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Trump attorney: ‘Every campaign is a conspiracy to win an election’
Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche argues that prosecutors want jurors to believe that Donald Trump caused false filings to promote the candidacy of an election that he already won.
“Even if you find that’s true, that’s still not enough.” Blanche said.
It doesn’t matter if there was a conspiracy to try and win an election. Every campaign in this country is a conspiracy to win an election. You have to find that this effort was done by unlawful means.
Key events
Trump attorney says Karen McDougal deal ‘not a catch or kill’
Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche argued that the effort to silence the former Playboy model Karen McDougal is “not a catch and kill either” because she didn’t want her story published.
McDougal “wanted to kick start her career” and the agreement with American Media Inc was to do just that, Blanche said.
How is that a catch and kill? It is not.
Blanche notes that the former AMI CEO David Pecker said that Michael Cohen said “I would take care of” the McDougal story, adding that “ultimately [there is] no proof that Trump ever bought the McDougal story”.
Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche notes that David Pecker, the former National Enquirer publisher, testified earlier in the trial that there was nothing unusual about catch and kill stories.
Blanche notes that Pecker was suppressing stories as far back as 1988, and says that there is no criminal intent. There is nothing wrong with politicians like Donald Trump trying to get positive stories, he says.
Trump attorney: ‘Every campaign is a conspiracy to win an election’
Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche argues that prosecutors want jurors to believe that Donald Trump caused false filings to promote the candidacy of an election that he already won.
“Even if you find that’s true, that’s still not enough.” Blanche said.
It doesn’t matter if there was a conspiracy to try and win an election. Every campaign in this country is a conspiracy to win an election. You have to find that this effort was done by unlawful means.
Robert De Niro, at a press conference across the street from the Manhattan courthouse, says voters have a second chance to make sure Donald Trump is not elected to the White House again.
“We don’t want to wake up after the election saying ‘What again? My God, what the hell have we done?’” the actor told reporters.
If Trump gets into the White House, “he will never leave”, he goes on.
Is that the country we want to live in? Do we want him running this country and saying ‘I’m not leaving, I’m dictator for life’?
“This is not a threat. This is a reality,” De Niro says, adding that the reason he joined the Biden-Harris campaign is “because the only way to preserve our freedoms and hold on to our humanity is to vote for Joe Biden for president”.
Behind De Niro stood Harry Dunn and Michael Fanone, two law enforcement officers who defended the US Capitol on January 6.
“These guys are the true heroes,” De Niro says. “They stood and put their lives on the line to defend this county and our democracy.”
When a heckler interrupts by saying the two officers “lied under oath”, De Niro snaps back that “I don’t even know how to deal with you” and says he is “honored” to be with Dunn and Fanone today.
“Mr Pecker told you that it was really good business to work with President Trump,” Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche said, referring to the former American Media Inc CEO David Pecker.
Blanche says:
As far back as 1988, Mr Pecker told you, that he had helped suppressed a story for Mr Trump – 1988, that’s 17 years ahead of the August 2015 meeting.
‘Trump could destroy the world’, says Robert De Niro outside courthouse
Just across the street from the courthouse, the Biden campaign is holding a press conference including the actor Robert De Niro.
De Niro says downtown New York city is his neighborhood. “I grew up here and feel at home in the streets … I love the city.”
He says the Twin Towers “fell just over there”, adding that we vowed “we will not allow terrorists to change our way of life.”
Donald Trump “wants to sow total chaos”, De Niro says, arguing that the former president is a “tyrant”.
Donald Trump wants to destroy not only the city, but the country and eventually he could destroy the world.
The former president “does not belong in my city. I don’t know where he belongs, but he certainly doesn’t belong here,” he says, adding that Trump is a “grubby real estate hustler masquerading as a big shot”.
De Niro says he became involved with the Biden Harris campaign to remind people that Trump will “use violence against anyone who stands in the way of his megalomania and greed.” He adds:
Yesterday was Memorial Day. It’s a good time to reflect on how Americans fought and died so that we may enjoy the freedoms guaranteed to us by a democratic government … Under Trump, this kind of government will perish from the earth. If Trump returns to the White House, you can kiss these freedoms goodbye that we all take for granted.
Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche has talked about the meeting of Donald Trump, the former tabloid executive David Pecker and Michael Cohen at Trump Tower in 2015, shortly after the then Apprentice star announced his candidacy.
“Many politicians work with the media to try and promote their image.” Blanche continued, “It was standard operating procedure to do so. He spent decades working. Blanche said:
Nothing criminal, nothing criminal about it, it’s done all the time.
“The government’s theory is that in 2017, President Trump caused false filings to be made on books on his personal records, to promote the candidacy of an election that he already won,” Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche said.
The government wants you to believe did these things, with these records, to conceal efforts to promote his successful candidacy in 2016 – the year before.
Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche also noted that Trump’s comptroller held on to the documents in this case which were purportedly falsified.
The reasoning seems to be: if documents were falsified, with an intent to defraud, why would his underling hold onto them?
“This is a case about false filings – about false business records,” Blanche said.
And yet the supposed evidence of false filing was in the records of Trump’s payroll department.
Blanche also said that a 1099 tax form had been filed for Cohen.
If there was some deep-rooted intent to defraud, why do you think it was reported to the IRS?
Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche spoke of the early February meeting between Michael Cohen and the White House where, he testified, Donald Trump asked if he was OK on money.
Cohen quoted Trump along the lines of, “Do you need money? Do you want me to write you a check?” Blanche said. Cohen claimed to have said “no.”
Blanche noted that Cohen worked with others to get paid shortly thereafter, which I think he’s noting to undermine that Trump was responsible for any payment.
“The idea that President Trump would agree to pay Michael Cohen $420,000 – even though he only owed him $130,000, is absurd,” Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche said.
Cohen even told you that he saw Allen Weisselberg hand that piece of paper for President Trump would look at.
Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche pointed jurors to Michael Cohen’s testimony that he expected to work for free as Trump’s personal attorney.
Prosecutors, of course, hope this testimony bolsters Cohen’s claim that the repayments related to hush money and not legal services.
“Do you believe for more than a second that after getting stiffed on his bonus in 2016,” Blanche said,
Do you think that Mr Cohen thought, ‘I’m going to work for free.’ Is that the man that testified? Or, is that a lie?
“Even without Mr Cohen, what we just went through, the government can’t get by the fact that the invoices were not generated by anybody at the Trump Organization – they were generated by Michael Cohen,” Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche said.
“The fact that the invoices talk about services rendered by Michael Cohen and the fact that he was rendering services in 2017.”
All of that, Blanche said, “ends the case – not guilty.”
Blanche said that, at the end of the day, prosecutors expect jurors to rely on Cohen which, for reasons he will continue to expand upon, is not enough.
“As you heard from two witnesses Donald Trump was very busy. He was running the country. There shouldn’t be any surprise about that,” Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche said, entering into another line of argument.
He said that the work-saddled Trump sometimes had a half-inch worth of personal checks he had to sign.
“The facts that the checks and the personal information was Fed Ex-ed from Trump Tower to [Trump bodyguard] Keith Schiller,” who gave it to Trump, “is common sense”, Blanche said.
Recall: Witness testimony revealed that Trump would get mail, such as checks, mailed to his bodyguard, who would then bring it into the White House. They have suggested that doing so was routine for presidents who wanted to get personal mail, because of delays in receiving mail at the White House even for presidents.
Trump attorney notes that Don Jr and Eric Trump were not called as witnesses
Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche is trying to chip away at allegations that there was a scheme to falsify business records.
He points to a document that Trump’s sons Eric and Donald Jr signed off on, related to repayment to Michael Cohen.
“Guess who else you did not hear from in this trial – Don or Eric,” Blanche said.
Is there some allegation they’re part of the scheme, they’re part of the conspiracy? That is reasonable doubt. We have no burden to do anything. The burden is always on the government. They make decisions about who to call at trial. They called Cohen. They did not call Don or Eric.
As for vouchers describing payment to Michael Cohen as a legal service, Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche said “there’s no other way to categorize an invoice from a lawyer” to Donald Trump.
“The government has criminalized that,” Blanche said. “That’s absurd.”
“He put that signature block on every single email that he sent in 2017, this was not a secret,” Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche said.
Michael Cohen was Donald Trump’s personal attorney, period.
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