I wont be resting. I dont dressed. Tonight, the collapse of trumps final witness and the judges crucial decisions about what the jury will decide. Then, another former trumps lawyer silenced in court. I dont want to mute you, but i need to move on. And the rnc head of Election Integrity arraigned for voter fraud. And why Samuel Alitos ethical nightmare for the Supreme Court is not going away. Created a situation that we are all talking about, so i think it was a mistake. When all in starts right now. Good evening from new york, i am chris hayes. After five weeks the first criminal trial of a former u. S. President is nearly over. The defense rested this morning. I called only two witnesses and despite all his bravado and insistence is to the contrary, donald trump was not one of them. We knew that. Instead we heard briefly from a paralegal about Phone Records before a man named Robert Costello took the stand. Costello is a former federal prosecutor. A very close associate with Rudy Giuliani, the twice indicted former mayor of new york city, we will have more on that later in the show, and also Donald Trumps personal attorney in the white house. Giuliani that is. I think it is fair to say that costellos testimony backfired on the defense, though how much remains to be determined. Trumps attorneys main reason to put that man on the stand was to contradict and impugn the credibility of the prosecutions key witness, Michael Cohen. It turns out costello might be the only person in the country who can make Michael Cohen seem eventempered by comparison. He began Testimony Acting like a petulant teenager, rolling his eyes, muttering under his breath. At one point saying to strike something. Of course that is not his job, that is the judge. Then after sort of crossing the judge, like he tried to stare him down at which point the judge was like, are you staring me down . He cleared the courtroom. After clearing the courtroom the judge called costellos conduct contemptuous, in the narrow sense of contempt of court, and threatened to remove him from the stand and strike his testimony from the record. That man, the star witness for the defense, the one man they are putting up returned to the stands today for Cross Examination. Remember, at the center of costellos testimony is a 2018 meeting he had with cohen, after cohen had a Search Warrant executed by the fbi and as cohen tells that he is having this back and forth with costello, who is putting a very highpressure sales job on him. The implication of which was that they had to kind of keep cohen in trumps circle to prevent him from flipping. Costello was aligned with rudy, aligned with trump, so hire me and you will stay in the circle. Costello says he was just there to offer legal services. That is the main battle over what happened and today Prosecutor Susan Hoffinger asked, quote, you discussed with cohen at the very first meeting how connect did you were with giuliani, correct . He responded, thats not true. Hoffinger then read an email that stated, and we quote here, im sure you saw the news that rudy is joining the trump legal team. I told you that my relationship with rudy could be very useful to you. In costellos words. The prosecutor also wrote also read an email costello wrote that said all the more reason to hire me because of my connection to giuliani, which i mentioned in our meeting. Let me read two emails in which you mentioned him. Okay. And further communication it is clear that costello continued to dangle his relationship with giuliani and, again, his relationship with donald trump. In another email he wrote i spoke with rudy, very positive. You are loved. Adding, quote, there was never a doubt. Adding this Communication Channel must be maintained. Sleep well tonight, you have friends in high places. Ps, i heard some very positive comments about you from the white house. You may be thinking that the indication repeatedly in emails by this man does not prove castillos intentions, but in an example of something you dont want to put in writing, prosecutors read another email from costello to the same legal partner. Im quoting again. Our issue is to get cohen on the right page without giving him the appearance that we are following instructions from giuliani or the president. I have to say when you put it like that, it sure sounds like he was following instructions from giuliani and the president , doesnt it . So the defenses final act of one big witness did not do a good job exonerating their client were knocking down the credibility of the manor was supposed to mark down, Michael Cohen. I have to say i follow this trail very closely. Not as closely as some of our next guests who have been in the courtroom every day, but i find Michael Cohen on the core matters of fact that are relevant to the charges, believable. That is in large part due to the extensive documentation provided by all sorts of people including Robert Costello himself, not to mention the lengthy paper trail outlining the scheme to repay for the hush money he paid to Stormy Daniels to cover up the sexual encounters she had with donald trump. The attempts to hide those reimbursements. The basic contours of all of that, like was Stormy Daniels paid . Did cohen pay for it . Was he reimbursed . All of that is not in dispute. A week from now when closing arguments start this will be in the hands of the jury and they will ultimately decide the x president s fate. Joining me now is lisa rubin and susanne craig. Great to have you both here. I missed the costello fireworks yesterday. I was following it and texting with lisa being like, is this as insane as it sounds . Go back a day because i was not there. The costello experience in the courtroom. You will not sell me out by reading my response. My response was, beyond. The costello experience in the courtroom is an instructive lesson on how demeanor matters, because you can say all sorts of things about your misdeeds and so long as you remain polite and contrite and succinct, jurors might believe you. Michael cohen is an illustration of that. What was so bizarre was the Robert Castillo we saw over the past couple of days reminded me of the Michael Cohen that we saw at the Civil Fraud Trial. Which was exactly the fear of everyone around the prosecutors office. Correct. Even to the point that costello said strike that where the email speaks for itself, which is also something lawyers say in defense of clients, for example. Michael cohen at the Civil Fraud Trial would say from the witness stand, asked and answered, very bombastic lee. I want to read another email that came out with Robert Castillo today toward the end because it is maybe the worst example of how costello was seeking to advance Donald Trumps interests and not Michael Cohens, as he swore. At one point he writes to his partner who had the relationship with cohen and says tune into cnn and see how they are playing this up. Cohen has to know this and yet he continues to so play to slope laos and the president. Is