0:02

The people of New York call Michael

0:04

Cohen. The

0:06

star witness at the center of the

0:09

case takes the stand. Tonight

0:15

the Michael Cohen testimony

0:17

begins. The guy we saw

0:19

this morning was credible and calm, if

0:21

not a little freaked out. And

0:23

Donald Trump's former fixer testifies

0:25

that the candidate himself led

0:28

the conspiracy. The most

0:30

repeated line of Michael Cohen's testimony was

0:32

just take care of it. Just

0:34

take care of it. This is a total disaster.

0:37

Women will hate me. The most important thing

0:39

that the jury heard today. He

0:41

wasn't thinking about Melania. This was

0:43

all about the candidate. Tonight

0:46

Rachel Maddow recaps the testimony

0:48

with Lawrence O'Donnell, Lisa Rubin,

0:51

Suzanne Craig and Katie Fang

0:53

who were inside the courthouse.

0:55

Plus Nicole Wallace, Chris Hayes,

0:57

Ari Melber, Jen Psaki and

0:59

Katherine Christian as special

1:02

coverage of Trump on trial

1:04

begins now. Good

1:11

evening and thanks for joining us for our

1:13

MSNBC prime time recap of the

1:16

criminal trial of former president Donald Trump.

1:18

I'm here tonight along with my colleagues,

1:20

Lawrence O'Donnell and Katie Fang and Nicole

1:22

Wallace and Chris Hayes. Big

1:24

night you guys. Today's proceedings

1:28

unexpectedly to me were

1:30

like that helpful moment in

1:32

the old Agatha Christie style British detective

1:35

story. You've been following along

1:37

more or less. You know who most

1:39

of the characters are. You can at

1:41

least remember most of their names. You

1:44

know the basic plot of this mystery, but

1:47

then there is this kindness, this

1:49

great helpful moment in the story

1:51

where the detective sits

1:54

down under some stupid pretense

1:56

with some other character and

1:58

in their conversation. give

2:00

you all the answers. It's okay you

2:02

haven't been paying close attention all along. They,

2:05

in this conversation, are going to recap

2:07

the whole story. And not only will

2:09

they get to the big answer, the

2:11

big who done it, they will also

2:13

give you the solutions to all the

2:15

other little mysteries and red herrings that

2:18

popped up over the course of the story.

2:20

That was Michael Agatha

2:23

Christie Cohen today. So,

2:25

for example, why did Michael Cohen

2:27

make the hush money payments to

2:29

Stormy Daniels from his home equity

2:31

line of credit rather than

2:34

from, I don't know, his bank account?

2:36

Ah, we learned today it's because

2:39

that account was paperless. No

2:41

statements related to that home equity line of

2:43

credit were going to be mailed to his

2:46

house. So Michael Cohen's wife

2:48

was never going to see some

2:50

inexplicable $130,000 payment

2:52

on a statement and question him as

2:54

to what he was up to. Now

2:56

we know. Also, why,

2:59

when the reimbursement was made to

3:01

Michael Cohen for him paying for

3:03

Stormy Daniels's hush money, why did

3:05

that include not just the Stormy

3:08

Daniels reimbursement, but a bunch of money

3:10

for a bunch of other things? Well,

3:13

we learned today that this

3:15

was going to be the last money

3:17

Michael Cohen ever received from the Trump

3:20

organization. In these

3:22

payments, they included everything he was

3:24

owed. They were zeroing him out. He

3:26

was leaving the company. And why was he

3:28

doing that? Because if Michael Cohen

3:31

was still a Trump organization employee like he

3:33

had been, it wouldn't make sense

3:35

for him to be getting checks as

3:38

a retainer for legal services. He

3:40

would just be getting a salary like he had

3:42

been for years before. So

3:44

instead, Cohen leaves the Trump

3:46

organization, becomes the personal attorney

3:48

to the president, which

3:51

makes the legal retainer checks look like

3:53

that was how Trump was paying for

3:55

Cohen's services as his personal attorney. In

3:58

reality, Cohen was... was never paid anything

4:01

for being personal attorney to the president. That's

4:03

just what they called it. That's just what

4:05

they called him. So it wouldn't look so

4:07

weird that Trump was paying him $35,000 checks

4:09

every month. Oh,

4:13

now that makes sense. Also,

4:15

why did prosecutors go out of their

4:18

way to point out that Ben Roethlisberger,

4:20

the former Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback, had

4:22

been at the golf event with

4:25

Donald Trump at the time of

4:27

the Trump, Stormy Daniels' alleged

4:30

sexual encounter? Now

4:32

we know. Contrary to

4:34

Trump's denials that he had sex

4:37

with Stormy Daniels, Michael Cohen testified

4:39

today that when he asked Donald

4:41

Trump if anything had happened between

4:43

him and Stormy Daniels, Trump bragged

4:46

to Michael Cohen that, yeah, even

4:48

though he was there at this

4:50

golf event with Big Ben Roethlisberger,

4:53

the women there, like Stormy

4:55

Daniels, they wanted him more

4:58

than they wanted Big Ben. All

5:03

the little mysteries that

5:05

have popped up over the course of us

5:07

learning about this scandal, all

5:10

the little mysteries that have popped

5:12

up are inexplicable sort of sidebars

5:14

and detours that we didn't necessarily

5:16

understand as the prosecution

5:18

has laid out its case thus

5:20

far. Michael Cohen today provided the

5:23

all is revealed scene in

5:25

this detective story, tying up the loose ends,

5:27

filling in the gaps in the story, and

5:30

yes, bringing us to the main event, the big

5:33

whodunit. Michael

5:36

Cohen, long-time lawyer, and

5:39

forter, bully, quote

5:42

unquote, fixer for former president Donald Trump,

5:44

the man who in the mob analogy

5:46

was not so much the hit man

5:48

as he was the underboss, the man

5:50

who testified today about, for example, telling

5:52

suppliers and contractors and vendors to Trump

5:55

University that they would get 20% of

5:57

what they invoiced Trump University for. or

6:00

they'd get nothing and they'd like it. Michael

6:03

Cohen gave testimony today that

6:05

Donald Trump was in

6:07

the room where it happened in

6:10

the worst possible way. The

6:13

one piece of paper that has emerged in

6:15

this case that is the most important piece

6:17

of paper of all is this one. This

6:20

document, People's Exhibit 35, is

6:23

the smoking gun document in this

6:25

first ever criminal trial of an American

6:27

president. It is a bank statement showing

6:30

the wire transfer of $130,000 to the representative for

6:32

Stormy Daniels. It's

6:36

the bank record showing that the Hush

6:38

money payment was in fact made. And

6:41

on the bottom of the bank statement

6:43

on the right, you see what we

6:45

now know is Michael Cohen's handwriting showing

6:48

something else he wants to be reimbursed for. Since

6:50

we now understand he's leaving the

6:52

Trump organization at this point,

6:54

he wants to make sure in this last payment that's

6:57

coming to him, this other money the Trump

6:59

organization owes him is going to be included.

7:01

That's on the bottom right side of this

7:03

piece of paper. On the

7:05

bottom left side of this piece of

7:07

paper, you see different handwriting. This

7:10

is handwriting from the Trump organization's

7:12

CFO, Alan Weisselberg, and it's him

7:14

doing the math. This is

7:16

how much Michael Cohen is owed. Since

7:19

we're gonna lie and say this

7:21

is income for him instead of

7:23

the reimbursement that it actually is, that

7:25

means he's gonna have to pay taxes on

7:27

it. So here's how much we'll add to

7:29

what we're paying him to account for the

7:31

taxes he's gonna have to pay. Here's the

7:33

add additional bonus line because he said he

7:35

was owed money on his annual bonus and

7:37

he's never getting another one because he's leaving

7:40

the organization. Here's the over 12 part

7:42

at the bottom there. That means we're gonna pay it

7:44

over 12 months. So it's $420,000

7:46

over 12 months, that's $35,000 a month. That's

7:50

Alan Weisselberg doing the math. That

7:52

document, People's Exhibit 35. What

7:55

prosecutors have laid out is that that is

7:57

the smoking gun document that shows the crime.

8:00

It shows what the payment

8:02

was really for and

8:05

how it was disguised as something else

8:07

in the business records of the Trump

8:09

organization. And it was disguised as

8:11

something else in order to conceal its true nature

8:14

because its true nature was that it was a

8:16

campaign expenditure. That's

8:19

the prosecution's case. That document

8:21

shows the crime. And

8:23

we have seen this document before in this

8:25

trial. But

8:27

today, Michael Cohen testified for the

8:29

first time that Trump was there

8:32

for it. That

8:34

he, Michael Cohen, and Alan Weisselberg,

8:36

the Trump CFO, talked it

8:38

over during which time they made

8:41

those notes on that piece of

8:43

paper. That's why there's two different sets of

8:45

handwriting on that piece of paper. After

8:47

the two of them marked up that piece

8:49

of paper the way I just described, they

8:52

then took that piece of paper and marched

8:54

it down to Donald Trump's office on the

8:56

26th floor of Trump's tower. And

8:58

with that paper in hand, the

9:00

three of them had a discussion about what exactly

9:02

they were doing and why they

9:05

were doing it. And he said,

9:07

do it. Prosecutor

9:10

following the meeting with Mr. Weisselberg and both of you

9:13

adding that handwriting to People's Exhibit 35, what did

9:15

you do? And where did the

9:17

two of you go at that time? Answer. We

9:19

went to Mr. Trump's office in order to

9:22

speak to him about this question. Now when

9:24

was this approximately? Answer. Right

9:26

before Mr. Trump left for the

9:28

inauguration. Question. So he was still at

9:30

Trump Tower at that time? Answer. Yes. What

9:33

did you understand he was engaged in at Trump Tower at that time?

9:36

Answer. Being president-elect. Was

9:39

he at meetings at Trump Tower? Yes. Now

9:42

what happened when you went into Mr. Trump's office to have

9:44

this discussion with him? During the

9:46

conversation, Alan turned around and said to me, while

9:48

we were talking about this, it was, and what

9:51

we're going to do is we're going to pay you over 12 months.

9:55

I think the indication here from the transcript is that

9:57

Cohen then sort of rebutted that. It

9:59

was probably better if I get it in one

10:01

lump sum. No, no, no.

10:04

Why don't you do it as over 12 months

10:06

and it will be paid out to you monthly?

10:09

Question. And did he say anything about

10:11

how it would be paid out as something?

10:13

Answer. Yeah. As like a legal

10:15

service rendered since I was then being

10:17

given the title as personal attorney

10:19

to the president. Question.

10:22

So was this conversation that you had with

10:24

Mr. Weisselberg in Mr. Trump's office?

10:27

With Mr. Trump? Answer.

10:29

Yes. Question. And

10:32

did Mr. Weisselberg have with him this

10:34

document, People's Exhibit 35? Answer. He did.

10:37

Question. And did he show this document to

10:40

Mr. Trump? Answer. Yes. Question. And did Mr.

10:42

Weisselberg say in front of Mr. Trump how

10:44

much you were going to be paid in

10:46

total? Answer. It was going to be divided

10:49

by 12 and it's $35,000 a month and

10:51

that they would actually start making the payments

10:53

in February, not January because there was a

10:55

lot going on with Mr. Trump moving to

10:58

DC, the inauguration and so on. Question.

11:01

And so was it stated, did Mr. Weisselberg state

11:03

in front of Mr. Trump that you were going

11:05

to receive $420,000 over

11:08

the course of 12 months? Answer. Yes. Question.

11:11

And what if anything did Mr. Trump say

11:13

at the time? Answer. He approved

11:15

it. And he also

11:17

said, this is going to be one heck of a

11:19

ride in DZ. Question. And

11:22

did Mr. Weisselberg say in front of

11:24

Mr. Trump that those monthly payments would

11:26

be, you know, like a retainer for

11:28

legal services? Answer. Yes. Question.

11:31

Now you mentioned something before, but I just wanted to

11:33

question you about it. Did you say something to the

11:35

effect that you had a sense

11:37

they had spoken about this previously? Answer.

