It’s closing argument day. The hush money trial involving Donald Trump and his alleged payments to adult entertainment star Stormy Daniels is coming to an end. The trial focused on falsifying business records to cover said payments, which are charges seldom brought to trial because it’s not worth the hassle. This case isn’t some Enron-like scandal.
If you want to play this game, this campaign finance violation comes with a fine, not jail time. Most cases of this nature come with a slap on the wrist. When jail time was recommended in past cases, most were no more than a month. We’re dealing with a misdemeanor charge that Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg opted to elevate to felony status for political reasons.
So, what’s going to happen? The jury pool is biased against Trump, which we all saw during the voir dire stage of this circus. While exoneration should be the verdict since I don’t know anyone who would have changed their vote if Trump’s reported tryst was made public, it’s either conviction or a hung jury.
Politico outlined the possible outcomes, though they did highlight at length, albeit buried in the story, how Michael Cohen was an atrocious witness for the prosecution since he's a serial liar who got exposed for being such again during cross-examination. Yet, before that, they had to go through the scenario where the former president is convicted:
Broadly speaking, the D.A.’s office has provided two logical paths for jurors to use to convict Trump — one that goes through Cohen and one that goes around him.
The path through Cohen relies on his testimony about purported conversations that he had with Trump about the relevant events in 2016 and 2017.
If you believe Cohen, his testimony broadly established Trump’s involvement in and knowledge of the underlying effort to purchase Daniels’ story in order to ensure that it did not hurt Trump’s 2016 election chances; prosecutors have characterized that scheme as a conspiracy to influence the election using an illegal campaign contribution. Cohen’s testimony also sought to establish the process for Trump reimbursing Cohen for the payment to Daniels using intentionally falsified business records.
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The second path to a conviction relies on circumstantial evidence, inference and common sense — all of which, as a legal matter, are perfectly appropriate grounds upon which jurors can render a verdict.
There is plenty of reason, even apart from the direct evidence offered by Cohen of Trump’s participation in approving the deal with Daniels and signing off on the false records regarding the reimbursement, to believe that Trump was in on everything and fully aware of the legal risks and implications of what he had done.
After all, Trump was the only full-time participant in all of the key events. He was the person who had sex with Daniels. He was the candidate running for president whose political interests were at risk if Daniels’ account became public. He was a principal (represented by Cohen) in the contract negotiations to acquire Daniels’ story. He was the person who ultimately gave the money for Daniels to stay quiet. And he was the head of the business whose records were falsified in the course of repaying Cohen.
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These two paths — one relying largely on Cohen’s testimony, and one relying largely on circumstantial evidence of Trump’s intent to conceal the commission of a crime when he reimbursed Cohen — aren’t mutually exclusive. For prosecutors to prevail, the jurors don’t have to agree on their reasoning, either, as long as they agree to convict.
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A conviction, however, is not a foregone conclusion.
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The most obvious path to doing so is — and has always been — to focus on Cohen’s credibility issues. After all, according to a poll conducted by Ipsos and POLITICO Magazine in the run-up to the trial, roughly half of the country already believes that Cohen is dishonest.
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These facts are arguably consistent with a legally innocuous scenario: Trump relied on his lawyer and CFO to ensure that Daniels was paid, but he was not aware of the underlying legal implications, and at the point of repaying Cohen, he did not intend to conceal the commission of “another crime.” Justice Juan Merchan precluded Trump’s lawyers from offering a very shaky “advice of counsel” defense — which basically would have allowed Trump to claim that he was simply following Cohen’s advice — but the facts about Cohen and Weisselberg’s involvement hang over the case regardless, and the practical implications may prove unavoidable for one or more of the jurors.
On paper at least, Trump lawyer Todd Blanche’s lengthy cross-examination of Cohen also drew out a series of damaging concessions that are likely to feature prominently in the closing argument.
First, Blanche appears to have established that Cohen is a serial, unrepentant liar who has often lied in legal proceedings to advance his own self-interest. In addition to lying to Congress (which was plausibly done for Trump), Cohen also lied to the Justice Department, to his bank and also to the IRS — all of which he did to help himself personally and financially. He also claims that he lied to the federal judge who took his guilty plea on tax fraud charges.
Second, Blanche appears to have established that Cohen has two classic motives to lie about Trump: vengeance and greed. Cohen acknowledged that he wants to see Trump go to prison the same way he did. He also conceded that he has made millions of dollars working in the media after turning against Trump and improbably becoming something of a hero to the sort of anti-Trump news consumers who get all of their information from cable and social media.
Third, and most damagingly, Blanche credibly identified several possible lies that Cohen told on the stand when he was being questioned on direct examination by prosecutors.
There is more text in the piece about there being a hung jury verdict than a conviction in the piece, though it’s buried. And yes, most it is because Cohen is not a credible witness, whose testimony is scarce on corroborating facts:
“A related weakness in the case also became clear on cross-examination: Cohen was never fully corroborated by other evidence…
Take, for instance, Cohen’s call with Schiller [Trump’s bodyguard] (and maybe Trump) in late October 2016. The fact of the call is corroborated by phone records, but what happened on the call — whether it was about Daniels, the 14-year-old kid prank-calling Cohen or both — is not, and of course, it is the content of the call that matters most.
The piece lists two other instances of Cohen’s testimony that cannot be verified, one of which centered on potential criminal intent on behalf of Trump regarding Cohen’s reimbursement in this purported scheme. Still, the other witness, Allen Weisselberg, was never called to testify. Also, I hope it wasn’t lost on anyone that Cohen seems to admit stealing money from the Trump Organization, an act that is more felonious than anything Trump is dealing with right now:
JUST IN: ‘Star witness’ Michael Cohen admits he stole $30,000 from the Trump Organization while getting questioned by Trump’s attorney.
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) May 20, 2024
Witch hunt.
Cohen said he requested $50k for IT services when the services were only $20k.
Attorney: “You stole from the Trump Organization,… pic.twitter.com/wT0bHbeY67
BREAKING: Cohen Admits Stealing From Trump's Company
— Ed Morrissey (@EdMorrissey) May 20, 2024
Prosecutors have built a case around a serial perjurer and now admitted embezzler about the veracity of Trump's business records. Great job, Alvin Bragg. https://t.co/rqCgvfHAju
“These are all credible flaws and gaps in the prosecutors’ case against Trump. Whether Trump’s legal team can mine them effectively enough to persuade at least one juror to side with them, of course, remains to be seen,” Politico added.
This trial appears to be the best shot the Left has at a conviction. With Special Counsel Jack Smith’s trials against the former president postponed indefinitely and the Georgia RICO case stalled due to alleged ethics violations committed on behalf of the prosecution, this four-pronged legal offensive against Trump has fizzled for now.
Now, we await what the jury hands down.
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