Donald Trump sits in the courtroom as his criminal trial continues over charges that he falsified business records to conceal money paid to silence porn star Stormy Daniels. Photograph: Getty Images
Donald Trump sits in the courtroom as his criminal trial continues over charges that he falsified business records to conceal money paid to silence porn star Stormy Daniels. Photograph: Getty Images
Donald Trump’s criminal trial on charges of falsifying business records to conceal a hush-money payment to the adult film star Stormy Daniels began in earnest on Monday, with lawyers for both sides making their opening statements.
A jury of seven men and five women will weigh whether Trump’s alleged efforts to conceal an affair with Daniels, which he feared would damage his bid for the White House, were illicit. Trump was charged in the spring of 2023 with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. He has pleaded not guilty.
The prosecution said Trump “orchestrated a criminal scheme to corrupt the 2016 presidential election” in his efforts to cover up an alleged affair with Daniels.
The prosecution called its first witness to the stand: David Pecker, former publisher of the National Enquirer and a man at the heart of Trump’s alleged crimes.
Prosecutor Matthew Colangelo told jurors that Trump, his former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen and Pecker hatched a plan to keep damaging information about Trump out of the press. Colangelo said this “catch-and-kill” campaign was geared towards helping Trump’s 2016 election campaign. He mentioned an earlier payment to Karen McDougal, the Playboy model who claimed to have had an affair with Trump.
The prosecutor also read out a transcript of Trump’s infamous comments on the set of the Access Hollywood television show, where Trump bragged he could sexually assault women because he was famous, and noted that the video was released to the public in October 2016, one month before election day.
The defense argued that “there’s nothing wrong with trying to influence an election – it’s called democracy”.
Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche said Trump “is innocent” and made an effort to humanize Trump, while also repeatedly calling him “President Trump”.
Blanche argued that Trump was unaware about the specifics of the hush-money payments because he left it all to Cohen. Trump had nothing to do with the 34 checks other than to sign them, Blanche said.
Trump, who has appeared mostly dour throughout the proceedings and fell asleep briefly at several points last week, looked very attentive to and focused on Pecker’s testimony.
Donald Trump was confronted on Monday with the unsavory details of his alleged attempt to illegally influence the 2016 election by covering up his hush-money payments to the adult film star Stormy Daniels, as the first criminal trial for a former US president got under way in New York.
Trump has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records – where the hush-money payments were recorded as legal expenses – to cover up the affair just weeks before the election.
Donald Trump spoke to the media after court was adjourned for the day, where he complained that the hush-money case is “a case of bookkeeping, which is a very minor thing”. He said:
I’m the leading candidate ... and this is what they’re trying to take me off the trail for. Checks being paid to a lawyer.
Trump attacked Michael Cohen, claimingthat the things Cohen got in trouble for “had nothing to do with me”. He said:
[Cohen] represented a lot of people over the years but they take this payment and they call it a legal expense ... and this is what I got indicted over.
The former president said he should be campaigning in Georgia, Florida and other places and instead “I’m sitting here and this will go on for a long time,” adding:
It’s very unfair what’s going on and I should be allowed to campaign.
Donald Trump speaks to the media outside of court during his trial for allegedly covering up hush money payments at Manhattan criminal court on Monday in New York City. Photograph: Getty Images
No cameras are allowed inside the Manhattan courtroom during Donald Trump’s hush-money trial, but courtroom sketches mean we are able to get a glimpse of proceedings.
Prosecutor Matthew Colangelo makes opening arguments as Donald Trump watches with his attorney Todd Blanche before Justice Juan Merchan. Photograph: Jane Rosenberg/Reuters
Donald Trump watches as his attorney Todd Blanche makes opening statements during Trump's criminal trial. Photograph: Jane Rosenberg/Reuters
Trump lawyer Alina Habba spoke to reporters a little while earlier as the court took a short recess, where she called the former president’s trials a “disgrace to the American judicial system”, per pool.
Habba, flanked by Christopher Kise and Clifford Robert, said:
The fact that we have two courts not one, criminal and civil, being used against one man because they cannot beat him in the polls is a disgrace to the American judicial system. You should not have two teams of lawyers here today. You should not even be here today, because you didn’t know is the epitome of a witch-hunt.
She did not take any questions.
Attorney Alina Habba speaks to the media outside of court along with attorney Christopher Kise, left, and attorney Cliff Robert during opening statements in Donald Trump’s trial for allegedly covering up hush-money payments at Manhattan criminal court in New York City. Photograph: Getty Images
Prosecutor Joshua Steinglass is trying to establish that David Pecker had the power as head of AMI to control coverage – which will help him later on as the prosecution tries to prove that Pecker was integral to the catch-and-kill conspiracy. Pecker said:
We used checkbook journalism and we paid for stories. I gave a number to the editors that they could not spend more than $10,000 to investigate or produce or publish a story, anything over $10,000 they would spend on a story, they would have to be vetted and brought up to me, for approval.
Did he have final editorial say, Steinglass pressed. Pecker replied:
Being in the publishing industry for 40 years, I realized early in my career that the only thing that was important is the cover of a magazine, so when the editors produced the story or prepared a cover, we would have a meeting and they would present to me what the story would be, what the concept was, what the cost was going to be.
David Pecker was a key Trump ally who served as the CEO of American Media Inc (AMI), the publisher of the National Enquirer.
Pecker helped Trump by purchasing the rights to potentially damaging stories and then never publishing them, a practice known as “catch and kill”. In 2015, AMI paid $30,000 to Dino Sajudin, a former doorman at Trump Tower, who was trying to sell a story that Trump had allegedly fathered a child out of wedlock.
In June of 2016, AMI paid Karen McDougal, a former Playboy model, $150,000 to suppress a story about an affair. AMI bought the story with the understanding that Trump would reimburse them, according to the indictment. Michael Cohenwould later release a tape of him and Trump discussing repaying Pecker.
In 2016, Dylan Howard, then the editor-in-chief of the National Enquirer, alerted Pecker that Daniels had potentially damaging information about Trump, according to the indictment. Pecker advised Howard to reach out to Cohen, and Cohen subsequently negotiated the deal with Stormy Daniels’ lawyer.
David Pecker in New York on 8 April 2015. Photograph: [your Name]/BFAnyc.com/REX/Shutterstock
And we’re off to the races. Judge Juan Merchan directs prosecution to call first witness. “The people call David Pecker.”
Pecker, with his silvery hair slicked back, sporting a slate suit and a yellow tie, walked to the witness stand.
He was instructed to raise his right hand while being sworn in and when he was directed to stand in a different direction, offered a smile. He’s seated at the stand.
Prosecutor Joshua Steinglass just said “good afternoon, Mr Pecker,” to which he replied, “Good afternoon.”