11:39

Yes. Why do you say that? Because

11:43

they always played that sort of game of frickin'

11:45

frack type game. And I didn't,

11:47

I had been around that office more than

11:49

enough to realize that this conversation had already

11:51

taken place between the two. And when I asked for

11:53

the 420, Mr. Trump said, no, it's

11:56

better. It's better to do it over the 12 months. Todd

12:00

Blanch, your honor, objection to that

12:02

answer and move to strike. The

12:04

judge overruled, overruled. Question

12:07

and when Allen Weisselberg laid out the plan of

12:09

how much you were going to get paid and

12:11

over what months and showed Mr. Trump this document,

12:14

did Mr. Trump try to renegotiate? Answer,

12:16

no. So

12:19

he approved it at that point? Answer, yes. Now,

12:22

at some point did Mr. Trump confirm to you that

12:24

he was going to give you the title of personal

12:26

attorney or personal counsel with the president? Answer, yes. Then

12:29

in relation to this meeting was that? Answer,

12:31

around this same exact time. And

12:34

it was, was the $420,000 that you were going to receive back from Mr. Trump

12:36

going to

12:39

be payment for future legal

12:41

services as personal counsel? Answer,

12:44

that was what it was designed to be.

12:48

Well, what was it actually? Answer,

12:50

reimbursement of my money. Question,

12:54

it was repayment of which money?

12:57

Answer, it was a repayment of the stormy deal. It was a

12:59

unanimous payment. Question,

13:01

now you said that you believe this occurred at

13:03

Trump Tower some days before Mr. Trump actually left

13:06

for Washington. Is that right? Answer,

13:08

correct. Did

13:13

Mr. Weisselberg have within this document People's Exhibit

13:15

35? He did. Did

13:17

he show this document to Mr. Trump? Yes. Michael

13:20

Cohen testifying today for the first time that

13:24

just before leaving to be inaugurated

13:26

as president of the United States.

13:28

Donald Trump reviewed the smoking gun

13:30

document that laid out the crime.

13:34

He then talked in detail about the

13:36

crime with his CFO and

13:38

with Michael Cohen and he

13:40

said, quote, do it. Quote,

13:44

he approved it. So

13:49

if there's anything in this case that isn't

13:51

just plainly black litter proven by the documents

13:54

and the records, if there's anything else that

13:56

we have been waiting for in

13:58

testimony from witnesses. This

14:01

is probably it, right? It

14:03

certainly wasn't all. There's a lot to say about what happened

14:05

today. But let's

14:07

start there. Lawrence O'Donnell, you were there today. Yeah.

14:10

And the one other bit that we got

14:12

that is sequential here and important is Donald

14:15

Trump at the time in

14:17

October of 2016, the final days

14:19

of the president's campaign, directing

14:22

Michael Cohen to make the payment

14:24

to Stormy Daniels. He said

14:26

he directed me to do it. We remember

14:28

in Michael Cohen's federal indictment for this that

14:31

everything he did was at the direction

14:33

of individual one who turns

14:35

out to be Donald Trump. So you have

14:37

both pieces here. You have

14:39

in today's testimony, Michael Cohen

14:42

saying he directed me to do this

14:44

to pay Stormy Daniels. And

14:46

then you have the payback, which occurs after

14:48

the election, the agreement to the payback. And

14:50

I have to say, Rachel, you know, we

14:53

were sitting there as this testimony

14:55

was coming out and we've all seen the document already.

14:58

And Michael Cohen was able to confirm, yes,

15:00

that's my handwriting on that other side of

15:02

the page, which technically in the record had

15:04

never been confirmed. The previous

15:06

witness who introduced that document identified

15:09

Alan Weisselberg's handwriting saying I've been

15:11

reading Alan Weisselberg's handwriting for 35 years.

15:14

So that's how that handwriting got in. It

15:16

also got in today, the Weisselberg piece,

15:19

when Michael Cohen said, yes, I can

15:21

identify that as Alan Weisselberg's handwriting because

15:23

I saw him write it, which is

15:25

about as good as

15:28

handwriting ID gets. And

15:30

then Michael Cohen explains, that's my writing over there,

15:32

explaining to Alan what I needed. And then Alan

15:34

grosses it up here. But what we didn't know

15:36

that was that the next thing that was going

15:38

to happen in the testimony is Alan

15:41

Weisselberg and Michael Cohen were going to

15:43

take that document down the hall. And

15:46

we were going to be in Donald

15:48

Trump's office. And Michael Cohen

15:50

was then telling us what Donald Trump

15:53

said about this and how he approved

15:55

it. And as you put

15:57

it, it was all there. That's

15:59

where the final

16:01

elements of what become the criminal

16:03

charges all get put together is

16:06

in that room. Katie, you

16:08

were there. It was

16:10

elegant because the prosecution had done

16:12

such an effective job of getting

16:15

evidence entered in to the

16:17

record because remember, if it's not in the record,

16:19

it can't be used. So to

16:21

Lawrence's point, we saw this exhibit

16:23

before. It had import through Jeff

16:26

McConnie, the former controller of the

16:28

Trump organization. But to

16:30

have the nuance added from Michael

16:32

Cohen's testimony is what good trial

16:34

lawyers do. You saw

16:36

a well executed plan from the

16:38

Manhattan DA's office to allow the

16:42

introduction of certain cell phone

16:44

records, text messages, emails, bank

16:46

statements. It all was the

16:48

corroborating evidence that allowed Michael

16:50

Cohen to stand on his own, on his

16:52

own testimony and not have to worry that

16:54

there was nothing underneath him in terms of

16:56

a foundation to be able to talk about

16:58

what happened because his credibility, as we know,

17:01

is going to be an issue. But

17:03

we also didn't hear very,

17:05

we heard very few objections today.

17:07

That was interesting. No sidebars

17:09

for incredibly aggressive defense that

17:11

we've seen. No objection. So what was

17:14

the import of that? It

17:16

was a free flowing, well

17:18

paced, clean, succinct direct examination

17:20

today. Michael Cohen was afforded

17:22

the opportunity to drive the narrative forward the

17:24

way that the DA's office wanted him to

17:26

do. And the jury was taking

17:29

notes intensely. There are at least three of them

17:31

that were feverishly taking notes and looking. And that's

17:33

the last thing I would say. The

17:36

visual aid of having that

17:38

exhibit displayed on the screen,

17:40

in addition to when the audio tape

17:43

was played of the famous, I secretly

17:45

recorded Donald Trump thing accompanied by the

17:47

transcript, it is so effective because jurors

17:49

just sit and they sit as we

17:52

do. And then they see

17:54

something and they feel the engagement. So when

17:56

they go into the jury room to deliberate,

17:58

people's 35 is something they're doing. going to

18:00

tangibly have and they'll look at the handwriting,

18:02

but more importantly, they'll see it matches with

18:04

essential consultants and matches with the 135 and

18:07

matches the wire to Keith

18:09

Davidson and matches the gross up. Everything

18:11

fits. And then today they left to

18:13

recess today. And the last thing they

18:16

heard was Donald Trump participating in the

18:18

conspiracy. Does it matter that they don't

18:20

have Weisselberg testifying? Weisselberg sitting in Rikers

18:22

right now. They're not going to have him

18:24

testifying. Does it matter that he

18:26

can't testify? Yes, that was my handwriting.

18:28

And yes, I was in that room as

18:31

well with Trump and Michael Cohen. And when

18:33

Michael Cohen was speculating that Trump and I

18:35

had talked about this before, here's the

18:37

truth or the non-truth of that. Is it matter? So

18:40

no objections to speculation from the defense

18:42

when they asked Michael Cohen. Right. Number

18:45

two, Jeff McConnie has independently verified and

18:47

authenticated the handwriting of Allen Weisselberg. Number

18:49

three, go ahead defense bringing convicted

18:51

perjurer Allen Weisselberg. And why did you

18:53

have Donald Trump take the stand and

18:55

explain what he really meant? If you

18:57

fail to bring anybody up to refute

18:59

the evidence, it stays as the

19:01

evidence. Nicole. I mean, I think the other

19:04

part that was as black and white is

19:06

that the motive is clearly established. I think

19:08

he was the 16th witness and the 17th

19:10

witness. Not one person has

19:12

told a different story other

19:14

than the compressed period between the

19:16

drop of Access Hollywood and Election

19:19

Day is the pressure cooker

19:21

that the candidate in the campaign feel to

19:23

pay the $130,000. We

19:26

have all this longer timeline and the longer

19:28

arc from pecker on the catch and kill,

19:30

which included the doorman and Karen MacDougall from

19:32

Cohen. His arc was even longer back in

19:35

2011. He was talking to the

19:37

boss about running for president. And the first thing the

19:39

boss says is a lot of women are going to come out of

19:41

the woodwork. Cohen was a fixer of

19:44

lots of things, but specifically infidelity

19:46

and women that came out and

19:49

claimed infidelity. And so

19:51

as he was integrated into the

19:53

campaign and the sort of team Trump

19:55

on that point, he was never a

19:57

rogue actor in handling measures of impeachment.

20:00

accusations of infidelity. He was always working

20:02

with others. Correct. And to that

20:04

point, Pekker, I think, was the first person who

20:07

told the story of how kind of middle management

20:09

Cohen was, right? Because Pekron Trump entered into the

20:11

conspiracy to catch and kill. They're the strategists, they're

20:13

the innovators, they're the founders of catch and kill.

20:15

And Cohen is the guy that has to go

20:17

make it all happen. He's the guy frantically on

20:20

the phone with his own banker. And we heard

20:22

that from Gary Faso. And

20:24

he's haggled back and forth with Keith Davidson.

20:26

And he's trying to trap down Trump on

20:28

the plane. And he's on the phone with

20:30

Schiller and Hope and all these other people.

20:32

But the conspirators is another sort

20:34

of undisputed fact that's now lack of life.

20:37

There is no counter narrative about the

20:39

other innocent facts

20:41

pattern that explains what happened here. I thought

20:43

today as I was listening to or reading

20:45

this testimony of John Bolton's line about Rudy

20:47

Giuliani during the first inauguration, which he pulled

20:49

somewhere and said, I want to have nothing

20:51

to do with this drug deal. They're cooking

20:53

up over there. Which

20:56

is just it's such a succinct articulation

20:58

of like his lawyer sense is like,

21:01

that stuff is not above board. What's

21:03

happening over there. And everything being described

21:05

here is so clearly not above board.

21:07

It is there is so much effort

21:09

being done to do wrong here. And

21:12

when it comes to Cohen putting Trump in the room, I

21:14

think the question you have to ask yourself is, is that

21:17

is it believable testimony? And the other thing I

21:20

thought about again today, which I thought all the

21:22

way is Trump is

21:24

paying a crime penalty because

21:26

it is recorded as income. It is grossed

21:28

up to double what it should be that

21:31

he is going to pay this cheap

21:33

dude is going to pay the crime

21:36

penalty to hide the

21:38

income. And do you think $130,000

21:41

payment, which we know this guy has in his head, he's going

21:43

to look at a $420,000 statement on

21:45

Michael Cohen and be like, yeah, close enough. No,

21:48

someone's got to walk through those numbers. If someone

21:50

comes to you and says, I, we

21:53

did the dirt, we did the payment. Now here's my

21:55

reimbursement. It's for 20, not 130. Someone's got

21:59

to go through the math. on the paper or there's

22:01

no way you're saying yes to that. Even a non-Donald

22:03

Trump is not saying yes to that. But

22:05

certainly not Donald Trump is saying yes. But the penny picture,

22:07

right? And like I said, it's the penny picture. That actually

22:09

is the closest thing that we've had to

22:12

a counter narrative from them, right? The

22:14

counter narrative is, oh, rich

22:16

people and celebrities, men, we're always

22:18

paying hush money. It's no crime,

22:20

right? That has been the counter

22:23

narrative. You're paying them to excellent. But that

22:25

would mean paying $130,000. That

22:27

would not mean paying $130,000. But Connie testifying that he got

22:30

fired for a day or two because he didn't

22:32

haggle down the bills. So it's a great point

22:34

that here's one that was more than 2X. And

22:37

he was like, eh. So when Cohen

22:39

says about Trump, did

22:41

he try to renegotiate this once you were in

22:43

the room and you're actually getting the final agreement that

22:45

he's going to pay? Did he try to renegotiate? One

22:48

word answer. No. No, and

22:50

it's because Weisselberg has had the key pre-meeting.

22:52

Yes. Right, the pre-meeting is, you're

22:54

not gonna like this number, but here's why it

22:56

has to be this number. Yes. All

22:59

right. Michael Cohen is a

23:01

witness for the prosecution in this criminal

23:03

case against former President Donald Trump. Today,

23:05

what they started is what's called their

23:07

direct examination of Cohen. It means

23:09

prosecutors firing questions at their own

23:11

witness. That will continue

23:14

into tomorrow, if not beyond. But

23:16

then the cross-examination of Michael Cohen will

23:18

begin. That's when Trump's defense lawyers will

23:21

get to question Cohen. Some legal

23:23

observer suggesting today that

23:26

that expected cross-examination of Michael Cohen,

23:28

which is now looming, that

23:30

effectively might be the

23:32

entirety of Trump's defense. The defense is

23:35

under no obligation to bring any witnesses

23:38

to the stand, including Trump himself.

