May11

electoral-vote.com

Dem 51

   

GOP 49

Trump Legal News: The Trial (Day 15)

It was a somewhat short and somewhat dry day of testimony in the Donald Trump criminal fraud case. Here are the main storylines:

• Good Witness for Trump: Former White House secretary Madeleine Westerhout, who is clearly sympathetic to her former boss, returned to the stand to finish her testimony. The main thing she established was that, in her experience, Trump cares about his family. This bolsters the argument that he paid Stormy Daniels off to spare Melania Trump's feelings.
  
  
• Good Ruling for Trump: The prosecution wanted to introduce a 1999 interview of Trump by Larry King, in which Trump says he's broadly familiar with campaign finance laws. Judge Juan Merchan said "no," rightly we think, because the campaign finance laws of 1999 and of 2016 are pretty different.
  
  
• No Weisselberg?: There was also some wrangling about whether or not the prosecution would be allowed to bring up the plea deal reached by former Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg. Merchan suggested that the prosecution was trying to do that in order to avoid actually calling Weisselberg, who could end up helping Trump. This question has not yet been resolved, but it's possible Weisselberg will appear in court without a jury, to preview what he might say.
  
  
• Now Batting, Michael Cohen: The prosecution said it will only call two more witnesses, depending on what happens with Weisselberg. The next one up is the star witness, Michael Cohen. That will be watched closely, because he's the linchpin of the whole case. On Friday, Merchan warned Cohen to stop talking about the case on social media.
  
  
• Resting Soon: Depending on how long it takes to finish with Michael Cohen, as well as the other (currently unknown) witness, and to deal with the Weisselberg situation, the prosecution says it might rest as soon as next week. That despite the fact that there will be only three days court is in session (Wednesday will be a day off, as usual, and Trump is getting Friday off to go to his son's graduation).

That's the news. Monday should be very interesting. (Z)