Trump trial live updates: David Pecker called as first witness in hush money case

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

82% : The prosection pays Trump a compliment (kind of) The evidence will show Trump is a “very frugal businessman.
69% : After the election, Trump invited Pecker to Trump Tower to thank him for his contribution to the campaign.
59% : An attorney for the state said they wanted extra assurances because Trump had raised the money with help from a relatively small out-of-state insurance company.
58% : Pecker is The National Enquirer’s former publisher and a longtime friend of Donald Trump.
55% : Trump exits the courtroom After court wraps for day 1 of testimony, Trump exited the court staring straight ahead and down, flanked by lawyers and others from his team.
55% : But his own lawyers are referring to him as “President Trump.”“We will call him President Trump, out of respect for the office that he held,” Blanche said.
53% : But he’s also here in this courtroom, doing what any of us would do: defending himself,” Blanche said as Trump looked on with interest.
53% : Colangelo told jurors they would hear Trump in his own voice, saying, “What do we got to pay for this?
53% : Trump turned in his seat and looked briefly in their direction.
51% : ”Yet, when it came to reimbursing Cohen, Trump paid him double.
48% : After departing Trump Tower a little after 8:30 a.m., Trump is posting some of his most common refrains from Truth Social.
46% : The other is the nearly $1 million fine that a federal judge in Florida last year ordered Trump and one of his attorneys to pay.
45% : Unfolding as Trump vies to reclaim the White House, the trial will require him to spend his days in a courtroom rather than the campaign trail.
43% : He went on to describe Trump as a former president but also an everyday person — a man, a husband, a father.
40% : At the same time, he noted, courts have sided with Trump in legal disputes with Daniels and that she owes him a substantial sum of cash.
39% : Trump “had nothing to do” with the invoice, the check being generated or the entry on the ledger, Blanche said.
39% : ▶ Read more about what prospective jurors said about Trump.
37% : ”Colangelo told jurors they would hear a recording Cohen made in September 2016 of himself briefing Trump on the plan to buy McDougal’s story.
37% : Prosecutors say Trump obscured the true nature of the payments in internal records when his company reimbursed Cohen, who pleaded guilty to federal charges in 2018 and is expected to be a star witness for the prosecution.
36% : Tomorrow’s first order of business Before testimony resumes, Merchan will hold a hearing Tuesday morning on the prosecution’s request to hold Trump in contempt of court and fined at least $3,000 for allegedly violating his gag order by making social media posts about witnesses.
36% : Trump had nothing to do with any of the 34 pieces of paper, the 34 counts, except that he signed the checks, in the White House, while he was running the country.”
36% : Before heading into the courtroom, Trump addressed a camera in the hallway, once again saying that it’s “unfair” he has to be there, rather than out campaigning.
35% : But the New York prosecution has taken on added importance because it may be the only one of the four cases against Trump that reaches trial before the election.
35% : A conviction would not preclude Trump from becoming president again, but because it is a state case, he would not be able to attempt to pardon himself if found guilty.
35% : Trump has denied having a sexual encounter with Daniels, and his lawyers argue that the payments to Cohen were legitimate legal expenses.
34% : Witness David Pecker, far right, talks on the witness stand while Donald Trump, far left, looks on as assistant district attorney Joshua Steingless asks questions with Judge Juan Merchan presiding in Manhattan criminal court Monday, April 22, 2024, in New York.
34% : “President Trump fought back, like he always does, and like he’s entitled to do, to protect his family, his reputation and his brand, and that is not a crime,” Blanche told jurors.
34% : Defense claims Trump had ‘nothing to do’ with payments Blanche portrayed the ledger entries at issue in the case as pro forma actions performed by a Trump Organization functionary.
34% : But Colangelo said Trump still had a few “loose ends” to tie up, including reimbursing Cohen for the payments he had given to Daniels.
34% : Trump wasn’t charged in that case.
33% : The prosecutor said evidence will show the Republican National Committee even considered whether it was possible to replace Trump with another candidate.
32% : Trump is charged with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records and could face four years in prison if convicted, though it’s not clear if the judge would seek to put him behind bars.
32% : Trump has nonetheless sought to turn his criminal defendant status into an asset for his campaign, fundraising off his legal jeopardy and repeatedly railing against a justice system that he has for years claimed is weaponized against him.