23:40

They may not try to mount

23:42

any witnesses, any defense at all,

23:44

other than what they are going to do

23:46

to Michael Cohen in trying to score points off

23:49

of him in cross-exam. How is it looking

23:51

that might go for them now that we're

23:53

seeing Michael Cohen on the stand? We've got

23:55

more on that and much more

23:57

ahead on all of this, including why divorce lawyers...

24:00

lawyers all over the country had their

24:02

ears turned red today and going, we'll be

24:04

right back with our recap of today's proceedings

24:06

in the first ever criminal trial of an

24:08

American president. Stay with us. Testimony

24:19

today from Michael Cohen, putting former

24:21

president Donald Trump in the room

24:24

where Cohen says they spelled

24:27

out the details of the alleged

24:29

crime. They spelled out this ruse

24:31

of covering up the hush money

24:33

payments, faking the business records to

24:35

make it look like legal fees

24:37

for Michael Cohen to occlude the

24:39

fact that what they were doing

24:41

was making a campaign expenditure. Michael

24:43

Cohen today describing the document in

24:46

which that was spelled out, saying

24:48

that that was discussed. That

24:50

document was brought into Trump's office

24:52

and discussed in detail with Trump

24:54

and he approved it, looking at

24:56

this same document that the jury

24:59

and all of us have now

25:01

seen describing the math behind this

25:03

alleged crime. It was

25:05

a sort of incandescent moment in this criminal

25:07

trial of Donald Trump, but it was hardly

25:10

the only moment that will stick with folks

25:12

from Michael Cohen's first day on the stand.

25:15

As to whether there was a reason to

25:17

approve the hush money payment other than to

25:19

influence the

25:22

campaign, whether there was some counter narrative that

25:25

might explain that the hush money was

25:27

being paid for some other reason other

25:29

than to influence the campaign, Michael Cohen

25:31

gave brand new testimony about

25:34

that today, that if

25:36

nothing else will presumably warm the

25:38

cockles of some divorce lawyer's heart

25:40

somewhere. Prosecutor,

25:43

now after you learned from Dylan Howard

25:45

and from Keith Davidson about the Stormy

25:47

Daniels story and her wanting to publish

25:49

that story and the conversations about purchasing

25:51

that story, did you speak to Mr.

25:53

Trump? Michael Cohen, I did. Question,

25:56

was this also a serious matter at that

25:58

time? Answer, a very serious matter. matter. Question,

26:00

did you tell him what you had heard

26:02

from Dylan Howard and Keith Davidson? Answer,

26:05

yes. Question, and what was

26:07

his reaction? Answer, he was really angry with

26:09

me. I thought you had this under control.

26:11

I thought you took care of this. And

26:13

he expressed to me, there

26:17

is a previous denial, meaning we have previously

26:20

been able to work with Stormy Daniels to

26:22

deny that any sexual encounter took place when

26:24

this first arose in 2011. Quote, there is

26:28

a previous denial, just take care

26:30

of it. Cohen says there

26:32

was a lot going on at the campaign at

26:34

the time. He was like, just take care of

26:36

it. Question, did he say

26:39

anything to you at that time about how this might

26:41

be viewed if it got out? Answer, yes.

26:44

Question, what did he say in substance? Answer,

26:46

he said to me, this is a disaster,

26:49

total disaster. Women are

26:51

going to hate me because this, this is

26:53

really a disaster. Women will hate me. Guys

26:55

may think it's cool, but this

26:57

is going to be a disaster for the campaign.

27:00

Question, what did you understand him to mean

27:02

by women will hate this? What was his

27:04

concern? Trump defense lawyer,

27:07

Mr. Blanche, objection, the judge

27:09

overruled Cohen. So

27:12

at the time, Mr. Trump was polling

27:14

very, very poorly with women. And

27:17

this coupled with the previous Access Hollywood

27:19

tape, he just stated this is a

27:21

disaster, get control over it. Question,

27:24

did you have any conversation, additional conversation

27:26

with Mr. Trump about a particular strategy

27:28

about how to get control of it

27:31

and how to deal with it? Answer,

27:33

he told me to work with David, meaning

27:36

David Pekker and get control

27:38

over this purchase the life rights. We

27:40

need to stop this from getting out.

27:42

Question, was there any conversation about pushing

27:44

it to a period of time? Answer,

27:46

yes. Question, what was that? Answer. So

27:48

during the negotiation to purchase and acquire

27:50

the life rights, and again, we're talking

27:52

about Stormy Daniels here, what

27:54

he had said to me is what I want you to

27:57

do is just push it out as long as you

27:59

can just get past the election

28:01

because if I win, it

28:04

has no relevance. I will be president. If

28:06

I lose, I don't even care. Question.

28:10

Did you bring up at the time, the topic

28:12

of his wife, Melania, in one of

28:14

those conversations with Mr. Trump? Answer. I

28:16

did question. What did you say in

28:18

substance to him? Answer. I said to him, and how's

28:21

things going to go with upstairs

28:25

question. Were you concerned about that?

28:27

Answer. I was. Question.

28:29

And what, if anything, did he say to

28:31

you about that? Answer. Don't

28:34

worry. He goes, he goes, how

28:36

long do you think I will be on the market for? Not

28:39

long. Question.

28:42

What did you understand that to mean? Answer.

28:45

He wasn't thinking about Melania. This

28:48

was all about the campaign. Few

28:53

things, Nicole. Women

28:55

will hate me. Guys may think it's cool. I'm

28:58

just going to leave that where it lies. But

29:00

this, what I want you to do is

29:02

push it out as long as you can, get past the

29:04

election. If I win, it has no relevance. I'll be president.

29:06

If I lose, I don't even care. So

29:09

that means this explains why they're not

29:11

paying Stormy Daniels. And in fact, them

29:13

not paying Stormy Daniels almost results in

29:15

them losing control of this and Stormy

29:18

Daniels telling her story to ABC news.

29:20

They have to scramble. Michael pays himself.

29:22

Michael Cohen pays himself because

29:25

they've almost lost it because they've been stringing it out.

29:27

They want to string it out past the election and

29:29

then never paying her at all. Right. But

29:31

then, the question about

29:33

his wife, aren't you worried about your wife? What she will

29:36

think. Michael Cohen is

29:38

describing a conversation with Donald Trump in which

29:40

he's trying to elicit, is there a reason

29:42

for us to suppress this story other than

29:44

the campaign? And Trump effectively says, no, I

29:46

don't care if she knows, I don't care if she's

29:49

mad. How long do you think I'll be on the

29:51

market for? Not long. Yeah. And

29:53

I mean, he's not the first person

29:55

to testify to Trump's singular concern with

29:57

this campaign and the other investigator and

29:59

prosecutor. investigators that had access to

30:01

David Pekker's unfiltered, unlimited testimony

30:04

was the Southern District of New York and

30:06

they found the same election crime to have

30:08

taken place. They simply decided not to charge

30:10

Trump. They named him individual one and described

30:12

his role as, quote, directing Michael

30:14

Cohen. So the facts are not in

30:16

dispute by the other investigators that looked

30:18

at this. No one who's come before

30:21

this jury has testified to any motive

30:23

other than the campaign. And

30:25

the real crisis, the thing that makes the

30:27

Stormy Daniels payment different in addition

30:29

to the crimes that were committed in the fraudulent

30:31

business records is that this is

30:33

the one that happens in the compressed time period.

30:35

Right. And Karen McDougal does

30:37

come out. It comes out the Monday before the

30:40

election. And you've got all those conversations where Trump

30:42

is telling HOPICS what to do. HOPICS says, no,

30:44

I'm going to deny, deny, deny. I mean,

30:46

they are hyper aware of the political damage.

30:48

And none of the witnesses that have come

30:50

through have said anything about Trump being scared

30:53

of wanting or worried about wanting. I had

30:55

a source that was inside the debate prep

30:57

when Access Hollywood Tape dropped. And

30:59

he told me he went upstairs

31:01

with Trump and Melania was very distraught. Now,

31:03

no one knows anything about anyone's marriage that

31:05

isn't in that marriage. So I have no

31:08

idea what your source was in the room with the debate

31:10

prep. And then when I don't think Trump went

31:12

upstairs alone, I don't think he would know. I

31:15

think the pay prep ended and a subset of

31:17

that group went upstairs to the residents to deal

31:19

with the statement to deal with Melania. I mean,

31:21

I think a group of them came from, I

31:23

don't think Reince Priebus went because his vote was

31:25

to dump Trump from the ticket and see if

31:27

they could switch a route with Mr. Mike Pence.

31:29

But I think a few of them went upstairs

31:32

from debate prep, which was in Trump Tower, head

31:34

to the residence. Melania was reportedly crying. But

31:37

again, we know, we don't know why she's probably,

31:39

was she mortified? Did she know? Was

31:41

she mad at him for getting out? I mean, who knows? But

31:44

his concerns about her were very distant

31:46

second. His political concerns about being what

31:48

he's always afraid of being a loser.

31:51

Chris, at the opening statements, Trump's

31:53

defense counsel did say,

31:56

did suggest that the reason that

31:58

Trump was paying

32:00

this hush money or the reason that this response

32:02

to Stormy Daniels rolled out some of the way

32:04

that it did despite the Parts that they deny

32:07

is because he did what anybody would have done

32:09

He's trying to avoid embarrassment with the implication being

32:11

that he was trying to avoid implication The

32:14

embarrassment to his family on this it does

32:16

seem to be repeatedly rebutted by multiple witnesses

32:18

in this case It does and one thing

32:20

that is a little unclear to me I've

32:22

referenced this before the John Edwards case in

32:24

which they they effectively use that as defense

32:26

right that that that when he was under

32:28

trial Federal trial for again, essentially campaign

32:30

finance violations for paying off hush money that

32:32

it was fundamentally about protecting his wife Who

32:34

you might remember the time was cancer-stricken and

32:36

I think had a much more plausible case

32:38

that that was the case What

32:41

I don't actually understand is what the standard

32:43

is for the jury on this aspect of the

32:45

crime Meaning like

32:48

they clearly falsified business records,

32:50

right? I mean There

32:52

clearly was a hush money payment That

32:54

was clearly like there's a huge amount

32:57

of paper transaction the motive to it

32:59

We have multiple witnesses saying it was

33:01

about the campaign and not Melania But

33:03

there's not the same kind of I mean there's there's

33:06

stuff in the evidentiary record, but no bank

33:08

is gonna have exactly There's not a bank

33:10

statements is like about the campaign right? So

33:12

and I guess my question is how much?

33:15

Whatever fuzziness a juror might feel

33:17

about whether that's as firmly establishes

33:19

other things affects Whether

33:22

you can find Katie Let me put that to

33:24

you because I write we all are now familiar

33:26

with these intricacies of New York law that

33:28

the reason this Is a felony or not a

33:31

misdemeanor you can be charged with misdemeanor falsification

33:33

of business records You're charged with a

33:35

felony falsification of business records when it

33:37

is used to commit or

33:39

conceal the commission of another crime But

33:42

you don't have to prove the crime

33:44

beyond a reasonable doubt. So if the

33:46

crime is influenced It's an

33:48

unfair it's an illegal campaign

33:51

expenditure They don't what is the

33:53

standard doesn't have to be beyond a reasonable

33:55

doubt? No, so it's a great

33:57

question because I think a lot of people went into

33:59

today's testimony if you're rooting

34:01

for the prosecution, hoping to have

34:03

the clarity from Michael Cohen's testimony.

34:05

So the underlying misdemeanors of falsification

34:07

of the business records is the

34:09

layup, as Chris says. But

34:12

for what purpose? Because that's what elevates it

34:14

or punts it up to the felony. That

34:16

secondary offense, the subject offense of why

34:19

would you want to falsify those business

34:21

records, you don't have to prove that

34:23

offense beyond and to the exclusion of

34:26

every reasonable doubt. You just have to point and say, this is

34:28

what we think it is. Exactly, and that

34:30

is why you're hearing the campaign component

34:32

so heavily here. You're not hearing as

34:34

much the tax side of it. You're

34:36

hearing the campaign, campaign, campaign, because that

34:38

is the theory that the prosecution got

34:40

up and opening and said is what

34:42

that is. That standard seems

34:44

to me, watching this all develop, to matter

34:47

a lot, right? Because I do think, if

34:49

you were to ask me how much of

34:51

the, they have established to me beyond a

34:53

reasonable doubt so far. The misdemeanors. Yeah, like

34:55

they, clearly they, this was clearly fraudulent, and

34:58

they clearly covered up this thing, that's clear.

