NY: Trump on Trial!

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

I don’t think this is a difficult case to build reasonable doubt about - all you need is to convince the jury that there’s a chance that there may have been some other motive for the payments besides the election - but the defense team has not done an amazing job thus far.

[emailking]

Unless they completely disbelieve Cohen, I think his testimony puts to rest any possibility that Trump was concerned about Melania in this whole affair. Like his statement that they just need to push it past the election, if he wins he's President and it doesn't matter, if he loses he doesn't care anyway. And also it supposedly was Malania's idea to call Access Hollywood just locker room talk which became a huge right wing messaging push that weekend. lol

[Redban]

If all they have is the former FEC guy, and maybe not even him, then the highlight of their defense is the cross of Cohen and that's not going well so far.

Disagree

- they exposed for the jury that Cohen has an extreme grudge against Trump (e.g. "dictator douchebag," "Cheeto-dusted cartoon villain," "belongs in a cage") and had to be asked by prosecutors to stop talking about Trump.

-  they got Cohen to say he'd like to see Trump convicted in this case

-  they got Cohen to admit that he earned $3-4 million from writing books attacking Trump and selling anti-Trump merchandise

- they got Cohen to admit that he lied several times under oath (e.g. Mueller investigation)

Overall, I still think the prosecution, who rested their case, needed to do more. We still don't know the "other crime," there is not much about Trump's intent (i.e. did Trump know he was commiting or concealing some other crime), and they still never said why the payments couldn't have been legally or reasonably classified as "legal expenses." People ITT are counting on a superstar closing statement to answer those questions and package this case for the jury

[Landslide Lyndon]

https://twitter.com/DougJBalloon/status/1790535811638652970

[Fmr. Gov. NickG]

Serious question: what does the defense’s case look like if they don’t call a single witness to the stand?

It sounds like they are calling expert witnesses, which seems like a pretty reasonable strategy to me.  If you can convince the jury that there is a reasonable interpretation of the law under which Trump isn’t guilty of the crime even if you accept all the prosecution’s facts, you don’t need to contest any of the prosecution’s facts.

[Sir Mohamed]

https://twitter.com/DougJBalloon/status/1790535811638652970

I've honestly lost all my previous respect for the Times. It was a solid newspaper many years ago, but over the last few years, it has been quite bad.

[mjba257]

Serious question: what does the defense’s case look like if they don’t call a single witness to the stand?

It sounds like they are calling expert witnesses, which seems like a pretty reasonable strategy to me.  If you can convince the jury that there is a reasonable interpretation of the law under which Trump isn’t guilty of the crime even if you accept all the prosecution’s facts, you don’t need to contest any of the prosecution’s facts.

What are the chances they call Avennati to the stand? There may be some logistical challenges with him being incarcerated so they'd need to let the judge know now in order to make arrangements to get him there by next week

[emailking]

I'm guessing low since they told the judge at the moment their only witnesses are Trump and the FEC guy and they haven't decided on either of those.

[emailking]

If all they have is the former FEC guy, and maybe not even him, then the highlight of their defense is the cross of Cohen and that's not going well so far.

Disagree

- they exposed for the jury that Cohen has an extreme grudge against Trump (e.g. "dictator douchebag," "Cheeto-dusted cartoon villain," "belongs in a cage") and had to be asked by prosecutors to stop talking about Trump.

-  they got Cohen to say he'd like to see Trump convicted in this case

-  they got Cohen to admit that he earned $3-4 million from writing books attacking Trump and selling anti-Trump merchandise

- they got Cohen to admit that he lied several times under oath (e.g. Mueller investigation)

Overall, I still think the prosecution, who rested their case, needed to do more. We still don't know the "other crime," there is not much about Trump's intent (i.e. did Trump know he was commiting or concealing some other crime), and they still never said why the payments couldn't have been legally or reasonably classified as "legal expenses." People ITT are counting on a superstar closing statement to answer those questions and package this case for the jury

They're good points. It sounds like Blanche's style isn't going over well though.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

I don’t think this is a difficult case to build reasonable doubt about - all you need is to convince the jury that there’s a chance that there may have been some other motive for the payments besides the election - but the defense team has not done an amazing job thus far.

This is untrue AFAIK. Under NY law, the jury can think that Trump did it for some other motive (i.e. to protect his family) as long as they ALSO think that he did it because of the election. In other words, NY law does not require it to be either-or. It can be both.

Which is an important distinction, because I would think it substantially increases the odds of conviction.

[soundchaser]

Serious question: what does the defense’s case look like if they don’t call a single witness to the stand?

It sounds like they are calling expert witnesses, which seems like a pretty reasonable strategy to me.  If you can convince the jury that there is a reasonable interpretation of the law under which Trump isn’t guilty of the crime even if you accept all the prosecution’s facts, you don’t need to contest any of the prosecution’s facts.

Potentially one expert witness — but they haven’t decided to call him yet. I’m just posing the hypothetical that they don’t, which seems bad for their case.

Even still, I don’t think the defense has painted a clear narrative for an alternative reason/interpretation yet.