Donald Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen is scheduled to return to the stand for the last time on Monday before prosecutors rest their case against the former president in Trump’s criminal hush money case.
Cohen said last week that Trump was deeply involved in a scheme to hide information from voters in the run-up to the 2016 election, but a scathing cross-examination undermined Cohen’s overall credibility with jurors. It may have been damaged.
Trump is on trial on charges that he falsified business records to hide repayments for hush money Cohen paid adult film actress Stormy Daniels to improve Trump’s chances of winning the 2016 presidential election. ing. The former president has denied all wrongdoing.
Prosecutors are scheduled to adjourn their case Monday morning, but the defense has not yet said who they plan to call to testify, including whether Trump will testify in his own defense.
Defense attorneys have indicated they may call federal campaign finance law expert Bradley Smith and are leaving the door open to calling rebuttal witnesses.
Judge Juan Melchan asked both sides to be ready to make closing arguments on Tuesday morning.
During Cohen’s cross-examination on Thursday, defense attorney Todd Blanche accused Cohen of lying about an alleged phone call with President Trump related to hush money payments to the Stormy Daniels family.
Mr. Cohen called Mr. Trump’s security guard, Keith Schiller, on October 24, 2016, and Mr. Schiller handed the phone to Mr. Trump to “discuss the Stormy Daniels issue and solutions” with Mr. Cohen. He testified that he was able to do so.
On Thursday, Mr. Blanche presented evidence suggesting that Mr. Cohen had lied about the purpose of the call, saying that Mr. Cohen was actually calling Mr. Schiller to complain about the teen’s prank call. insisted.
Jurors saw text messages between Cohen and the prank caller on the same day that Cohen and Trump allegedly made the call.
“Due to continued and ongoing harassment of both your cell phone and the main line of your organization, this number has been sent to the Secret Service,” Cohen texted the teenager.
“It wasn’t me,” the 14-year-old prank caller replied. “My friend told me to call.”
Jurors also saw text messages between Mr. Cohen and Mr. Schiller prior to the 8:02 p.m. phone conversation.
“Who do I talk to about the harassing calls to my cell phone and office? The drug addict forgot to block calls to one of them,” Cohen texted Schiller. Ta.
“Call me,” Schiller texted Cohen at 8:02 p.m.
When faced with the alleged discrepancy, Cohen stood by his original testimony, insisting that he not only talked to Schiller about the perpetrator of the prank call, but also talked to Trump about hush money payments.
“That was a lie. You didn’t talk to President Trump that night. You talked to Keith Schiller about what we just went through. Can you admit that?” Blanche said, raising her voice. We confronted each other.
“No, I can’t. I don’t know if that’s accurate,” Cohen replied.
While this cross-examination may have caused widespread damage to Cohen’s credibility, the specific phone call highlighted by Branch was the first of many conversations between Cohen and Trump related to the Daniels’ pay. Just one of them. Cohen testified that he had multiple other phone calls and in-person meetings, both in Trump Tower and in the Oval Office, in which he discussed how to address Stormy Daniels’ claims and how Cohen planned to make the payments. He claimed to have discussed it. and plans to redeem Cohen in 2017.
Trump has repeatedly announced his intention to testify during the trial.
President Trump told ABC News on March 25, “I have no problem testifying. I did nothing wrong.”
“I will absolutely testify,” President Trump said on April 12. “This is fraud. It’s fraud. It’s not a trial. It’s not a trial. It’s fraud.”
But President Trump appeared to backtrack on that idea earlier this month, lying to reporters that he could not testify because of the case’s limited gag order, which prohibits extrajudicial statements about witnesses or jurors. is.
In court the next day, Judge Juan Melchan made it clear that President Trump had an “absolute right” to testify in person and that the gag order did not apply to what he said in court.
“Mr. Trump, I want to emphasize that you have an absolute right to testify in court if you do so after consulting with your attorney,” Marchand said.
