Trumps relationship with the National Enquirer was even sleazy or than it looked into the lead starts right now former Tabloid Publisher david pecker, under oath on the record revealing just how far donald trump wins, allegedly to protect his 2016 president ial campaign. But when it comes to whether trump committed a felony in the process how damaging was todays testimony. And that infamous meeting in august 2015, what packer said went down in that room that could hurt Donald Trumps case nearly nine years later, plus trumps legal team admonished in court today, scolded by the judge over social media posts by the former president that prosecutors say violated a gag order coming up the tough decision for the judge deciding how to punish trump welcome to the leaf im jake tapper. Were going to start with our Law And Justice lead a dramatic day of testimony in the new york hush money coverup trial. Tabloid mobile. David pecker testified in front of his longtime friend, donald trump, revealing details about there shall we call it symbiotic relationship and the extent of the trump teams say, over the popular National Enquirer tabloid, including weighing in on running negative stories about trumps political opponents. Now, refresh your memory of how deep in the tank the National Enquirer was for trump in 2016, the editors were not only buying negative stories about trump in order to not run them, to bury them, to hide them from the public. But heres a look at some of those covers over the National Enquirer during the campaign. Hillary, six months to live, blared the tabloid nine years ago hilary going to jail and one that. Said corrupt on the stand today, david pecker also revealed how at a meeting in 2015, former President Trump and his attorney and fixer Michael Cohen, asked pecker how he could quote, help the Campaign Pecker testified he agreed to be the eyes and ears of the campaign and would notify Michael Cohen if he ever heard of any womens selling any stories about trump than he would act to buy those stories and then kill them to benefit the trump campaign. He testified Michael Coleman would also call pecker an ask be enquirer to run negative stories about trumps opponents, such as marco rubio or ted cruz. Heres one of the ridiculous ted cruz smears on a cover shown in court today from may 2016 ted cruz, father linked to Jfk Assassination exclamation point. Now obviously, this is deranged nonsense, but we should know this story came out in may 2016 when packer testified ted cruz was gaining popularity during the republican primaries. Another sleazy baseless hit piece against ted cruz, cruises five secret mistresses not true vial, unfair to cruise horrible to his wife, horrific to their two daughters unfair to those five wimp becker also testified about the first time he ever paid to kill a story about donald trump. It was apparently November 2015 and pecker had former National Enquirer editor and chief dylan howard pay 30,000 to a doorman who was selling and apparently false story about donald trump allegedly father and his son with someone not his wife. Pecker said that the story turned out to be 1,000 false. But quote, i made the decision to purchase the story because because of the potential embarrassment and would have been to the campaign and to mr. Trump pecker testified about a second catch and kill deal, this time involving 1998 playmate of the year, Karen Mcdougal and the ten month romance. She alleges she had with mr. Trump packer testified today that when donald trump heard that her story might come out, trump told packer, quote anytime you do anything like this it always gets out. Okay . Who knows what donald trump was thinking when mr. Pecker testified all of this in court today, when the National Enquirer endorse trump back in 2016, trump, after all, returned the favor ive always said, why didnt the National Enquirer get the Pulitzer Prize for edwards and o j simpson and all of these things i think maybe we got an idea today why the National Enquirer hasnt been awarded any policy prizes. Cnns Kara Scannell was in court for all this. Kara, how attentive . Word jurors, as all of this sleeves was displayed before them jake, it was a very short Court Session today. David pecker was on the and for just over two hours. And during his testimony, the jurors appear to be paying close attention. You could see when pecker was testifying, he often looked at the jury box when he was answering some of the questions. And you could see the jurors eyes following him back to the prosecutor, who would then ask the followup question. A bit like a tennis match for their heads going back and forth. We also saw there was some evidence introduced today, some emails. This agreement, the that was painted trumps the doorman at trump tower that came into evidence and you can see the jurors looking down at the monitors. They all have a monitor that shows what the email is thats being displayed to the courtroom and also to them individually. So we saw a lot of them looking down, paying attention to the exhibits that