Republican presidential candidate and former President Donald Trump. Photo / AP
The 45th President of the United States will from today not only be fighting an election campaign but also criminal charges.
The aptly dubbed “hush money case” marks the beginning of Donald Trump’s slew of criminal trials.
The Manhattan trial will focus on accusations the former President falsified his company’s business records in connection to a $130,000 payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels in the run-up to the 2016 election.
According to prosecutors, while in the White House, Trump reimbursed his former attorney, Michael Cohen, in a series of installment payments processed by Trump’s company.
Prosecutors say Trump fraudulently disguised those installments as corporate legal expenses, violating New York law.
Trump denies any wrongdoing.
Politico magazine senior writer and former federal prosecutor Ankush Khardori told The Front Page Trump faces 34 felony counts in one indictment.
Khardori expects Trump’s defence team will take a wrecking ball to Cohen’s credibility - or lack thereof.
“He [Cohen] has a long history of lying to federal government entities. I think he’s actually lied to every branch of our federal government in recent years and effectively admitted to it.
“Trump’s lawyers, I would expect, would want to portray him as a critical element of the case and be able to argue to the jury: ‘Well, if you can’t believe this guy, the whole case is garbage, too’.”
Another tactic his team could use is that the hush money wasn’t paid to affect the 2016 election - but to save his family embarrassment.
“I don’t know how much in the way of lives that a defense like that’ll have unless Trump himself takes the stand,” Khardori says.
“He has indicated that he would take the stand in this case, but Trump is an inveterate liar. So, I have no idea if that’s true or if he ever will actually do it. He has testified in some civil cases very recently, and that all went very poorly for him.”
Khardori also points to another possibility: for Trump’s team to ask the judge to instruct jurors that they can convict him not on the felony counts but on the lesser misdemeanor offences.
“There are several apparent benefits [to this]. The most obvious is that it’s less serious criminal misconduct and as a result, any chance that Trump may face a period of incarceration, you expect that to be significantly reduced,” Khardori says.
Trump’s attorneys did not respond to a request from Khardori for comment.
Polling conducted by Ipsos and Politico suggests a conviction in Manhattan could hurt Trump electorally, particularly with independents.
“Now, this is all very new, polling in this area and this sort of political and legal situation that the country is confronting... But, that’s what people are saying. They’re saying that they care about this case and all the others.”
Khardori has spoken to insiders who believe the prosecution’s case won’t hinge on Cohen’s testimony.
“I spoke to Lanny Davis, who was Michael Cohen’s legal advisor durng a very crucial part of this story - when Cohen was interviewing with the DA’s office and giving them information.
“Davis was very careful in our discussion not to divulge anything he learned from those meetings, but he was very insistent and wanted to convey quite clearly in his estimation we will be seeing a lot more corroborating evidence in the form of other witnesses, documents, text messages, financial records, things like that,” Khardori said.
Stormy Daniels
The adult film star, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, is expected to testify. She was considering giving a story to a tabloid about her extramarital affair with Trump and will likely testify about a cover-up plot involving hush money and a contract she signed to keep quiet. Last year, she said if a better leader isn’t elected to lead America in 2024, then speaking out about her alleged fling with the former President will have been for nothing.
Michael Cohen
Trump’s former personal lawyer from 2006 to 2018. Reuters reports Cohen pleaded guilty in 2018 to federal charges that he violated campaign finance law through the payment to Daniels. He separately pleaded guilty later that year to lying to Congress in 2017 about a real estate project in Moscow, though he says he did so to protect Trump. Most recently, he testified last year against Trump in a trial focused on New York Attorney-General Letitia James’ lawsuit alleging that Trump and his company duped banks, insurers and others by giving them financial statements that inflated his wealth.
The National Enquirer
David Pecker is the former CEO of American Media Inc., which published the National Enquirer during the period of the alleged offending. One of the prosecution’s goals will be to persuade the jury Trump orchestrated a cover-up, using the “catch-and-kill” tactic - wherein a story is paid for, but then never published.
Allen Weisselberg
The ex-Trump Organisation CFO was recently sentenced to five months in jail for lying under oath in a civil fraud case, after pleading guilty last month to two counts of perjury in the first degree. It’s unclear what role, if any, he’ll play in the hush money trial.
Others
“There’s a witness list that indicates a White House aide during Trump’s time in the White House may be called as a witness and I imagine there will be some fairly unexciting witnesses [too]. I believe the controller who worked at Trump’s organisation may testify,” Khardori says.
Listen to the full episode to hear more about how Trump’s Manhattan trial could play out and about his other criminal charges.
The Front Page is a daily news podcast from the New Zealand Herald, available to listen to every weekday from 5am. The podcast is presented by Chelsea Daniels, an Auckland-based journalist with a background in world news and crime/justice reporting who joined NZME in 2016.
You can follow the podcast at iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
The Kremlin refuses to comment on Ukrainian allegations.