by Alexis Simendinger & Kristina Karisch | The Hill
Manhattan prosecutors turned Monday to star witness Michael Cohen to describe the crux of their alleged criminal evidence against former President Trump stemming from his bid for the White House in 2016.
Cohen’s account of doing Trump’s bidding to hide extramarital sex as Trump sought the presidency eventually angered the defendant. Trump exited the courtroom to say he chafed at being off the campaign trail and he read at length from articles written by legal allies. Trump also blasted the presiding justice after hours of listening, sometimes with his eyes closed, to his former “fixer” retell a story now internationally familiar.
The Hill: Angry Trump blasts Justice Juan Merchan following Cohen’s testimony.
Accompanying witness testimony, which Trump challenges, is alleged evidence gathered in documents, text messages, email and phone calls.
It would be embarrassing but not a felony if Trump was intimately involved in hush payments that were paid by Cohen to two women to lock up their stories about sex with the then-businessman. Cohen says he received reimbursement from Trump for funds he expended on his boss’s behalf. But the criminal charge against Trump is pegged to evidence that Trump sought to disguise the repayments as mundane legal expenses to hide his activities from voters during a presidential election. Trump denies all charges.
Just do it,” Cohen recalled his boss saying when approving a plan to repay him for concluding a deal to buy silence from adult-film personality Stormy Daniels.
He described being deeply involved in attempts to protect Trump’s campaign from scandal, including by covering up Daniels’s tale of sex with a married Trump. The former president’s ex-attorney testified that his then-boss feared the story could sink his 2016 electoral hopes.
The Hill’s Niall Stanage weaves with five takeaways the day’s vivid Cohen testimony and the foundation of the prosecution’s case thus far.
Cohen, convicted for lying to Congress and to investigators, is expected back on the stand today. His cross-examination by the defense team is expected to be harsh after linking Trump directly to hush payments ahead of the 2016 election. The trial will take a break Wednesday and Friday and prosecutors have suggested they may rest their case by the end of the week.