John live look inside the New York State Supreme Court where former President Donald Trump just walked back into the courtroom. The prosecutions star witness former trump Attorney Michael Cohen set to resume testimony any second now. Along john roberts in washington, sandra, welcome back to the craziest week of court history. Sandra i was looking at that live shot and thinking bill hemmer hopefully made his way and there and got his seat. He will be joining us shortly as court is set to resume any moment now. Im sandra smith and this is america reports. You begin the test when he early this morning and said his duties at the Trump Organization included killing what he called negative stories. He detailed shutting down the Karen Mcdougal story alongside david packer. Prosecutors are tasked with making him a credible witness despite his past criminal charges and lying to congress. Spiel live an allstar team throughout us as Testimony Resumes. Sandra lets get the nate foy outside. Here we go. Here we go. The jury is being let in right now. Michael cohens testimony is set to resume. So far during much of the morning session, he has talked about the Karen Mcdougal deal that American Media purchase for 150,000 but just before lunch starting to get into the specifics of the deal that has brought former President Donald Trump on trial and that is the charges related to how the Stormy Daniels payment was made and he talked about how this happened right after the release of the access Hollywood Tape and he spoke about former President Trumps reaction when he brought that news to him saying that trump was very angry. Michael cohen claims that trump told him to take care of it fearing that women wouldnt vote for him in the 2016 president ial election. He claims that trump said women are going to hate me as a result of it and cohen told the court this is a trump quote push out as long as it can. Get past the election. If i when it has no relevance and if i lose, i dont even care. He testified today that when women came forward alleging affairs, trump was more concerned about his political future rather than his family. Trump denies the affair was happened and his political allies say this trial is meant to take them out of this years president ial election. At the end of the day, the democrats, the democrats are trying to be President Trump in the jury box because they cant beat him at the ballot box. So when the crossexamination begins, trumps lawyers will lead into his credibility concerns. He is a convicted felon who pleaded guilty to lying under oath and has testified since then admitting to being untruthful several times under oath. Prosecutors say he lied in the past to protect his former boss. Trump. The fo former president son eris here today and he posted on x i have never seen anything more rehearsed. Michael cohens testimony is resuming right now and as john just mentioned we are going to hear a lot more about how and why he was compensated as former President Trumps former lawyer. Back to you. Thank you for setting that up. John. John lets bring in Fox News ContributorJonathan Turley as Testimony Resumes this afternoon. I want to go back again to this quote that was carried in the New York TimesFebruary 13th 2018 in which he says neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump Campaign was a party to the transaction with ms. Clifford and neither reimbursed me for the payment either directly or indirectly. The payment to ms. Clifford was lawful and was not a Campaign Contribution or a Campaign Expenditure by anyone. To quote a noted constitutional law professor, how do they make that cat walk backwards . That will be a very difficult thing indeed and thank you for the reference. This witness is a little different because he seems to believe in reincarnation during his own life. He is going to say that was a different Michael Cohen. That was three redemptions ago. Every time he announces he is a redemptive center hes caught again and then he said i get it this time. I shall not sin again. And thats all going to be laid out by this litany of lies when he takes the stand. He has already done what alvin bragg has demanded to some extent. He has said that trump told him he just wanted to bury this until after the election but thats not enough. And part of my problem with what the court has done here, one of the reversible elements of this case is that the court has not really given clear instructions to counsel as to what has to be shown. He hasnt responded to objections from the defense as they refer to things like Election Violations making it sound like trump violated Election Laws which he did not. But its also not enough for Michael Cohen to say he wanted to bury an embarrassing story because bill clinton had an army of lawyers that buried stories with women. Thats politics. Thats what happens. Michael cohen himself admitted that he was completely unaware that pecker had been telling stories about trump for a couple of decades. If he was killing stories 20 years ago, was trump planning to run in 2016 . Of course not. He was also killing stories for other celebrities. Cohens testimony is already somewhat adrift. Sandra so just real quickly a few minutes ago we did see the former president reenter the courtroom. Theres a quick little shot of him moments ago. As he reentered. Based on what you just said about the clear instructions to the council, to counsel lacking and as far as the objections from the defense not being addressed by the judge, can the defense stand up for itself and request this . A camper at the critical moment will be when the prosecution rests. The defense will stand up and make a standard motion for a directed verdict and say there is no evidence of a crime here. There is an insufficiency of evidence. Merchan should grant that motion and i dont put that out of the realm of possibility because even he at this point may be a little bit concerned about how this entire case has gone adrift. He has allowed us to go forward without a clear definition of what crime was involved here. What alvin bragg is worried about is that the judge may get Sticker Shock and say this is too much for me to carry over to the jury. So what bragg is trying to do is have Michael Cohen state the words he needs and then he can go to the judge and say it is just a credibility issue. It has to go to the jury. John it seems to me that if the prosecution is going to try to get a guilty verdict, what they need to get out of Michael Cohen is they need to have him say that the financial reimbursement to him was a scheme that was cooked up with him and trump and weisselberg to hide the fact that this was a reimbursement under the guise of legal payments. To which i assume that the defense would simply say you said back in 2018 that none of this happened. Were you lying then or are you lying now . And how was anybody to believe anything you are saying if you say you were lying then and now you are not lying and how do we know you are lying . How do we know you are telling the truth back then . This just seems to be on such than ice. Its virtually imperceptible, the ice. What bragg is trying to do is rely on a motivated judge and a motivated jury is out as long he can get this past that motion to dismiss, he is hoping that the defendants name alone could secure a conviction. Im not as confident on that point because cohen has got to say that trump shows evidence that trump intended not only to conceal these payments but to do sue to conceal a crime. We are still not sure what that crime was. But he needs a very high level of intent. Hes not very close to satisfying that and thats what makes the judge uncomfortable because merchan might get uncomfortable unless he gets a vague this story is going to go away. What bragg is counting on is he can get cohen to go forward and to sate the intent was to hide a crime. Sandra Jonathan Turley always appreciate you joining us. Thank you so much and we know the jury is now being brought back into the courtroom. The Cohen Testimony will resume and we will take a quick break and mike eilers will join us on the other side. You have a witness where the only witness that prosecution will present as far as linking trump to a crime and this witness has no credibility. Dow. 