he totally nuts . What should i say . He is playing with the most powerful man on the planet and despite that he did not mean to him, he meant donald trump. What should the story cohen is telling is, you are donald trump student you are there to get me and he is writing this. Do you, what did you think of the cross of costello . I first want to give some props to the Sketch Artist who was in court the cop that moment we just had up. The stare down where the judge is like, whoa. It is good, youre right. Definitely. So what did i think of the Cross Examination today when the government got back up . I thought it was incredible. I mean, just how she dissected him in the amount of time and just got right to those emails and i think laid the bear that he was an agent of giuliani and donald trump and no wonder Michael Cohen the whole premise of having costello up there was to discredit cohen because costello could say he never admitted that he made these payments to me and Michael Cohen said i was very suspicious of this guy. Well, no wonder. I was going to say there is one piece of testimony that costello gives where he says Michael Cohen told him i dont have anything on the president and in some ways that is relevant and i can see on the defense you want to get that in. You want to plant the seeds that he invented it later, ex post facto, but there are two stories about this interaction. The cohen story to my mind from the testimony i saw in that room and from the emails, the cohen story seems to match the other evidence much better than the costello story does. Right . That is correct and there is another problem. In order to Credit Bob Costello story that Michael Cohen lied, you have to believe he was telling the truth to costello at some point in time, which means Michael Cohen tells the truth at points in time. So it is ridiculous for bob castillo to go, Michael Cohen is a liar, because his entire testimony is premised on Michael Cohen telling him the truth for some time. Michael cohen, he is a liar, he is achieved, but the case will come down to the jury believing at least at some point he can tell the truth. It is not like he always lies. They have to believe him on certain points and those will be points that the government will say they have cooperation for. Either they have interviews, im sorry, conversations to corroborate or they have documents. Because Michael Cohen is the only person who can speak to the criminal disguise of the documents. He was at all the meetings. He has the through line. There has to be some believability on those meetings. We have the Allen Weisselberg document where everything is sort of cooked and here are how the payments are going to work. Then Allen Weisselberg and Michael Cohen go to speak to donald trump about it. We have not heard from Allen Weisselberg. He is over at rikers and has not been called. So we have Michael Cohens word on that conversation with donald trump where he signed off on it. It is very important. They have to believe him on stuff for there is evidence that they put up on the screen that that may have happened. One is a tactical choice. The idea is the defense does not just mount the case and says you have not met your standard. Im saying that happens fairly often. We dont even have to put someone on, because this case is insufficient. When you start to go down the road and go, weve got this guy. We will catch Michael Cohen lying and then it is like parts of the cross on Michael Cohen felt effective to me, but that is now not the last thing in their mind. It is now costello. There are other parts of the cross with Michael Cohen that never touched on the key meetings. The meeting between trump, Allen Weisselberg and Michael Cohen where they walked down the hall with the Chicken Scratches and trump approves it. The other being the Oval Office Meeting where trump and cohen cement the Repayment Agreement and trump says to him you will get your january and february checks soon. Not one word about either of those meetings during the very lengthy, sometimes effective, cross of Michael Cohen. I think to your point if they had just said look, they havent met their standard so we are not going to put on a defense. But then they put on a defense and this is the best they have. Very strange. His client came up with it. 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On the matter of the falsification of Business Records, that seems pretty clearcut to me. The Business Records or invoices to Michael Cohen for a fictitious Retainer Agreement and then checks cut to pay those invoices, many with trumps own signature and memos that say retainer for legal fees and they falsely record those payments as legal expenses. So that happened, we know that. Michael cohen testified those were false and there is a lot to back him up the those were not legal payments. Lets say you did that Misdemeanor Falsification of Business Records. The tricky part will be the intent and what it does, because donald trump is facing Felony Counts since the falsification, which is in black and white and not very well contested, is, according to prosecutors, in furtherance of another crime, violating Campaign Finance law. So what will the jury be told about how to establish trumps intent there, the furtherance of the crime part . How will they be told to apply the law to testimony and evidence presented to them on that score . I dont think it is an overstatement to say this case could be won or lost on those instructions. Back with me, msnbc Legal Correspondent lisa lisa rubin. We are joined by charles coleman. Lisa, you were in the hearing today. First of all do you agree of that characterization of the weight of the instructions . I agree about the weight of the instructions. I disagree about what will be easy and what will be difficult. I will give you an example from today. In order to find trump guilty of Felony Falsification of Business Records, the jury has to find that he made the false Business Records himself or caused someone else to make them. The meaning of the word, caused, is something on which this case hinges, because the prosecutors want a definition that is expansive. If based on your conduct you could foresee the Business Records would be falsified, you have caused the falsification. That is the instruction they wanted today and the instruction that the judge indicated he is not likely to give. So then the question is what will cause me nand how will it be defined for the jurors . If it means literally that i direct charles, here is how youre going to set up his general business ledger, thats not evidence that is in this case right now because of how he does business. So while i think that these Business Records were false, to establish that trump falsified them i think the cause thing is a huge thing. It is huge because of testimony we have not heard in terms of someone explicitly saying that donald trump instructed me or directed me to do these things. Which is why Michael Cohens testimony was so