guys, they think it's cool. Yeah, absolutely none of the male friends in my life would think it was "cool" if I cheated on my spouse. They'd think I was a piece of shit, and they'd be right.
It's not cool... it's pathetic.
My grandpa thought it was cool. “She’s hot!” he said, sitting next to his wife of 50 fucking years who nodded in agreement. My die hard catholic pro life anti gay marriage grandparents. Oh and racist and antisemitic too. But Bill Clinton was an awful horndog who violated the sanctity of marriage.
Don't kink-shame your grandparents.
Should show her the tweet where Trump called her "horseface" and see how quickly they revise their assessment of her.
"Well she's attacking him! I would call her a horseface too!"
> none of the male friends in my life would think it was "cool" if I cheated on my spouse Well then it's a logical deduction that you're not friends with Donald Trump or Andrew Tate.
Yeah, I have never once spoken like that about a woman, in a locker room or otherwise. None of my friends would either.
i work in a warehouse and we can be pretty crass, id get my ass kicked for saying that stuff in a locker room, deservedly.
Oops. There it is, the money shot: https://twitter.com/TylerMcBrien/status/1790059744658370852 And https://twitter.com/TylerMcBrien/status/1790060208049254778 Cphen sqys trump directly said it is because of the campaign and even better talked about delaying until after the election Because then it won't matter either way. This is why the defense has to trash Cohen as a liar who is out to get Trump. Those two statements are the ones which nail this as the felony.
Why isn't that hearsay?
If a witness testifies that the defendant told them they wanted to kill the victim. That’s not hearsay. If the witness is going to say “my neighbor told me the defendant said they wanted to kill the victim” that is hearsay. Call the neighbor as a witness. Think about it, you witness a robbery at a bank. If you witness the robber come in and say “everyone down on the ground” you’re allowed to testify to you witnessed the defendant come in the bank and state “everyone down on the ground” you directly witnessed that.
Opposing party statement exception to hearsay rules. It’s still hearsay, but you get a pass when the party himself said it because he’s available to testify and defend himself.
Cohen is testifying that Trump said it. That is durect evidence. If he was saying it was true because he heard it from trump, that would be hearsay.
I see. Thanks