35:01

I think they have also established that it was

35:03

for the campaign, but have they established it in

35:05

my mind to the same level of rock solid

35:07

beyond, as that other thing,

35:09

I would probably say no so far, but they

35:11

don't have to. But they don't need to. But

35:13

having the testimony from Cohen

35:15

saying that Trump was in the room

35:18

when they talked about the falsification gets

35:20

you there. That's why that was

35:22

so important. These things, it

35:24

can be both. That's the most important

35:26

part. The jurors can think he did

35:29

it for both reasons. And as long

35:31

as the campaign is one of them,

35:33

and certainly if it's the dominant one,

35:35

then the case is made. So, but

35:37

they don't have to completely exclude some

35:39

sort of motivation involving his wife. However,

35:42

Michael, the evidence, this is really important, the

35:45

evidence so far has excluded

35:47

Melania. Correct, yeah. Michael Cohen,

35:49

under oath, in evidence, said,

35:52

he wasn't thinking about Melania. You

35:55

cannot get a clearer statement than

35:57

that. Now, this is gonna be

35:59

important. I just got to instruct on this. Nothing

36:02

the Trump lawyers said in the opening is evidence.

36:05

Everything that the witnesses said is evidence.

36:09

The defense attorneys' cross-examination

36:12

questions are not evidence.

36:15

So what the cross-examination questions are going to

36:17

be is, you lied about that, didn't you?

36:20

And Cohen's going to go, no. And

36:22

that you lied about it isn't

36:24

evidence. They cannot and will not

36:26

put Donald Trump on the witness

36:28

stand, who's the only person alive

36:30

who can present evidence against what

36:32

Michael Cohen has said. That's

36:35

how you'd have to prevent evidence. It has to be Trump

36:37

saying, I never told him to do it, and

36:40

I absolutely did not reimburse him.

36:43

That was I was paying him to be my lawyer. Trump would

36:45

have to give you that indirect testimony

36:47

from the defense he's not going to.

36:50

So the likelihood is you're going to go

36:52

to the jury with nothing but the evidence

36:54

presented by the prosecution. You think it's a

36:56

zero percent chance that Trump testifies zero. It

36:58

always has been. When we

37:00

come back, we will look at what Michael

37:03

Cohen had to say about the rest of

37:05

Trump world by name as he

37:07

made the case that he did not act alone.

37:09

We will also surprisingly, to

37:12

my mind, at least we will be

37:14

talking about the other appearances of the

37:16

former first lady in today's trial testimony.

37:19

Boy, did that one come as a surprise. We'll

37:22

have that portion of the transcript for you and an explanation

37:24

when we come back. Welcome

37:35

back to our prime time recap

37:37

of the criminal trial of former President

37:39

Donald Trump. Prosecutor, I

37:42

would like to direct your attention now to October 7th, 2016.

37:45

Do you remember where you were that day? Michael

37:48

Cohen, yes. Question, where were you? Answer, I

37:50

was in London. Question, how do you remember

37:52

that you were in London? Answer, well, I

37:54

went to London. For my daughter's 21st birthday,

37:56

as well as for my anniversary. And

37:59

while you were in London, did you? become aware of the

38:01

release of what's known as the Access Hollywood

38:03

tape? Answer, yes. And how did

38:05

you become aware of that tape coming out or that

38:07

it had come out? Answer, I received a phone call.

38:09

Who did you receive a phone call from? Answer,

38:11

from Hope Hicks. Who was Hope Hicks

38:14

at the time? Hope Hicks was communication

38:16

director for the Trump campaign. Do

38:18

you also recall receiving at around that time an

38:20

email from Steve Bannon about the potential

38:23

release of the Access Hollywood tape? Answer,

38:25

yes. And who was Steve

38:27

Bannon at the time? Campaign manager for

38:29

the Trump campaign. Question, do you recognize

38:31

this email? Answer, I do. It's an

38:33

email between me and Steve Bannon, as

38:35

well as Hope Hicks, Jason Miller, Kellyanne

38:37

Conway, David Bossi. Does it relate

38:39

to the release of the Access Hollywood tape? It

38:41

does. And can you tell the jury what you

38:43

understand this bottom email to be? Answer,

38:45

yes. This is an email from David Farinthold

38:48

of the Washington Post, and it's to Hope

38:50

Hicks with the subject matter of urgent

38:53

Washington Post query. Question.

38:56

And just in general, what's he communicating

38:58

to Hope Hicks, and what is he

39:00

asking her for? Answer, he's asking her

39:02

for comment in regard to the leak

39:04

of the tape from Access Hollywood. Question,

39:06

and is there a transcript of the

39:08

Access Hollywood tape attached to the email

39:10

from David Farinthold to Hope Hicks? Answer,

39:12

there is. Question, and does Hope Hicks

39:14

then forward that email to some other

39:17

folks? Answer, she does. What

39:19

does Hope Hicks say in that email that she forwards

39:21

on to those folks involved in the campaign? Answer,

39:24

need to hear the tape to be sure,

39:27

then followed by deny, deny, deny.

39:31

Question. And does

39:33

that get forwarded? Now, as we scroll down, does

39:36

that get forwarded by Mr. Bannon on to you?

39:38

Answer, yes, ma'am. Question. And while you were

39:40

in London, did you have several calls with

39:43

Hope Hicks about this matter, the Access Hollywood

39:45

tape? Answer, I did. At one

39:47

point, did Mr. Trump join a call with

39:49

yourself and Hope Hicks? Answer, yes. On

39:51

that day, on October 8th? Answer,

39:54

yes. Question. And did you also have another

39:56

separate call with Mr. Trump on October 8th,

39:58

2016? Answer, yes. Yes. Question.

40:00

Do you have a separate memory of where you

40:02

were and what you were doing when you had

40:04

these phone calls with him? Answer. Yes. What were

40:06

you doing? Answer. I was with my

40:09

family and friends in London. Question. Were

40:11

you having dinner? Answer. I was. Did you

40:13

step out to take these calls? I did.

40:15

And what, if any, discussion do you remember

40:18

with Mr. Trump about the tape and the

40:20

strategy for dealing with it? Answer. He wanted

40:22

me to reach out to all of my

40:24

contacts with the media. We needed to put

40:26

a spin on this. And

40:28

the spin that he wanted to put on it was

40:32

that this is locker room talk.

40:35

Something that Melania had recommended.

40:39

Or at least he told me that that's

40:41

what Melania had thought it was and used

40:43

that in order to get control over the

40:45

story and to minimize its impact on him

40:48

and the campaign. Question. And

40:50

what, if anything, did you do at that point

40:52

to try to assist the campaign with that effort?

40:54

Answer. I reached out to members of

40:57

the media. He

40:59

told her that, excuse me, he told Mr. Cohen

41:01

that the locker room talk

41:04

defense, which became the

41:06

defense, that spin about what

41:08

the access Hollywood tape was all about.

41:10

Michael Cohen says that Trump told him

41:12

it was his wife's idea,

41:15

that it was Melania Trump's phrase, locker

41:17

room talk. The

41:20

other thing that's important about this exchange

41:22

besides that bizarre assertion

41:25

is that it shows that

41:27

Michael Cohen was not a rogue

41:29

employee. He was not a solo

41:31

operator, especially on issues like as

41:34

Nicole points out, things that related

41:36

to alleged infidelity. Michael

41:38

Cohen was on the team. He was

41:40

part of, if not leading the whole

41:42

team response. That was also made clear

41:44

in this exhibit, this printed exhibit that

41:46

was filed for the first time in court today. This

41:48

is right before the election. The

41:50

election was November 8th. This was November 4th. And

41:53

this email exchange between Hope Hicks

41:55

and Michael Cohen shows Hicks trying

41:57

out different types of denials. that

42:00

she wants to issue potentially to the

42:02

Wall Street Journal about the story they're

42:04

about to run about these alleged infidelities

42:06

and the cover-up of them. She's

42:09

running these proposed denials by Michael

42:11

Cohen. Cohen responds with

42:13

his own. He says, quote, instead, say this,

42:16

these accusations are completely untrue and

42:18

just the latest despicable attempt by the liberal

42:20

media and the Clinton machine to blah, blah,

42:22

blah, blah, blah,

42:26

blah. Witnesses throughout this trial have

42:29

not just allowed, they have

42:31

basically invited testimony from earlier

42:33

witnesses, including from Hope Hooks, invited

42:37

these witnesses to disparage

42:40

or say how much they

42:42

didn't like or didn't respect Michael Cohen.

42:46

But then today they showed the receipts

42:48

of him not operating alone, of him

42:50

being totally part of team Trump, responding

42:52

to allegations about Trump being consulted at the

42:54

highest levels about what the response should be.

42:57

Specifically, he was a key part

42:59

of the whole team's response when

43:02

it came to allegations from women. How

43:05

does that part of his testimony

43:07

today and this evidence introduced today

43:09

help the prosecution? I'm endlessly

43:12

intrigued by the sinister role Hope

43:14

Hicks played behind the scenes because other

43:17

than Bill Barr, there's no one whose

43:19

reputation has been more successfully laundered before,

43:22

during, and after the Trump years than

43:24

Hope Hicks. Hope Hicks gets a transcript

43:26

of Access Hollywood. She's in the room

43:28

where Trump is saying, Trump, he's talking

43:30

about himself in the third person, I

43:33

understand. And she sends the transcript, of

43:35

course, we're going to deny, deny, deny. The

43:37

first thing she writes when Wall Street Journal

43:39

calls with McDougal is deny, deny, deny. And

43:42

If you read her draft responses, they

43:44

are more bombastic, more partisan, and more

43:46

nasty than anything. Cohen Edits her down.

43:49

I Mean, Hope Hicks is sort of

43:51

the surprise, and it shouldn't be a

43:53

surprise, but a really sharp elbowed sort

43:55

of paid liar for Donald Trump. And

43:57

Cohen is a moderating force on the.

44:00

The public statements, other campaigns which is stunning

44:02

for millennia thing I had heard of the

44:04

time and one he actually goes out and

44:06

doesn't an interview where she says I am.

44:08

I think she says it in an interview.

44:10

I can't remember if it's in his hostage

44:12

statement that night. remember his mother? My sister

44:14

Carolyn to Allocate River uses it. but she

44:16

doesn't interview vague somehow either. How would they

44:18

get her to do an interview and she

44:20

uses that line in an interview That she

44:22

does. I think it's maybe us to visit.

44:24

Paint says maybe four days after the tape

44:26

and stop. but that is their their line

44:29

and I mean tragic. Waste because the

44:31

other stories stay silent. He

44:34

though. in their minds I think about. Work for

44:36

so you know the molony a

44:38

question or do is kind of

44:40

importance On on this point spoke

44:42

because Milan or you will through

44:44

the questioning of defense that they

44:46

will try to use her as

44:48

a reason. Donald. Trump. One

44:51

of these things to bought some out

44:53

of. But what you're seeing there's morning

44:55

Trump is this in. This was going

44:57

to be uncontested. Let's remember Storm Trump

45:00

is not going take the witness stand

45:02

and say Milan. He didn't say that

45:04

Milan He is not going to take

45:06

the wouldn't stand and say she didn't

45:09

say that. So it will be uncontested.

45:11

Him the records and this is millennia

45:13

Trump's After seeing what Donald for how

45:15

Donald Trump brags about his favorite method

45:18

of sexual assault. this is worse. Than

45:20

what you're learning about stories journals.

45:22

This is worse than what you're

45:24

learning about says Mr. Glyphs and

45:26

this portrays Milan a up as

45:28

a team player in the cover

45:30

up. Let's get our guys through.

45:32

It's which means. Why? Would you

45:35

ever worry about Milan and when

45:37

the storm is daniel story comes

45:39

along. Which matters is that a

45:42

sense is going to count on

45:44

putting in a mind of a

45:46

single dirceu a counter narrative that

45:49

makes this whole. Hush money

45:51

and and and falsification of

45:53

business records scheme. Something that

45:55

is innocent Because it wasn't criminals just

45:57

designed to protect Molony. I just. designed

46:00

to protect the family, rather than to influence the

46:02

campaign. I mean, if that's what they're going

46:04

to try to do, it seems very hard

46:06

to do that now, given the

46:08

testimony about Mrs. Trump's

46:11

own contributions to this defense, and to

46:13

what Trump explained about how he didn't care

46:15

about whether she knew. So just a second

46:17

on, here's how a defense would do that.

