Spectroscope and that, that energy field, i would be very interested in hearing what she has to say. To me, it was completely indiscernible. Standby, mary trump has the y answer. Thank you, rachel. For the jury filed into the courtroom today to hear testimony in the case of the people of the state of new york versus Donald J Trump, judge merchan issued his ruling to the lawyers of what would actually happen to donald trump if he were to testify in his own defense in this trial. No, of course, before the judge issued his ruling about what evidence the prosecution would be allowed to use to attack Donald Trumps credibility as ad witness, there was absolutely no reason to believe donald so trump was going to actually testify in his own defense. Donald trump is incapable of telling the truth and that would become quickly obvious to the jury, who would probably ju find themselves watching donald trump commit perjury and probably concluding that they were watching him committing perjury. So, there really was no chance donald trump was going to t testify. But, here is what the judge ruled the prosecution could bring up if donald trump were to take the Witness Stand. The judge said the prosecution could bring up the fact that, the defendant was found to have violated Executive Law Section 63 by fraudulently misstating the value of its assets for an economic benefit. That is the attorney generals case in new york. And that, the defendant violated a court order by failing to remove an untrue, disparaging, and personally identifying post about the courts principal law clerk from the website, Donald J Trump. Com. The court find the defendant 5000 resents. The prosecution would be allowed to use the fact that, the defendant was found to d have intentionally violated a court order by making public attacks on the judges law ck clerk, despite two prior court orders not to do so. The court find the defendant 10,000. 00. The judge also ruled prosecutors would be able to bring up the fact that, the defendant was found to have defamed E Jean Carroll in Public Statements in 2019 by Making False Statements with actual malice. And that, the defendant was found to have defamed E Jean Carroll in Public Statements made in 2022 onto social by making a false statement with actual malice. And the prosecution would be d allowed to confront donald trump with the fact that, the defendant stipulated to the dissolution of the Donald J Trump foundation to resolve claims by the new York Attorney general that he engaged in repeated and willful selfdealing transactions. So, there should be no suspense tonight about donald trump testifying in his own defense. F he could not possibly survive questions about E Jean Carroll, his public attacks on Court Personnel, with jurors sitting there in the room with Court Personnel, wondering if donald trump is going to attack those Court Personnel or those jurors themselves. Then there was another powerful indication that donald trump will not, cannot testify in his own defense today and that was when his Defense Lawyer testified for donald trump. Saying this, i expect that you will learn that when ms. Daniels threatened to go public with her false claim of sexual encounter with the President Trump back in 2008, that it was, as the people just said, very close to the election. And it was almost an attempt by ms. Clifford, ms. Daniels to extort President Trump to which prosecutors said objection and the judge sustained. There is Donald Trumps criminal Defense Lawyer saying donald trump never had a sexual encounter with Stormy Daniels. Stormy daniels has publicly described in detail. Donald trump was alone in a hotel room with Stormy Daniels while Donald Trumps wife was e home with his four month old son at the time. The only people who can testify about what happened in that room are Stormy Daniels and donald trump, not Donald TrumpsDefense Lawyer. Donald trump is not going to testifying. There will never be a moment when donald trump sits on that Witness Stand and says i did not have with Stormy Daniels. Today, Donald Trumps criminal Defense Lawyer did it for him. Mr. Blanche try to get away with testifying for donald trump in his Opening Statement by saying Stormy Daniels description of her sexual encounter with donald trump is false. According to Stormy Daniels, who has spoken about it ha publicly many times, it was a sexual encounter that did not last long and that in the pre and postsexual chatter, donald trump, among other things, compared Stormy Daniels to his oldest daughter. Stormy daniels has given us my plenty of detail about. The essence of the Trump Defense is that the 420,000. 00 that was paid to Michael Cohen was paid for Legal Services having nothing to do with Stormy Daniels. Donald trumps criminal Defense Lawyers told the jury, you will hear that he, Michael Cohen, did legal work for President Trump and the first lady, as his personal attorney. You will learn that each month in 2017, Michael Cohen sent an invoice to some of the ic employees at trump tower right here in midtown for 35,000. 00. I on this invoice, Michael Cohen described his work as payment to the Retainer Agreement for Legal Services rendered. The invoice was processed. Somebody at trump tower generated a check. The check was ultimately signed and there was a record in a letter on President Trumps personal records that reflected the invoice. For nine of the checks, the check made its way to the white house, President Trumps ended. You will hear he is the only signatory of his personal checking account, which is why he sent the check. So, what on earth is a crying . What is a crime about what i just described . The prosecutions answer to that question was that it was all, a planned, coordinated, longrunning conspiracy to influence the 2016 election to d help donald trump get elected through illegal expenditures to sentence people who have something bad to say about his behavior using doctored corporate records and bank forms to conceal those payments along the way. It was election fraud, pure and simple. Persecutors said, we will never know and it doesnt matter, if this conspiracy was r the Difference Maker in a close election. In the prosecution revealed a communication on election night, 2016, between Stormy Daniels lawyer and dylan howard at the National Enquirer, who was part of the conspiracy to suppress negative information about donald trump the prosecutor told the jury, you will also see evidence that on election night, as news outlets got closer to calm the election for donald trump, keith davidson, who was the lawyer for both Stormy Daniels and Karen Mcdougal texted dylan howard at the National Enquirer and he said what have we done . Meeting of the discussion me tonight, adam klotz field, who was in the courtroom, in the Courthouse Today and who will be there every day for us for the trial. He is a follow at justice security. Also during this, former fbi general counsel, Andrew Weissman. And melissa murray, they are both Nyu Law Professors and msnbc legal analysts and co authors of the New York Times bestselling book the trump indictments, the historic charging documents with commentary. Adam, you are our eyes and ears in there. You are getting the Juror Experience of taking the picture of it all. What do you