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Sandra court is back in session and former President Donald Trumps criminal trial with the prosecutions star witness back on the stand Michael Cohen and joining us now is Mark Eiglarsh criminal defense attorney. We are getting some read out of what is happening now the court is resumed. I will read it to you almost verbatim from our producer inside the room. Resumes by asking about the funding deadline to Stormy Daniels for it exhibit 64 is presented which is emails between Michael Cohen and davidson dated october 2016. He said cohen should have all necessary docs and cohen explains that this was to continue to delay the execution of funding. He used the holiday of yom kippur to delay the payment until after the election because after the election it wont matter according to mr. Trump. Your response to hearing that is how things are back underway in the courtroom . How convenient. Cohen and convenience go handinhand paired everything the prosecution has been missing up until now, hes going to put it out there on a silver platter. If i am defending this case, i divide up his testimony into two parts. Number one, all the stuff i can live with. I take him through his testimony and say these payments or stories that dont help people who are high profile, not only is that not uncommon its been going on for decades and they know that through pickers testimony. The stuff that they really give the testimony that lays out the missing pieces of this case, you eviscerate him. You show how he cannot be trusted. John this comes back to the point that the prosecution unless they haul weisselberg and court which there is no indication they will do at this point, all they have it cohen potentially saying that some scheme was cooked duct to pay him back and cover the payments so that long after and cover up the fact that they tried to influence the Effect Election but then they have this contradictory statement from tht hour where he told the New York Times that he paid the money, he was never paid back, the Trump Organization and the Trump Campaign did not know anything about it. It strikes me as hard to believe that bragg will pin the entire case on cohen making that point if indeed that is where they are headed. As right. After they rest, there is a motion to dismiss that almost always is not granted by the judge. Its very rare. Usually he will let jurors decide but i would make a very compelling argument at a minimum to the Appellate Courts if theres ever a conviction and say theres not sufficient evidence to let a jury decide this case. They did not make what we call a prima facie case meaning they did not hit every single element that is required here. Too much of this was done by Michael Cohen by his own admission. Sandra while we try to reestablish a connection with mark, it looks like we are getting another update from inside the courtroom and mark, do we have you back . John i dont think we ever lost him. Sandra continue. I apologize. I made my point. I dont know where i got cut off but my point is there is too much here that can be argued to the judge after the prosecution rests their case assuming this is it and there might be some more but assuming this is that, there was enough to make an argument that there is just not enough to let this go to a jury. Sandra the update we are getting from inside the courtroom per hour reporter, cohen acknowledges that he did not use a truthful description of the First Republic bank account. He open to required the story rights from Stormy Daniels. He wrote Management Consulting including hr and marketing. The prosecution asked why not use the true description and he says if he had written to pay off Adult Film Star for nda, not sure they would have opened the account. If the bank didnt open an account because they knew it would pay an Adult Film Star, that is a reputational concern. It is not because it is illegal. Your response to that . Thats all him. He did that. Thats what the defense should argue. Trump was out there, big picture. Little picture in that he authorized to pay off perhaps if you want to concede that but how specifically, it should be handled, that is what he has a lawyer for. To make sure that its not in everyones face but to abide by the laws as cohen understands them. You can argue that what cohen did, assuming the prosecution is arguing it, was nefarious, maybe even unlawful and i wouldnt necessarily concede that if less i had to but that trump did not know about it, did not approve it, did not okay it, does not have the requisite fraudulent intent which is what was required for a criminal case. John and this goes back to what cohen testified to congress in October Of 2022 when he said theres not a single thing that occurs at the Trump Organization that is not directed by and for the benefit of donald j. Trump. But if he is telling untruths to a bank on which he is trying to open an account, there is no account that donald trump is directing him to do that. So what else has he been doing without the direction of trump . There is plenty. Its impossible for anyone to embrace that testimony that trump knew of all the minor show. Again, its one thing for him to know generally what Michael Cohen is doing but the specifics and how he carried it out which is what the claim was unlawful, i dont know that anybody would believe that trump knew and was down in the weeds with him in light of all the other things that were going on in his life at the time. Sandra really interesting stuff coming out of the courtroom in real time we will keep covering it. Mark eiglarsh, thank you. Sandra we continued to watch Michael Cohens testimonym the stand. Former Trump Attorney will join us on that coming up next. Sandra plus how are these legal cases impacting the former president s president ial campaign . A brandnew set of polling suggests he might still have the advantage appeared more on that with James Freeman who will join us live coming up. Anybody who lives through october 2016 knew that that story was going to be bad for donald trump politically. But just because something was bad for him politically does not mean that the steps he took thereafter were wrong illegally. Oh, yeah, man. Take it from your inner child. What