46:19

They'd put Melania, they'd put the wife on

46:21

the witness stand, she'd be in tears saying,

46:23

this crushed me, this was devastating. When I

46:25

learned this Stormy Daniels news, it was the

46:28

most horrible day of my life. That's the

46:30

way a defense would actually get that into

46:32

a case like this. Or she'd be

46:34

there, she'd be sitting behind him every day

46:36

of the trial, showing her support, even if

46:38

she doesn't take the stand. But her absence

46:41

screams volumes of a lack of

46:43

a belief in Donald Trump. Our

46:45

primetime recap of the only criminal

46:48

trial in history, of an American

46:50

president, continues right after the break.

46:52

We got much more to come, stay with us. Welcome

46:59

back to our MSNBC primetime recap of the criminal trial

47:13

of former president Donald Trump. I'm here

47:16

with my colleagues Ari Melber and Katie

47:18

Fang and Chris Hayes from MSNBC, along with

47:20

Suzanne Craig from the New York Times. Good

47:22

to have you all here. Today

47:24

the prosecution called its 20th

47:26

and likely its final witness. Trump's

47:29

long-time lawyer and quote unquote

47:31

fixer, Michael Cohen. Michael

47:33

Cohen today told the jury that

47:36

Trump personally approved and directed the hush

47:38

money payment to an adult film actress

47:40

and director in 2016, including

47:43

the false pretense of structuring

47:45

the payment as if it was a

47:48

set of legal fees when it wasn't.

47:51

Cohen cast a vibe today that Trump

47:53

did this explicitly to protect his presidential

47:55

campaign from the damage her story would

47:58

cause, that it was not a not

48:00

paid to protect his family or

48:02

his wife from any embarrassment. This

48:05

blockbuster testimony defined the

48:07

official court action inside the court.

48:09

The direct examination of Cohen

48:11

will continue. Tomorrow, the cross-examination

48:14

will then begin thereafter, and we expect

48:16

lots of fireworks at that point.

48:18

But today, outside the court, Trump

48:21

made his own bid for attention with the

48:23

help from some of his friends.

48:26

Do we call them friends? Possible

48:28

running mates, political allies, I don't

48:30

know, as he always does on

48:32

his way into court. This morning, the former president

48:34

himself stopped in front of cameras to spend a

48:36

few minutes denouncing the trial. But if

48:39

you look over his right shoulder there, are those familiar

48:41

faces? Yes, they are. In front

48:43

of Donald Trump's adult son, Eric,

48:45

he's the blonde one. He's

48:47

standing in the back there. There are

48:49

two Republican United States senators, JD

48:52

Vance of Ohio and Tommy Tupperville

48:54

of Alabama. Those two senators came,

48:56

along with a Republican Congresswoman from

48:58

Staten Island and two Republican state

49:01

attorneys general, one from Alabama, one

49:03

from, I think, Iowa, to

49:07

keep Donald Trump company. This

49:10

is becoming kind of a thing in

49:13

Republican politics to make a pilgrimage to

49:15

Trump's trial. Last week, it was Republican

49:17

Senator Rick Scott. He's up for reelection

49:19

this year in Trump's adopted home state

49:21

of Florida. NBC News has

49:23

confirmed that former Republican presidential candidate

49:26

Vivek Ramaswamy will join Trump in

49:28

court tomorrow. OK. And

49:31

the craven, desperate politics

49:34

of all this is embarrassing

49:36

to everybody who's watching it. Many

49:39

of these folks are obviously hoping for

49:41

gigs in what they hope will be

49:43

a second Trump administration. JD Vance, in

49:45

particular, is desperate to be considered for

49:47

Trump's vice president. But when

49:50

Senator Vance and Senator Tupperville left the courtroom

49:52

today after a couple of hours and headed

49:54

for the cameras themselves, they made

49:56

sure to tell everybody that they were only there

49:58

to support their dear. Dear friend

50:00

in need I'm

50:04

here for the civil reason to show

50:06

support for a friend Luckily the president

50:09

supporters should know that he's actually in

50:11

great spirits despite the circumstances of this

50:13

I'm here today to represent and to

50:15

pay my respects to what President Trump is going

50:17

through It's a

50:20

tough time for him that courtroom is

50:22

depressing. This is New York City The

50:25

icon of our country and we got

50:27

a courtroom that's most depressing thing

50:29

I've ever been in Mental

50:32

anguish is trying to be pushed on Republican

50:36

candidate for the president of United

50:38

States this year. That's all this is Republican

50:40

candidate for president United States

50:43

is going through mental anguish in

50:45

a courtroom. That's very depressing very

50:48

depressing There

50:50

is a little-known constitutional amendment

50:52

which requires a playful mobile

50:55

To be put above criminal defendants

50:57

in courtrooms that are particularly depressing

51:01

It's like a subset of the eighth of it At

51:04

one point senator Vance voiced his concern

51:06

that Donald Trump was being made to

51:08

feel quote lonely Because

51:11

he isn't seeing crowds of supporters every

51:13

day outside the courthouse. That's because

51:15

they're not there But

51:18

the senators and the rest of the gaggle of

51:20

Republican officials who were at the courthouse today They

51:23

all echoed one of Trump's most common complaints about

51:25

his trial, which is that it's keeping him off

51:27

the campaign trail He

51:31

should be out on the campaign trail But

51:33

of course he's here with this trial our president Trump

51:35

is tied up in court when he should

51:37

be out on the campaign trail This

51:39

is simply an effort keep Donald Trump in

51:41

New York City So he can't

51:44

go out and speak to the people of

51:46

this country about why he should be reelected

51:48

this president It's

51:56

not that cold Donald

51:58

Trump should be out campaigning He should

52:00

be out barnstorming the swing states. That's

52:03

what, of course, he would be doing if he

52:05

were not trapped at this trial. That's

52:07

the line, right? Here's the problem. It

52:09

is true that Trump is required to be in

52:11

court when it is in session. He is, after

52:14

all, a criminal defendant. But

52:16

that's only maximum four days a week.

52:18

Sometimes it's only three days a week.

52:20

And on those other days when court

52:22

isn't in session, the former president is

52:24

mostly not campaigning. Most of

52:26

his non-trial days he's been hanging out

52:28

at his club in Florida or staying

52:31

home in New York or New Jersey,

52:33

as is his right. But

52:35

it remains this strange

52:38

and easily disprovable thing that

52:41

Trump and his allies and, quote, friends

52:43

are constantly saying that he would be

52:45

out campaigning if he weren't in court.

52:48

That is easily disproven by the observable fact that

52:50

when he is not in court, he is mostly

52:52

not doing that. To

52:56

be fair, he did have one big rally this

52:58

weekend in New Jersey. That is a state that

53:00

has not voted for a Republican for president since

53:02

1988. But hey, hope

53:04

this brings eternal. It does have

53:06

the advantage of being a quick hop, skip,

53:08

and a jump from Trump's New York apartment.

53:11

So maybe that was the reason he

53:13

did it. But meanwhile, President Biden is

53:15

running what you might call counterprogramming.

53:17

President Biden is actually

53:19

doing what Trump says he wants to

53:22

be doing. He is hitting the swing

53:24

states repeatedly. Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Joe

53:26

Biden even hit Trump's backyard in Florida

53:28

last month. And while Trump

53:30

has made his trial the centerpiece of his

53:32

campaign, now to the point where Republicans have

53:35

to come and sit in court with him

53:37

in order to show their support, President

53:40

Biden basically never mentions the trial.

53:42

He barely even mentions who

53:44

his opponent in the election is. He

53:47

talks up his administration's accomplishments. He talks

53:49

up how his accomplishments will help the

53:51

people of whatever swing state he's in.

53:54

Like much of the Biden presidency, it feels like

53:57

an act of radical normalcy in the face of

53:59

what's going on. The other side of American

54:01

politics and now the other side of

54:03

the presidential contest. Whatever.

54:06

Of can be said about this presidential

54:08

election: The two candidates are running wildly

54:10

different campaigns, and especially on a day

54:12

like this feels like they are running.

54:15

Frankly, on wildly different planet. So

54:17

let's bring in are calling Jen Psaki: She's

54:19

the host of Inside With and Saki here

54:21

on Msnbc. should have a veteran of many

54:23

campaign. She's former White House Press Secretary for

54:26

President Biden. is Jen. Thank you so much.

54:28

For being with us tonight, I don't want to make sure we were able

54:30

to talk to. Let. Let

54:32

me ask you. There I feel

54:35

like there's this is there was this

54:37

pre trial sort of panda talk or

54:39

see common wisdom that Trump was going

54:41

to not only sell a lot of

54:44

merge witnesses mugshot on submerged but this

54:46

was going to be a political bonanza

54:48

for him. I feel like to the

54:51

extent that we can see anything in

54:53

the polling. It's showing that the trial

54:55

isn't changing things much one way or

54:57

the other in terms of use of

54:59

either of the two candidates. What? How

55:01

are the politics of this. Trial

55:03

being made manifest. Well.

55:06

We don't know yet. I will say one

55:08

additional detail you didn't mention but as my

55:11

favorite from last Wednesday is that Trump spend

55:13

time dining with people whose gave up spent

55:15

about ten thousand dollars on and as teas

55:17

and got to get a piece of his

55:20

suit and a piece of his tie. That's

55:22

how we spend a day campaigning scenario. I

55:24

think on the polling of it's it has

55:26

an impact of people yet we know from

55:28

polling with seen that if he is convicted

55:31

that's that Pulling has showed that it could

55:33

impact people and how they view him. We

55:35

will see. but if you look at

55:37

the contrast here rachel i mean it's still

55:39

biden as other think one of the best

55:41

things he's done recently is that of in

55:43

wisconsin where he basically went to a states

55:46

and went to a place fox com or

55:48

trump made a promise about jobs that he

55:50

couldn't deliver on didn't deliver on that had

55:52

a little edge to it you need a

55:54

little adds to break through these days so

55:56

that was a good thing but there's gotta

55:58

be more of that too in order for

56:00

Biden to continue to kind of make progress

56:02

in this campaign. The most interesting, and you

56:04

touch on this and went over it, and

56:06

this is the thing that's stuck out to

56:08

me so much about today is this sort

56:10

of sideshow, but it's not a sideshow, of

56:13

these senators. It's so strange seeing J.D. Vance

56:15

and Tommy Tuberville in New York. It was like

56:17

a where's Waldo moment. Like, there they are, oh,

56:20

there they are, in back of him at this

56:22

press conference. But it tells you so

56:24

much, because as you said, not only did they

56:26

stand there, they went out afterwards, and then they

56:28

put out things in social media because

56:31

they're looking for approval from Trump. And

56:33

that adds to what we've seen over

56:35

the last couple of weeks, which is,

56:37

one, people who want to be the vice

56:40

presidential running mate or in the cabinet saying,

56:43

confirming they don't think Trump lost the election in

56:45

2020. Two, we've started to

56:47

see a number of people recently in the last couple

56:49

of weeks and a number of shows suggest they might

56:51

not respect the outcome of the election in 2024. That's

56:54

replaying the game again. And this is the third piece.

56:56

I mean, we're gonna see Vivek tomorrow. How crazy will

56:59

that be? I don't know yet, we will see. But

57:01

that is a piece of this that tells

57:04

you so much about his own political power,

57:06

even if we're not clear about where the

57:08

polls between the two candidates are gonna be

57:10

at the end of this trial yet. Can

57:12

I just, I mean, if you like, imagineer

57:15

a world in which Republican politics is not

57:17

rotating around the axis of

57:19

Donald Trump, what are

57:21

the politics, what's the political impact

57:23

of these sitting senators and very

57:25

ambitious Republican politicians making sure that

57:28

they are seen inside of what

57:30

they are decrying as a very

57:32

depressing New York City courtroom. I

57:34

mean, they're putting themselves in state

57:36

criminal court as a way of

57:38

trying to get themselves before the American people so

57:41

that this is where we imagine them. I mean, this

57:43

is just, it may be

57:45

one thing to try to get Trump's favor,

57:47

but this exists in its own right in

57:49

terms of how they are displaying

57:51

themselves, how they want

57:53

us to think of their milieu in politics and

57:56

how they want us to think of them when it comes

57:58

to criminal defendants in the criminal press. Well,

58:01

they think it's a winner for them

58:03

politically, to some degree, to hug and

58:05

to align themselves with Trump. And

58:07

perhaps in their states it is. You

58:10

know, J.D. Vance, he's not up for reelection this year.

58:12

Tommy Tuberville, he does a

58:15

lot of crazy things, but he's Alabama.