31% : The bond stops the state from potentially seizing Trump’s assets to satisfy the more than $454 million that he owes after Judge Arthur Engoron in February concluded that Trump and others had deceived banks and insurers by exaggerating his wealth on financial statements.
31% : While arguing that Trump did nothing illegal when his company recorded the checks to Cohen as legal expenses — prosecutors say they were veiled reimbursements meant to cover up Cohen’s payments to Daniels — Blanche is also challenging the notion that Trump agreed to the Daniels payout to safeguard his campaign.
31% : “Neither Trump nor the Trump Organization could just write a check to Cohen with a memo line that said ‘reimbursement for porn star pay-off,’” Colangelo said.
31% : As the prosecution makes their argument, jurors are largely stone-faced All 18 jurors are looking directly at the veteran prosecutor, who stands at a lectern in the middle of the courtroom about halfway between them and Trump.
30% : Court subsequently took a break and Trump left the courtroom without speaking to reporters in the hallway.
30% : Trump was forced to listen silently as potential jurors offered their opinions of him
30% : Jail time is just one of the stakes Trump faces Former President Donald Trump speaks to the media alongside his attorney Todd Blanche, right, as they exit the courtroom following proceedings in his trial, Friday, April 19, 2024, at Manhattan Criminal Court in New York.
29% : cannot make a serious decision about President Trump relying on the words of Michael Cohen,” Blanche said.
28% : “There’s nothing illegal about what you will hear happened among the National Enquirer, AMI, David Pecker and Donald Trump,” Blanche said, adding: “It’s not a scheme, unless a scheme means something that doesn’t matter, that’s not illegal.”
28% : In the prosecution’s openings, Donald Trump was referred to as “the defendant.”
28% : The prosecution hones in on Stormy Daniels Within days of the “Access Hollywood” tape becoming public, Colangelo told jurors that The National Enquirer alerted Cohen that porn actor Stormy Daniels was agitating to go public with her claims of a sexual encounter with Trump in 2006.“At
28% : But Merchan said that in his view there is “no reason” why a transcript of the video, where Trump boasted about grabbing women’s genitals without permission, “should not be admitted into evidence.”
27% : Trump arrives at the courthouse He walked straight inside.
27% : In the tape, from 2005, Trump boasted about grabbing women without permission.
27% : To convict Trump of a felony, prosecutors must show he not only falsified or caused business records to be entered falsely, which would be a misdemeanor, but that he did so to conceal another crime.
26% : Trump claims Judge Merchan is forcing him to skip his son’s graduation.
26% : Judge Merchan bars prosecutors from bringing up two Trump legal cases While allowing for Trump — if he testifies — to be questioned to a limited extent about his recent civil business fraud trial and writer E. Jean Carroll’s defamation lawsuits against him, Merchan declined prosecutors’ requests to bring up two other legal cases.
26% : Strict limits will be placed on what prosecutors can question Trump about regarding those cases, including prohibiting them from eliciting the amounts of the monetary penalties imposed, said Merchan.
26% : KAREN MCDOUGAL — A former Playboy model who said she had a 10-month affair with Trump in the mid-2000s.
25% : President Trump did not commit any crimes.
24% : Trump shows no reaction as excerpt from ‘Access Hollywood’ tape read aloud Colangelo told jurors that The Washington Post’s publication of the 2005 “Access Hollywood” tape, where Trump was heard on a hot mic “bragging about sexual assaults,” “was immediate and explosive.”
24% : Prosecutors can cross-examine Trump about several of his recent legal setbacks if he chooses to testify, judge rules Trump shook his head as Judge Merchan ruled that prosecutors could ask him about the outcome of his recent civil business fraud trial, in which another judge found that Trump, along with his business and key executives, fraudulently inflated his wealth on paperwork used to secure loans and insurance.
24% : Now a criminal defendant, Trump will instead spend the next several weeks subjected to strict rules that strip him of control over everything from what he is permitted to say to the temperature of the room.
24% : Prosecutors say she spoke with Trump by phone during a frenzied effort to keep allegations of his marital infidelity out of the press after the infamous “Access Hollywood” tape leaked weeks before the 2016 election.
23% : Blanche emphasized that although prosecutors described the allegations in their opening as a conspiracy, they didn’t actually charge Trump with conspiring.