think the jurors went on with today . They came home with a lot of information because this was an alert jury. They were wrapped in attention w both in the prosecution and th defense statements. And, they came home with this Bombshell Quote that ended your introduction, limit, the what have we done . It was almost in oppenheimer like moment where you have Stormy Daniels lawyer with a recognition that, and which is the central theory of the case for the prosecution, e that this is related to the election. With a very powerful moment and it came within a powerful monologue, which you read a lo part of, that it was election fraud, pure and simple. So, that was a very powerful moment. We had, they also came away with, from the defense Opening Statement a stop and go affair, where todd blanche was frequently interrupted by objections that were sustained and the jurors cannot help but have noticed that todd blanche kept touching the tripwire. What about that, for the jury, we get the transcript, it is a cold transcript, as they say, do you, could you feel that the defense was scoring any points at all, capturing anything that the jurors were paying attention to . There was this one moment where i could see one Juror Nodding along when todd blanche had made the point that, it was in this moment where he was saying that influencing an t election is not a crime, it is democracy. There was a moment he was talking, going further into that statement with just kind me of turning to the page here where he was sort of going through that a little bit further. And, one of the jurors nodded along. Where he found it persuasive or he just caught his eye, who knows. But, it did show that it caught the attention of at least one member of the panel. Professor melissa murray, a former president of the United States has now spent one day of his life as a criminal defendant during testimony in ad Criminal Trial in front of the jury. Constitutional law professors all over the country, the mind boggles at this point. We are just about to write exams so this is perfect. S this was an extra in every moment. The idea of a former president of the United States being held to account by a jury of 12 ordinary new yorkers is truly ry an extra ordinary act. Andrew and i talk about this in the book. These are extra ordinary times for us. But, again, not for other countries where it has been relatively routine to hold former leaders even has a l state, to account for their misconduct that was undertaken even before, during, or after their terms in office. So, we have now joined the rest of the world in holding our public leaders to account. Andrew, we have always been in the years we have covering investigations of donald trump, eager to hear a defense, when the january securities were going on, we were eager to hear what is the Trump Defense to what we just heard today . Usually in these forms, there ll is no trump events. Every once in a while, he would treat something and we would say here is a piece of defense. We finally, formerly got a Defense Presentation for the very first time today. Did that defense answer the Prosecution Charge that this was election interference and that this conspiracy, which included the Stormy Daniels payments was criminal . So, you know, one of the things i was listening to when the government was Going Forward was not just about what witnesses would say. We know they will say david didnt have a good memory or he forgot something or he is some piece that is missing. Obviously with respect to Michael Cohen, they are going to say hes just a liar. You heard that today. But, there was so many what is called hard evidence, there was references, as adam pointed out, to phone calls, really critical phone calls on october 26th, when the mechanism that Michael Cohen used was created and there were phone calls with donald trump. There is this record where i sort of fell off my chair where Allen Weisselberg has written out exactly how the Payment Scheme worked in his own Me Handwriting on a piece of paper that Allen Weisselberg, the cfo, had asked Michael Cohen to bring and that was his Guest Chapter and verse and it was said you are going to see that. There are other things like that. And, i was waiting to hear, for instance, the Tape Recording where we heard about it. E but, you have to Say Something if you are a Defense Lawyer about that. Donald trump on that tape is not citing what are you talking about . Im not engaged in some Payment Scheme. He says can we pick it in cash . For 130,000 and cents. In the opening, we didnt hear the Defense Lawyer, i dont remember the Defense Lawyer addressing that at all. There were these gaps. So, that, i mean, one of my favorite moments, just to give you a sense of, not to be to present about it, but there was sort of a claude rains moment when he was talking about h Michael Cohen and he had to distance himself and he said to just imagine how shocked, shocked donald trump was to find out that his lawyer, Michael Cohen, was engaged in a crime. You were just waiting to hear, this was like straight out of casablanca. So, i think there was sort of a lack of dealing with the evidence. Obviously, they still have time to do that. They can do that during the trial, they can do that in closing. In terms of starting the case, i thought, you know what it is great that there is a smart jury. They seemed extremely well educated. That is going to play well if The Other Side, if the defense doesnt have an answer for those pieces of evidence. Adam, the defense is that, look, this 420,000 and cents, 35,000. 00 a month, as of 2017 was just the agreed on price for, for Michael Cohen to be the personal lawyer. They are now saying, of donald trump and his wife. And, that is why the point that andrew made a moment ago is so important. And, Allen Weisselberg wrote it all down. The Bank Statement i told you about. He, todd blanche put it out there that there is this alternate , innocent expedition for why 420,000. 00 does not equal 130,000. 00. And, if the explanation the i prosecutor put forward is in writing and that destroys that, that will stay with the jury in terms of the credibility. And, that we have out there from the getgo. Those numbers, that math sheet has been out there, melissa, for a long time. Michael cohen went public with this description of heres how he did it. Because is going to have to pay income tax on it, even me up and they are throwing him a bonus of the number equals this. It is not new information and theyve had a long time, the trump team has had a long time to stare at that and say, okay, heres what we are going to do with it and theyve chosen, sometimes works in defense, the simplest possible approach to it, which is just say that is just his paycheck for Legal Services, thats all it is. There are moments today where, you read the readout of what had happened and it help ne less like the west wing and more like the wire. Remember the scene where stringer bell, after discussing what they are doing with the truck conspiracy, said one of his minions, are you taking notes on a criminal conspiracy . That is the Allen Weisselberg moment. You wrote all of this down. The defense hasnt said anything about the fact that ng this has been laid out, that Michael Cohen has been talking abou