58:17

Trump is quite popular there, right? So

58:19

for them, it might be a win

58:21

among their constituents. But it also

58:23

tells you that, that they don't think that

58:25

standing by and attending the criminal trial of

58:27

a former president, who by the way is

58:29

there because of his role in paying hush

58:32

money to a former adult film star, that

58:34

that's not going to hurt them politically, that

58:36

it won't result in a primary race per

58:38

their assessment, that it only helps them among

58:40

the base. And that tells

58:42

you so much about kind of where the Republican

58:44

Party and the base of the Republican Party is.

58:47

The other thing, and you've talked about this a lot as well

58:49

over the course of time on your show, is it

58:52

also tells you that these people are saying, I

58:54

know that you had enablers in 2020, I'm raising my hand. I'm

58:58

happy to be there and enable you in

59:00

2024, should you want to question the outcome

59:02

of the election, whatever the outcome, you know,

59:05

if you lose the election. That's

59:07

what they're, that's the message they're sending

59:09

by being there and by answering questions

59:11

as many have over the past couple

59:13

of weeks, suggesting they won't necessarily commit

59:16

to respecting the outcome of the election.

59:18

That's right. They're saying, put me in,

59:20

coach, when it comes time to

59:22

try to subvert American democracy, essentially

59:24

do something that is criminal in order

59:26

to hold on to power against American,

59:28

against the constitution, against democratic principles. I

59:31

want you to call on me and

59:33

I'm willing to stand with you in

59:35

the criminal docket in order to do

59:37

it. If that's all served. Yeah, it's

59:39

the law, it's the law and order

59:41

party, obviously. Jen Psaki, thank you

59:43

so much for joining us, my friend. Much

59:45

appreciated. As I mentioned at the

59:47

top, joining us now, Suzanne Craig from the New York

59:49

Times and Ari Melber, our esteemed legal

59:52

correspondent here. Suzanne, you were there at the courthouse

59:54

today. I know you've been there every day. Michael

59:57

Cohen to me following the

59:59

reporting today. looking at the transcript once

1:00:01

it came out, I feel like he

1:00:03

really is functioning as a summation

1:00:05

witness. It's not just about Michael

1:00:07

Cohen's own role in the

1:00:10

plot. It feels like he's telling us everything

1:00:12

that happened. He's giving us the whole story. Does

1:00:14

it feel that way in court? It

1:00:17

did. He's interested in that he's coming at

1:00:19

the end. And I saw it a little bit differently because I

1:00:21

felt while he did that, they

1:00:24

also kept him very much, I think

1:00:26

three parts, they kept him very much to

1:00:28

the evidence. He was a cooperating witness for

1:00:30

a lot of testimony that has come. So

1:00:32

what he said today, some of it was

1:00:35

familiar. I think that's a good thing because

1:00:37

his credibility is going to be questioned on

1:00:39

cross. He also spoke to

1:00:41

the documents. We heard that

1:00:43

not only did Donald Trump instruct the

1:00:45

payment to Stormy Daniels get made, but

1:00:47

then they went in and they talked

1:00:49

about it in the office. So he

1:00:51

had some additional testimony

1:00:54

along those lines because the documents, and he's

1:00:56

going to speak to some of them, I

1:00:58

think again tomorrow, but they don't get you

1:01:00

too intent. But I really do feel that

1:01:02

they wanted Michael to come in and really,

1:01:05

I just think come in and

1:01:07

back up a lot of what's been heard. I

1:01:09

found that the testimony today was incredibly

1:01:11

quick. There were so many

1:01:13

yes, no questions. Just fast,

1:01:15

fast, fast. They weren't

1:01:17

creating a narrative like they did with

1:01:20

David Pecker at the beginning. David Pecker was

1:01:22

an incredible tour guide through all of it.

1:01:24

Michael Cohen, it was very fast and sometimes

1:01:26

we were having even trouble keeping track of

1:01:28

the dates. It was yes, no, yes, no.

1:01:30

If we got to a meeting, boy, did

1:01:32

we want to know something more about that

1:01:35

meeting. There was no, can

1:01:37

you elaborate on that? They wanted, I

1:01:39

think they know what's coming on cross

1:01:41

and they don't want him to say

1:01:43

anything outside of the four corners.

1:01:45

They're limiting what he says so that it

1:01:47

can't be turned off. I

1:01:49

really felt that they were. He became more comfortable

1:01:51

too once he got up on the stand but

1:01:54

he was very nervous at first.

1:01:58

I felt they kept him moving. I actually thought

1:02:00

they were. wanted to finish today. It was going

1:02:02

that quickly. Obviously, we're going to head in tomorrow

1:02:04

with more direct, but then the cross is going

1:02:06

to open. But I just don't think they wanted

1:02:08

to open the door for anything because they know

1:02:11

the storm that's coming. Ari, in terms of looking

1:02:13

ahead to that cross, I was interested in your

1:02:15

special coverage today. You had a

1:02:17

guest on who was very bullish on

1:02:20

the defense and said

1:02:22

that Michael Cohen's going to get destroyed

1:02:24

on cross-examination. He also repeatedly called you

1:02:26

Airy, including at the end saying in

1:02:29

a very performative way, Asa la vista, Airy.

1:02:31

And I was like, is he actually trying

1:02:33

to start a fight with Ari right here?

1:02:35

Is this going to be a sis-the-cups

1:02:37

moment on MSNBC? So, Airy,

1:02:39

it was a weird thing. Looking

1:02:43

ahead toward that cross-examination, do you feel

1:02:45

like Michael Cohen has

1:02:48

a glass jaw here that he has shown

1:02:50

himself to be vulnerable in a way that

1:02:52

is inviting a real beating from

1:02:54

the defense? Not glass, but

1:02:56

maybe recently smelt

1:02:58

clay. He

1:03:01

has some holes, and I think they will get to that.

1:03:03

And the lawyer you mentioned defended Donald

1:03:05

Trump at the second impeachment, which if

1:03:07

you're picking is the worst one. So that's where he's

1:03:09

coming from. Although I was happy to get his views

1:03:12

because it's interesting, but that's the perspective. I

1:03:14

think the issue for Michael Cohen

1:03:16

on cross will be overall

1:03:18

credibility because they will get into the

1:03:20

criminal record and the story did change.

1:03:22

And then raising doubt that

1:03:24

he might have gone rogue, the he

1:03:26

went rogue story is far

1:03:28

fetched, but they don't need to prove it. They

1:03:30

just need to raise the doubt that it could

1:03:33

be true. I did think to echo what we

1:03:35

were just discussing, there have been days where

1:03:37

defendant Trump looked unseemly, certainly

1:03:39

did not look relatable, looked untrustworthy. I thought

1:03:42

today, Michael Cohen and the way they did

1:03:44

this testimony, this is the day that Donald

1:03:47

Trump looked most like a criminal. I thought

1:03:49

it was a very bad day for him

1:03:51

because his own lawyer who famously went to

1:03:53

prison very clearly provided

1:03:56

the timeline of a

1:03:58

proactive plan to allegedly commit. It

1:04:00

sounded familiar too, because we've had all

1:04:02

these other witnesses come in and I

1:04:04

thought that's what was effective today. Most

1:04:07

of the things he said, the jury's heard it

1:04:09

before. They've heard a piece of it here and

1:04:11

there. And I thought that's what I thought

1:04:13

was effective about today's testimony. It's not him

1:04:15

going rogue. Katie, let me ask you a

1:04:17

piece of this. Just as a

1:04:19

lawyer, looking at the way the prosecution is making this

1:04:21

case, one of the things that we got today over

1:04:23

and over and over again, as Suzanne was saying, some

1:04:25

of this stuff was familiar, was Donald Trump doesn't pay

1:04:28

his bills. And so we got that

1:04:30

a whole bunch of different ways. We got that

1:04:32

Michael Cohen was first hired as a lawyer

1:04:34

at the Trump organization after he

1:04:37

was working for another law firm, submitted

1:04:39

a bill for $100,000 for that legal fees. And

1:04:43

Trump didn't want to pay them and said, I'm not going to pay that bill.

1:04:46

You come work for me instead. Michael Cohen

1:04:48

never goes back to his office. They send

1:04:50

Trump organization employees to go clean out that

1:04:52

office. And the bill disappears and Michael Cohen

1:04:54

becomes his employee. Michael Cohen's

1:04:56

first big coup working as Trump's lawyer

1:04:58

is stiffing the vendors

1:05:00

and suppliers to Trump University. Michael

1:05:03

Cohen almost loses the Karen

1:05:05

McDougall hush money arrangement

1:05:07

because they don't want to pay Karen

1:05:09

McDougall. Michael Cohen almost loses the Stormy

1:05:12

Daniels hush money arrangement because they don't

1:05:14

want to pay Stormy Daniels. Michael Cohen

1:05:16

ultimately gets back some of his money

1:05:19

that he paid to a technical

1:05:21

services firm in his final

1:05:24

payments because that firm was

1:05:26

also stiffed by two

1:05:28

years prior by Donald Trump.

1:05:31

We get the recording that was played for the jury because

1:05:33

Michael Cohen has to cover up

1:05:36

for Donald Trump's stiffing AMI

1:05:38

on the payment for Karen McDougall

1:05:40

until he's making the recording to

1:05:42

assure AMI eventually will pay you.

1:05:44

I mean all of these things

1:05:46

are a cascading series of

1:05:50

screwy people, for

1:05:52

lack of a better term, in terms of their bills. Why

1:05:55

are they giving us that as a pattern?

1:05:58

Because it speaks to the end. Ebenezer Scrooge energy

1:06:00

of Donald Trump. But why is that bad?

1:06:02

Why is that bad for the defense? Why

1:06:04

is that good for the prosecution? It's good

1:06:06

for the prosecution because it feeds into the

1:06:09

concept of the evidence which says that Donald

1:06:11

Trump is a penny pinching, miserly person who

1:06:13

will always count as pennies. And to Chris's

1:06:15

point earlier about the fact that you cannot

1:06:17

present a $420,000 approved invoice for

1:06:21

essential consultants, LLC, a la, you know,

1:06:23

Michael Cohen when all he did was

1:06:26

front $130,000. But

1:06:28

what you just did right now, and this, you

1:06:30

could just get up to your closings at this point, Rachel, you

1:06:33

proved how effective Michael Cohen is.

1:06:36

Think about this. Donald Trump always said

1:06:38

famously, where's my Roy Cohn? There's a

1:06:40

reason why he wanted Roy Cohn. Roy

1:06:42

Cohn was indicted four times. Roy Cohn

1:06:44

also represented John Gotti.

1:06:47

If Michael Cohen was so bad

1:06:49

at his job, Trump wouldn't

1:06:51

have ever kept him around. And because

1:06:53

of the effectiveness of him dealing with

1:06:56

the cheapness of Donald Trump, Donald

1:06:58

Trump kept Michael Cohen. And that's the

1:07:01

reason why Donald Trump never wanted a

1:07:03

good attorney. He wanted a flawed attorney.

1:07:05

He saw that in Michael Cohen. He

1:07:07

tested Michael Cohen with that bill from

1:07:10

Michael Cohen's original law firm. And when

1:07:12

he stiffed Michael Cohen's original law firm

1:07:14

and Cohen jumped at the opportunity, Donald

1:07:17

Trump said, here's my new Roy Cohn, right? They're

1:07:21

saying Donald Trump wouldn't pay $400,000 unless

1:07:24

he authorized it. Yeah. Right,

1:07:27

because the defense is gonna be Cohen and Weisselberg went

1:07:29

rogue and he didn't, this is a

1:07:31

big, this penny pinching thing is gonna come up, was

1:07:33

he or not? Because the defense is,

1:07:35

I think their main thing is gonna be those two

1:07:37

went rogue. Yeah, all right. And he was just, he

1:07:39

didn't see it. Much more to come in our coverage

1:07:41

of the Trump criminal trial today in New York, including

1:07:44

what happened when Michael Cohen

1:07:46

asked Donald Trump directly about what

1:07:49

happened with Stormy Daniels. The answer Cohen

1:07:51

says he got, which the defense is

1:07:53

not gonna like and is

1:07:55

not gonna want to explain and more when we come back to the

1:07:57

thing. Welcome

1:08:06

back to our primetime recap of the criminal

1:08:08

trial of former President Donald Trump. Prosecutor,

1:08:12

I will take you back for a minute now to 2011 when

1:08:14

you, Mr. Cohen, first learned about

1:08:17

Stormy Daniels' account of her encounter with

1:08:19

Mr. Trump. Had you learned at that

1:08:21

time in 2011 about what Ms. Daniels

1:08:23

did for a living? Michael Cohen, I

1:08:25

did. Prosecutor, what did you hear at that time

1:08:28

in 2011 about what she did for work? Cohen,

1:08:30

that she was an adult film star. Prosecutor,

1:08:33

and this came up again, I think

1:08:35

you mentioned, because it was an article

1:08:37

on the dirty.com at the time. Cohen,

1:08:40

correct. Question, and you

1:08:42

worked with Keith Davidson to get that article taken

1:08:45

down? Answer, yes ma'am. Question,

1:08:47

in 2011 when you were engaged in doing that and

1:08:49

getting the article taken down, did you have a conversation

1:08:51

with Mr. Trump about Stormy Daniels?