23% : As Colangelo read aloud words from the tape, Trump showed no reaction.
22% : Daniels has made “hundreds of thousands of dollars” since her allegations against Trump became public, Blanche said.
22% : He said that Cohen turned against Trump only after he was not given a job in the administration and found himself in legal trouble.
22% : While prosecutors allege Trump reimbursed Michael Cohen $420,000 — more than double what Cohen paid to Daniels — because the cover-up was crucial to the campaign, Blanche said the excess payments are proof that Trump had nothing to do with the scheme.
22% : The timing of this case lends to its significance The allegations at the heart of this case don’t accuse Trump of an egregious abuse of power like the federal case in Washington charging him with plotting to overturn the 2020 presidential election, or of flouting national security protocols like the federal case in Florida charging him with hoarding classified documents.
21% : The defense’s opening statements begin Trump’s lawyer Todd Blanche began, “President Trump is innocent.
18% : Trump sits down in court ahead of opening statements Republican presidential candidate and former President Donald Trump sits in the courtroom at his criminal trial at Manhattan state court in New York, Monday, April 22, 2024.
18% : Trump denies having sex with Daniels.
18% : Trump denies having sex with McDougal.
16% : Blanche accused Cohen of being “obsessed with President Trump,” saying “his entirely financial livelihood depends on President Trump’s destruction.”“You
16% : The judge levied the penalty after finding that Trump filed a “completely frivolous” lawsuit against his 2016 rival Hillary Clinton and others.
16% : Trump is accused of falsifying internal business records as part of an alleged scheme to bury stories he thought might hurt his presidential campaign in 2016.
16% : Trump is accused of falsifying internal business records as part of an alleged scheme to bury stories he thought might hurt his presidential campaign in 2016.
16% : One such payment was a $130,000 sum that Michael Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer and personal fixer, gave to porn actor Stormy Daniels to prevent her claims of a sexual encounter with Trump from emerging into public shortly before the 2016 election.
15% : Opening statements underway in Trump’s hush money trial For the first time in history, prosecutors are presenting a criminal case against a former American president to a jury as they accuse Donald Trump of a hush money scheme aimed at preventing damaging stories about his personal life from being public.
14% : Trump also spoke at length about another hearing taking place at a nearby court, regarding the $175 million bond he paid in his civil fraud case.
14% : For the first time in history, prosecutors will present a criminal case against a former American president to a jury as they accuse Donald Trump of a hush money scheme aimed at preventing damaging stories about his personal life from becoming public.
13% : Opening statements have begun “The defendant, Donald Trump, orchestrated a criminal scheme to corrupt the 2016 presidential election.
12% : In a nearby Manhattan civil court on Monday, state lawyers and an attorney for Trump settled their differences over a $175 million bond that Trump posted to block a large civil fraud judgment while he pursues appeals.
12% : (Christine Cornell via AP, Pool) Over the past week, Donald Trump has been forced to sit inside a frigid New York courtroom and listen to a parade of potential jurors in his criminal hush money trial share their unvarnished assessments of him.
10% : Prosecutors say he met with Trump and Cohen at Trump Tower in August 2015 and agreed to help Trump’s campaign identify negative stories about him.
10% : Prosecutors say he met with Trump and Cohen at Trump Tower in August 2015 and agreed to help Trump’s campaign identify negative stories about him.
9% : Colangelo ended by saying the evidence will lead to “one inescapable conclusion,” that Donald Trump is guilty Next up, Trump’s defense attorney Todd Blanche.
9% : (AP Video: David R. Martin) Trump ‘desperately did not want this information’ Speaking of the arrangements made to pay former Playboy model Karen McDougal $150,000 to suppress her claims of a nearly year-long affair with the married Trump, Colangelo said Trump “desperately did not want this information ... become public because he was worried about its effect on the election.
9% : Trump speaks out about ‘unfair’ trial Former president Donald Trump leaves Trump Tower on his way to Manhattan criminal court, Monday, April 22, 2024, in New York.

*Our bias meter rating uses data science including sentiment analysis, machine learning and our proprietary algorithm for determining biases in news articles. Bias scores are on a scale of -100% to 100% with higher negative scores being more liberal and higher positive scores being more conservative, and 0% being neutral. The rating is an independent analysis and is not affiliated nor sponsored by the news source or any other organization.