were being entered into evidence today, but could see some people were pretty engaged, paying attention following the testimony and following the backandforth between the questions. Its hard to imagine them not paying attention. It was rather riveting kara courts out tomorrow. But it sounds as though david pecker will be back on the stand thursday after all, they didnt get to the the big crescendo here, the Stormy Daniels lets catch and kill. What should we expect on thursday right . I mean, today, david pecker with setting this up, explaining what prosecutors say was this key august 2015 meeting where this alleged conspiracy was hatched between trump, Michael Cohen, and david pecker. So when he is back on this in on thursday, he will then begin to describe the Karen Mcdougal deal we got just the beginning of this today where they learned about her allegation of a romantic relationship with trump, and theyre figuring out what to do with it. When he left us 20 today was that he was being called frequently by a by Michael Cohen who wanted to know where things stood. So that will pick up on thursday, understanding how this deal ended up being one of these caching kills were ami paid 150,000 start to go away and then shifting into the Stormy Daniels payment that is at the heart of this case. And what that transfer and how am i found out about it and how it ultimately led to Michael Cohen being the one to pay the 130,000 that then prosecutor Peter Say Trump reimbursed in width so that well get to the key elements of this case when pecker is back on the stand on thursday. All right. Kara scannell outside the courthouse in manhattan. Thanks so much for joining us. Sounded discuss is jeremy saland, a former prosecutor with manhattan District Attorney, as well as Trial Attorney misty marris. Welcome to both you, jeremy, let me start with you because the prosecution argued today, quote, the entire case is predicated on the idea that there was a conspiracy to influence the election in 2016. In your view . How helpful has peckers testimony been to this central argument of a conspiracy, even though they havent charged anyone with conspiracy well, i think you can say Josh Steinglass in the prosecutors that a fabulous job. They ask the right questions and they got the right answers. Youve heard from so many different pieces here you hear about the ban and you hear about going to signal which is an app to cover up buck communications, not being uncertain phones. You hear about why there isnt a formal agreement between donald trump and david pecker. You understand that things were being run by Michael Cohen to confirm that the story should be run or shouldnt be run, youve got all well the foundational pieces, the bricks, if you will to build this foundation and were only in the beginning, but he did a fabulous job, yet to be crossexamined, but were moving in the right direction. If were the prosecution, misty notably, david pecker testified that trump was cautious and frugal in his handling of money, so much so that he personally reviewed invoices and signed checks. He called him. I think he called the meticulous and your experience is that enough to prove to the jury that trump had to have been aware of any falsified Business Records and the idea that theyre paying Michael Cohen to reimburse him for these Hush Money Payments as opposed to just filing off money for a retainer . Yeah. This is a really important part of the prosecutions case. Remember, the defense called the 34, they call the 34 pieces of paper as far as the falsification of the Business Records its very, very critical for donald trump to be aware of those false vacation of Business Records. And then the second piece is in furtherance of another crime, which in this case is. Likely to be a violation of new york election law. And thats why this conspiracy, this aspect of the meeting of the minds between pecker cohen and trump is central to the prosecutions case. Now the flip side is that we anticipate donald trump argued theres lots of reasons to kill stories about affairs could have to do with reputation, could have to do with his wife but date picker testified today that this was directly related to the election. So to your point, jake, the his awareness of all of these circumstances and Donald Trumps participation and being involved in the process is central to what the prosecution needs to prove. Jeremy david pecker said he tried to keep his agreement with trumps secret tests defining quote, i told him were going to try to help the campaign and to do that, i want to keep this as quiet as possible. Thats what pecker says. He said then a prosecutor had pecker confirm that the positive stories about trump were of Mutual Benefit . But stopping stories from being printed about trump, catching and killing stories that would have sold on the newsstand, but he killed them like Karen Mcdougal only benefitted the campaign and did not benefit the National Enquirer. Explain why that clarification was necessary because who the winner out of all this, when we