1:08:54

Answer, yes. Question, can you tell us

1:08:56

in general the gist of that conversation? Answer, after I

1:08:59

received the information from Dylan Howard, I immediately

1:09:01

went to Mr. Trump's office, knocked on the

1:09:03

door and said, boss, I got to speak

1:09:05

to you. And I told him about

1:09:07

the conversation, the sum and substance of the conversation

1:09:09

that I just had with Dylan Howard. And

1:09:12

I asked him, meaning I asked Trump, if

1:09:14

he knew who she was. He

1:09:16

told me that he did. And I

1:09:19

stated about the story that existed on the

1:09:21

dirty.com that they'd had a relationship that occurred

1:09:23

during a golf outing going back to like 2006. And

1:09:26

I told him that one of the things that we need

1:09:28

to do is we need to obviously take care of it.

1:09:31

Question, did Mr. Trump also tell you anything

1:09:33

about having met her at the golf tournament

1:09:36

back in 2006? Answer,

1:09:38

yes. Question, what did

1:09:40

he tell you? Answer, he told me

1:09:42

that he was playing golf with Big

1:09:45

Ben Roethlisberger, the football player. And

1:09:47

they had met Stormy Daniels and others there.

1:09:50

But she liked Mr. Trump, that

1:09:52

women prefer Trump even over someone like

1:09:54

Big Ben. Question,

1:09:57

and did you ask him at that time in 2011? 11,

1:10:00

whether he had had a sexual encounter with

1:10:03

Stormy Daniels. Answer, I did. Question,

1:10:05

did he answer you directly? Answer,

1:10:08

no ma'am. Question, did he mention anything

1:10:10

about what she looked like? Answer,

1:10:12

he said she was a beautiful woman.

1:10:18

Quick break for a shower, and

1:10:20

we're back. This adds to the litany of

1:10:22

testimony at the trial thus far

1:10:25

that supports, at

1:10:27

least circumstantially, the contention that Stormy Daniels was

1:10:30

not lying, that a sexual

1:10:32

interaction did happen between her and Donald

1:10:34

Trump. Why do we have

1:10:36

so much testimony to that end in this

1:10:38

trial? And what does it do,

1:10:41

if anything, for the prosecution's case,

1:10:43

Chris? Well, I think, first

1:10:45

of all, the Michael Cohen, that

1:10:47

little detail about Rafflesberger really left

1:10:49

off the page when I read

1:10:51

it today because that part of

1:10:53

Stormy Daniels' testimony was so memorable

1:10:55

that he introduces her to

1:10:57

Rafflesberger and then she has to push him

1:10:59

out of her room the next night. We

1:11:02

also know that then Rafflesberger settled a

1:11:04

civil claim for sexual assault with

1:11:07

a woman who says that he sexually assaulted her, which

1:11:10

he denies, at that same golf tournament

1:11:12

in a different year. So there's

1:11:14

that part of it, which is that deep. It was the

1:11:16

same golf tournament? It was the same golf tournament. I did

1:11:18

not realize that. Same golf tournament, different year. So,

1:11:21

the same place. So that lights

1:11:23

up, I think, the memory of the

1:11:25

jurors in terms of corroborating. Everyone's gonna

1:11:27

remember if Ben Rafflesberger's around and

1:11:29

Trump's gonna talk about it and Stormy Daniels gonna

1:11:32

talk about it. The other thing is

1:11:34

just that, again, the

1:11:36

underlying facts here of being corroborated

1:11:38

do seem really important in

1:11:41

terms of the motive for covering it up.

1:11:43

I do think you would be more concerned

1:11:45

about a true allegation than a false one,

1:11:47

probably, and particularly a true

1:11:49

allegation that there might be other people around

1:11:51

who could have corroborated it, like if you're

1:11:54

palling around at a golf tournament. So

1:11:56

it seems to me that that establishes

1:11:58

that. Katie? look for

1:12:00

pattern and practice when we talk about some legal

1:12:02

concepts. And the common denominator that we're hearing always

1:12:04

is Dean of the doorman allegedly

1:12:07

had a story about Donald Trump fathering a

1:12:09

love child. That's a sex act, right?

1:12:11

Karen McDougall had a year's long affair with

1:12:14

Donald Trump, allegedly. That's a sex act. Stormy

1:12:16

Daniels had a one night stand with Donald

1:12:18

Trump, allegedly, that's a sex act. It's all

1:12:20

the common denominator of something that Donald Trump

1:12:23

theoretically, according to him, just being locker talk,

1:12:25

locker room talk, you wouldn't be ashamed about

1:12:27

that, right? You just say, Hey, it's a

1:12:30

whole bunch of people doing locker room talk.

1:12:32

It just completely feeds into the idea that

1:12:35

he was doing all of this hush money

1:12:37

payments for Dino all the way to Stormy

1:12:39

to make sure that once he made it

1:12:41

into the White House, according to him, what did he say,

1:12:43

right? It doesn't make a difference if it

1:12:46

makes it to the White House. It doesn't make a

1:12:48

difference, which is why he booted Michael Cohen when he

1:12:50

made it to the White House. He didn't need Michael

1:12:52

Cohen anymore because he made it across the finish line,

1:12:54

which is completely supports the Trump campaign to the beneficiary,

1:12:56

not the personal part. Although, could I just note something

1:12:58

because it's stuck out to me today when I was

1:13:00

following it, which is that it's also

1:13:03

the case that way before he's even running for office in 2011,

1:13:05

when the article ends up on

1:13:07

the dirty.com, absolutely named dirty.com. He's like,

1:13:10

we got

1:13:12

to take get it taken down. Like there's a certain

1:13:14

level of reputational protection. Yeah,

1:13:16

that's happening in the background. Now they're not paying

1:13:19

money for it. I think that to me is

1:13:21

what is so stands out about the entire hush

1:13:23

money deal. He was doing a rep for action.

1:13:25

Right, of course. My point being though is like,

1:13:27

celebrity apprentice. You could want to suppress that stuff

1:13:30

for non-campaign reasons and clearly did in 2011. To

1:13:32

me, what's so distinguishing

1:13:34

about the scheme as given

1:13:37

by the prosecutors is the timing and the amount

1:13:39

of money at stake. And I would put it

1:13:41

a little even more simply. He's

1:13:43

on trial for lying. That's what fraud

1:13:45

is. Business fraud is lying. And then

1:13:47

in service of what? A campaign crime.

1:13:49

And so we talk

1:13:52

about low information voters. Sometime there's that

1:13:54

term people who aren't following the news

1:13:56

every night like we are and many

1:13:58

people in America, viewers are. Jurors

1:14:01

are supposed to be low. Information he had

1:14:03

isn't right. If they're super high information, they

1:14:05

are probably not all we covered to questing

1:14:07

of them. And so the other thing that's

1:14:09

happening here is very simple. Most.

1:14:12

Of these years. Have not

1:14:14

followed all of this really closely. Maybe they

1:14:16

know Michael Collins name? they probably don't know

1:14:18

care Mcdougall name or David Packers. They are

1:14:21

many other things that we've all been falling

1:14:23

until for low information Jurors. If

1:14:25

you can, show. This is Trump's shows

1:14:28

in environments and these are the stream of

1:14:30

lies and some of the laws were not

1:14:32

crime spree. That's okay, you know they get

1:14:34

instructions on that our that's the This has

1:14:36

gotta be fair to the defendants and some

1:14:38

of the alleged lies are alleged crimes because

1:14:41

you can't just go around and take a

1:14:43

hundred thirty k and called four hundred and

1:14:45

twenty and and lot of the government and

1:14:47

see you know what to do. That says

1:14:49

and as you are watching this day after

1:14:51

day and putting yourself in the mine I

1:14:54

think that's a very good point are and

1:14:56

how to do. Weird things. Are not only

1:14:58

picking people who necessarily are the highest information

1:15:00

people but then the jurors. Are instructed do

1:15:02

not watch any news about bet you

1:15:05

see this Msnbc rooftop of this. Do

1:15:07

not pay attention to any discussion about

1:15:09

this only. Focus on what is being given

1:15:11

to you as evidence and his courtroom. See

1:15:13

it laid out in the courtroom is a

1:15:15

cogent. It. Is oh no, it's

1:15:18

it's. a powerful story and I accent. So

1:15:20

come back to David Packer and. See what a

1:15:22

great to her got he was at the beginning. To

1:15:24

see was able to laid out from beginning

1:15:26

to and and he spoke. To Trump since

1:15:28

he was talking to Trump's he sort of.

1:15:30

Michael Cohen was sort of the go between,

1:15:33

and I sixteen affectively set him up at

1:15:35

the beginning. And then we get to the

1:15:37

and now and we've got Michael Cohen and I keep

1:15:39

saying when when you were talking about the jury did

1:15:41

it once and we haven't talked about. Is

1:15:43

the tape that team in? We've

1:15:46

got Donald Trump talking about the

1:15:48

payments. Nice. like paid. In cash

1:15:50

since Michael Collins like no, no, no in the

1:15:52

reason that he was like no no no He

1:15:55

explained it to days because he wanted to have.

1:15:57

A. Record so that it could look like a

1:15:59

legitimate busy. Transactions if a lot of was

1:16:01

sitting on dodgy if it was a suitcase. hello

1:16:03

my name is. And then he

1:16:06

explains why was taping yet? because he he

1:16:08

he According to him he was it's hippie

1:16:10

act as he didn't trust all the participants.

1:16:12

What's maybe he should know? He. Was taping it

1:16:15

so he could tell. David Parker said he

1:16:17

was good at. The Liberal at

1:16:19

a slump intended to pay and right

1:16:21

is gonna pay you. I can prove

1:16:23

it all. Secret race I'm saying. It that.

1:16:25

It's just a good reminder that not everything

1:16:27

today was sort of. It's Michael Cohen narrating

1:16:29

a lot of things, including tapes with Donald

1:16:32

Trump. them where to start a turn that

1:16:34

from for your whole grain. I remember that

1:16:36

much more of our special primetime That was

1:16:38

me talking to the Control Room breaking the

1:16:40

law here just for such. As sweet of

1:16:42

I said deaths are more for food shops

1:16:44

or comes up as a sermon and now

1:16:46

we come to that that telephone records. Another

1:16:48

woman whose story threatened to take the Trump

1:16:51

campaign with stood out a lot more as

1:16:53

a matter cost us money today. stay with.

1:17:04

More. Come back to our recap of the

1:17:06

criminal Trial A former President Donald Trump.

1:17:08

One of the things that happened today

1:17:10

and Michael Cohen testimony is that she

1:17:13

described the circumstances under which he made

1:17:15

a recording of himself speaking to his

1:17:17

boss, speaking to Donald Trump and was

1:17:20

recording of an in person meeting. He

1:17:22

walked into Trump's office with the voice

1:17:24

notes app on his phone recording while

1:17:27

he's are held his phone or how

1:17:29

did in his pocket or near his

1:17:31

pockets. The reason he said he made

1:17:33

the recording is because David Pepper from

1:17:36

American media expected to be paid. Back.

1:17:39

One. hundred and fifty thousand dollars

1:17:41

that american media had advance so

1:17:43

woman name's karen mcdougall who had

1:17:45

claimed that she had had a

1:17:47

long affair with donald trump's am

1:17:50

i as part of it's alleged

1:17:52

scheme with donald trump to suppress

1:17:54

negative information about him in order

1:17:56

to benefit his campaign had paid

1:17:58

mcdougall a stand to do

1:18:01

some work for their magazine empire, but

1:18:03

really so that they would own the

1:18:05

life rights to that story about Donald Trump

1:18:07

and make sure that that story never saw the

1:18:09

light of day. Now, at

1:18:12

some point after AMI had advanced

1:18:14

that money, Cohen and Trump, according

1:18:16

to Trump, decided, excuse me, according

1:18:18

to Cohen, decided that they would

1:18:21

purchase those rights from AMI. They

1:18:24

would effectively reimburse AMI

1:18:26

for having made that outlay of cash,

1:18:28

but in so doing, they would buy

1:18:30

those life rights themselves and

1:18:33

for a while, they talked about,

1:18:35

including in that purchase price, the

1:18:38

treasure chest of information that

1:18:40

American media had accumulated over time

1:18:43

about the life and loves of

1:18:45

Donald Trump. A locked drawer reportedly full

1:18:48

of information about Trump. They thought for

1:18:50

their 150 grand, they

1:18:52

could get the Karen McDougall rights, they

1:18:55

could get all the Trump stuff. They

1:18:57

were worried to get that information because

1:18:59

Cohen testified today that David Pecker,

1:19:01

the head of this magazine empire, they

1:19:03

believed was gonna get a different job

1:19:05

at Time Incorporated, he was going to

1:19:07

leave. That would mean David Pecker, their

1:19:09

friend and protector, the member of this

1:19:11

conspiracy with them was gonna leave behind

1:19:13

at AMI all of that information about

1:19:15

Trump in that locked door, wouldn't that

1:19:17

in that locked drawer, wouldn't that be

1:19:19

terrible? Somebody else might get it. Wouldn't

1:19:22

it be better if we owned that ourselves?

1:19:24

So here's Michael Cohen and Donald Trump

1:19:27

in a recording that Cohen made without

1:19:29

Trump knowing in a meeting in Trump's

1:19:31

office. I've

1:19:36

been looking to Allen Weisselberg about

1:19:42

the funding, and

1:19:47

all the stuff, all the stuff, because you

1:19:49

never know where that company, never know where he's gonna be.

1:19:52

Correct, so I'm all over that.

1:19:54

And I spoke to Allen about it when it comes

1:19:57

time for the financing, which will be. No,

1:20:00

no, no, no, no, no, no,

1:20:02

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

1:20:04

no, no, no, not

1:20:08

cash. Check. Why

1:20:10

check? Let's bring into the conversation our colleague Lisa

1:20:13

Rubin, who is at the courthouse today. Also,

1:20:15

Catherine Christian, former assistant district attorney at the Manhattan

1:20:17

DA's office. Thank you, Ms. Christian, for being with

1:20:19

us. Lisa, let me ask

1:20:21

you, first of all, if I characterize the

1:20:24

context of that recording correctly.

1:20:26

And when they

1:20:28

say Pekka might get hit by a

1:20:30

truck, what they mean is Pekka might

1:20:32

no longer be the custodian of what

1:20:34

we believe is negative information about Trump.

1:20:36

So we should own that ourselves. Correct.

1:20:38

Okay. Why does, or is

1:20:40

it clear to you why it matters

1:20:43

that Trump is suggesting making this payment

1:20:45

in cash, even though

1:20:48

Cohen argues against that?

1:20:50

Well, for starters, Trump

1:20:52

doesn't want a record of it. The exact

1:20:55

same reasons that Cohen is saying let's cut

1:20:57

a check because I want to protect Trump

1:20:59

with a record is the very same reason

1:21:01

that Donald Trump is begging him to use

1:21:04

cash because he wants no one to know

1:21:06

about it at all. But I think the

1:21:08

larger import of the tape is not about

1:21:10

the cash or check. It's about situating Donald

1:21:13

Trump at the center of this scheme and

1:21:15

showing that not only did he join the

1:21:17

conspiracy, but that he was involved in each

1:21:19

and every plan to execute on that conspiracy

1:21:22

by repaying for Karen McDougall's settlement

1:21:24

on one hand, and then later

1:21:26

on paying Stormy Daniels himself. When

1:21:28

you talk about paying

1:21:31

for something in a way that

1:21:33

is untraceable or communicating about something

1:21:35

in a way that is untraceable,

1:21:37

is that to a jury or

1:21:40

you know, to a court of law, is that

1:21:42

potentially evidence of knowledge or criminality?

1:21:45

I think it is. But again, let's

1:21:47

remember that here, what the actual crime

1:21:49

that's being alleged here is falsification of

1:21:52

business records. And so this tape doesn't

1:21:54

necessarily move the needle about the falsification

1:21:56

and Donald Trump's own knowledge and involvement

1:21:59

in that. On the other

1:22:01

hand, it shows his motive to

1:22:03

be involved in that cover-up because

1:22:05

he was directly involved in the

1:22:07

crime itself. Right. Okay.

1:22:09

So this goes to a larger point

1:22:12

that we've been talking about tonight, all of

1:22:14

us, which is that there is no viable,

1:22:17

if the prosecution is doing its job, there

1:22:19

is no viable counter-narrative that

1:22:22

Michael Cohen was acting alone, that Trump

1:22:24

had no idea any of this was

1:22:26

happening, rather the prosecution is presenting a

1:22:29

picture of Michael Cohen's actions as situated

1:22:31

and connected

1:22:33

to and integral with

1:22:35

Trump's own actions. Right, Catherine?

1:22:38

Yeah. And it also goes to intent.

1:22:40

And the judge is going to instruct

1:22:42

the jury that the definition of intent,

1:22:44

it was the defendant's conscious objective to

1:22:46

cause a result. So motive, intent, consciousness

1:22:49

of guilt. What gets me about this

1:22:51

relationship, it wasn't an attorney-client relationship, it

1:22:53

was a master servant, no offense to

1:22:55

Mr. Cohen. So of course

1:22:57

these weren't legal expenses because this was

1:22:59

not really an attorney. I mean, the

1:23:01

prosecution will probably not argue that, but

1:23:03

this really was not an

1:23:06

attorney-client relationship. I don't

1:23:08

know. Again, if we keep coming back to

1:23:10

this idea that you don't, you know, the

1:23:12

burden of proof correctly constitutionally is on the

1:23:14

prosecution. I just feel like, and again, maybe

1:23:16

I'm thinking of this in a way that it's not the

1:23:18

median juror because I'm exposed in a different way to it,

1:23:20

but I do need something to

1:23:22

hang on to that's an alternate story for

1:23:25

all this stuff. I mean, you

1:23:27

can raise doubts about it, but I mean like in

1:23:29

order to empathize with the defense, in order to think

1:23:31

that it wasn't exactly what it looks like. I mean,

1:23:33

I guess I just sort of feel like, okay, let's

1:23:36

say you gave me some theory

1:23:38

that Cohen went rogue. This was cooked up by Weissel,

1:23:40

Britton and Cohen. Like maybe that seems

1:23:42

plausible and they wanted to do it for

1:23:44

the boss, but then like I need something

1:23:47

about why Trump writes in the chat. Right?

1:23:50

Like I mean, I can give it to you. Okay. But

1:23:52

it's not very strong. If you

1:23:54

admit the misdemeanor, well,

1:23:56

yeah, business fraud. It's on paper.

1:23:58

There's no question. Oh, you lied.

1:24:01

But you say when Cohen did

1:24:03

all this and the defendant sitting

1:24:06

in the White House, he then felt like paying

1:24:08

him back. So it's partly the road, but it's

1:24:10

all after the fact. If you move the decision,

1:24:12

which is still bad, later after

1:24:14

the fact, you might and tell us what you

1:24:16

think help raise doubt against

1:24:19

whether it was contemporaneously consciousness intent

1:24:21

at the time before election day,

1:24:23

which means again, I'm not here

1:24:25

doing free legal services. They already

1:24:27

have their plan, which means you

1:24:30

admit the misdemeanor, which is a common defense tactic when

1:24:32

you have a bad case. Then

1:24:34

you post date the other action and that allows

1:24:36

for the fact that it could be true that

1:24:38

you reimbursed him. And will

1:24:41

Donald Trump allow his defense attorneys to say,

1:24:43

your honor, we want you to instruct the

1:24:45

jury on the lesser included offense of falsifying

1:24:47

business records in the second degree. Don't you

1:24:49

think that would be in New York? That

1:24:51

would be allowed his lawyers to essentially plead

1:24:53

guilty to the misdemeanor. Well, not plead guilty.

1:24:56

You're you're admitting it basically. And then he

1:24:58

would be again, assuming the jury says, you

1:25:00

know what, we don't think it's, you

1:25:02

know, the higher we don't, we don't know where

1:25:04

the intent to conceal another crime is, but he

1:25:07

did intend to defraud. But don't you think it's

1:25:09

34 misdemeanor convictions as opposed to fellas. Don't you

1:25:11

think if you have a defendant who's not consumed

1:25:14

by ego, that's a better instruction.

1:25:16

I would give my client the

1:25:18

client and say, yeah, right. If

1:25:20

this had been me, I would have pled guilty day one and

1:25:23

it would all be over by now. Right. All right.

1:25:25

I'll recap of the action today and the Trump criminal

1:25:27

trial continues to be clear. I didn't do it. We'll

1:25:30

be right back. Prosecutor.

1:25:39

What, if anything, did you discuss with

1:25:41

Mr. Davidson on those phone calls about

1:25:43

Karen McDougall, Michael Cohen, that she

1:25:45

was also under control, that nobody's

1:25:47

going rogue here. Prosecutor. In addition

1:25:49

to that, did you express any

1:25:52

anger at Keith Davidson for that

1:25:54

article? Michael Cohen. Yes. Prosecutor. Why

1:25:56

Cohen? Because she was his client

1:25:58

and I expect. that he would

1:26:01

have this under control. Again, it

1:26:03

was days before, and I wanted to ensure

1:26:05

Mr. Trump was safe. Prosecutor,

1:26:08

were you angry with him? Cohen,

1:26:10

very. Prosecutor, did you think someone

1:26:12

on his side had leaked something like this

1:26:14

to the Wall Street Journal? Cohen, yes. Prosecutor,

1:26:17

did you indicate to him that somebody

1:26:19

might be very upset with him? Cohen,

1:26:21

I did. Prosecutor, who did

1:26:23

you indicate might be very upset with him?

1:26:26

Trump defense counsel, Todd Glitch, objection leading.

1:26:31

The judge sustained. Prosecutor, what,

1:26:33

if anything, did you tell him about

1:26:35

Mr. Trump during those calls? Cohen, that

1:26:38

he was really angry, and I

1:26:40

truly hoped that we don't come back to

1:26:42

find out that this is something that you

1:26:44

guys did where this

1:26:47

is a major problem. Michael

1:26:50

Cohen giving us a window into the type of

1:26:52

work he did for Donald Trump. I wanted to

1:26:54

get to that part of the transcript, Catherine, because

1:26:56

you were talking about what

1:26:59

Michael Cohen was doing for Donald Trump, what

1:27:01

type of relationship this was. It was, and

1:27:04

again, I don't wanna be offensive, but it

1:27:06

was servant, master. He did whatever Trump told

1:27:08

him to do. He reported directly to him.

1:27:10

He wanted to please him, basically. He was,

1:27:13

you know, I have

1:27:15

someone I have to please, which explains

1:27:17

his hostility and hatred now after

1:27:19

all I did for him, and he

1:27:22

doesn't take me to the White House.

1:27:24

This is what he's done. And does

1:27:26

this go to disproving the

1:27:28

theoretical counter narrative that this really

1:27:30

was Michael Cohen being

1:27:33

paid for a legal retainer, that Michael

1:27:35

Cohen's legal services were super valuable to

1:27:38

Trump as president? I mean, these don't

1:27:40

seem like legal services. They are not legal services

1:27:42

in 2016, and

1:27:44

there weren't any legal services in 2017, which

1:27:47

I think is the stronger proof. Michael Cohen

1:27:49

will say that, but to your point, he

1:27:51

was much more even generously viewed. It calms

1:27:53

professional than he was a lawyer. One of

1:27:56

the things I found funny today was whole

1:27:58

pigs really demeaned. Michael

1:28:00

Cohen basically saying he was useless. He was

1:28:02

Mr. Fixin' in name only. But who did

1:28:04

they rely on when they needed people to

1:28:06

clean up excess Hollywood? Who did Hope Hicks

1:28:08

and Steve Bannon call? They called Michael Cohen

1:28:10

asking him to exploit his press contacts. Yeah.

1:28:13

And to make Karen McDougall go away and to make

1:28:15

Dino the doorman go away and to make Stormy Daniels

1:28:17

go away. I mean, Michael Cohen was involved in all

1:28:19

of these things because he was asked to, not because

1:28:21

he freelanced it. This was his job. Can

1:28:24

I just ask a question about

1:28:26

comportment and credibility? My

1:28:28

sense from reading the accounts today was that

1:28:31

he came off pretty well. He was pretty... Cohen.

1:28:34

Cohen. That Cohen came off pretty well, that

1:28:36

he seemed credible. He admitted to doing shady

1:28:38

stuff without doing a lot

1:28:40

of circumlocution around it. Was

1:28:43

that an accurate sense? It was

1:28:45

the most humble Michael Cohen I think any of

1:28:48

us have ever seen. All

1:28:50

right, that's going to do it for us for right now.