look at the intent and what the purpose and goal is, you have to see, well, why are we doing this . And thats a big question. The jurys going to ask and youre going to get some of that direct evidence. But it also doesnt take a Leap Of Faith to say, well, Michael Cohens not benefiting. What is he necessarily getting directly david pecker now clears up that other piece. Were not getting in any extra money. Were not getting extra oversight. A. Pardon me, more publicity for our articles. Hr actually losing that publicity. So who is the person whos winning here, who has the motive, who has the intent. Thats donald trump. And with all of these bricks, as i mentioned before, its putting it together and its creating that foundation and doing it very, very well at all points to one person while trump key bona, right . Who benefits as jeremy mentioned, pecker says Michael Cohen suggested they switch to talk on signal rather than on a landline or a regular cell phone explain why thats significant yes. Signal is notorious for being private messages. Theres the types of Methods Judges that wouldnt necessarily be found if there were two b. Discovery. And so that the air of using signal is something that could be a bit more nefarious. And thats why its really a big part of the case that not only are these communications happening, theyre having these discussions about the stories that are being planted and also being removed from the enquirer. But theyre doing it in a secretive way. Now that leads to that old issue of intent, mens riaa, why is it secret . Well, its secret because its in furtherance of another crime and Jeremy David Pecker would even testified, to even test started today, quote when we were preparing an article for the National Enquirer, wed communicate what we were doing at the direction of the article from Michael Cohen we would also send him the pdfs the visuals of the story. Before it was published, Unquote Pecker added cohen had been former role in Trumps Campaign and quoting injected himself into the campaign, but often called pecker and urged him to run negative stories about trumps opponents. And we saw them against cruz, against rubio, against hillary. What do you make of cohens role here . Well, we also heard from a pardon me, from pecker that Michael Cohen said the boss is pleased or something to that effect, something going along those lines he was the gobetween. He was almost a de facto person for the campaign. If you believe the prosecution story and as it comes out, that really manipulated the press via via the enquirer to either as we said, kill the bad stories or promote the, promote the sois that adversely impacting them, meaning something about, for example, rubio. So hes a central piece here and its Helping Lift UpMichael Cohen before Michael Cohen testifies, its corroborating Michael Cohen before it has to be solely on Michael Cohen shoulder. And thats why again, peckers doing a terrific job for the prosecution and messy. Theres also this moment where theyre talking about the story that the doorman was alleging, which apparently was false. But he had a story and pecker said he was just going to hold it. And then if it turned out to be true, he would run it after the election. Why is that significant . This is one of the most significant point its, its all about tying this back. This, these actions back specifically to the election because the prosecution has to show the furtherance of another crime, presumably violation of election laws, Campaign Finance laws. They have to eliminate that defense of i would kill the story for any other reason just because im a highprofile theyll person when its directly tied to the Election Planting of stories against political opponents is different than killing a story about your personal life. Clearly that shows motivation related to the election and jake, thats why this story, if its true, im going to run it after the election is so key because it means that thats the purpose of the catch and kill plan. All right. Misty and jeremy stay with me prosecutors spent a lot of time today question and gave it back for about a 2015 meeting at trump tower what pecker says happened that day and its significance in this case, plus the Heated Exchange between the judge and trumps lawyers when questions come came up about in cell insults that trump posted on social media the white house correspondents dinner, Live Saturday at seven eastern khan, cnne, sarlin, never easy the star name, eight months pregnant. Thats a different story. With the chest inke cart, we got up and running in no time earn unlimited 1. 5 cash back on every purchase chase ink business unlimited car from chase for visits all new subway routes are packed with delicious ingredients in a pillar, well advice, wrap family or refreshing lunch to Taster Murphy for pro athletes like me, right . Get off, finish by one wrap, get one 50 up in a subway app to date our biggest Challenge Uncertainty hidden fees, surcharges who knows what to expect . 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