Monday’s opening statements in the first criminal trial of a former American president provided a clear roadmap of how prosecutors will try to make the case that Donald Trump broke the law, and how the defense plans to fight the charges on multiple fronts.
Lawyers presented dueling narratives as jurors got their first glimpse into the prosecution accusing Trump of falsifying business records as part of a scheme to squelch negative stories about him during his 2016 presidential campaign.
Still to come are weeks of what’s likely to be dramatic and embarrassing testimony about the presumptive Republican presidential nominee’s personal life as he simultaneously campaigns to return to the White House in November.
Here’s a look at some key takeaways from opening statements:
Former Trump Organization chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg, center, appears during his sentencing hearing in Manhattan Supreme Court, Tuesday, Jan. 10, 2023, in New York.
Election fraud vs. ‘bookkeeping’ case
Trump is charged with 34 counts of falsifying internal Trump Organization business records. But prosecutors made clear they do not want jurors to view this as a routine paper case. Prosecutor Matthew Colangelo said the heart of the case is a scheme to “corrupt” the 2016 election by silencing people who were about to come forward with embarrassing stories Trump feared would hurt his campaign.
“No politician wants bad press,” Colangelo said. “But the evidence at trial will show that this was not spin or communication strategy. This was a planned, coordinated, long-running conspiracy to influence the 2016 election, to help Donald Trump get elected through illegal expenditures to silence people who had something bad to say about his behavior.” He added: “It was election fraud, pure and simple.”
The business records charges stem from things like invoices and checks that were deemed legal expenses in Trump Organization records when prosecutors say they were really reimbursements to former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen for a $130,000 hush money payment to porn actor Stormy Daniels. Daniels was threatening to go public with claims she had an extramarital sexual encounter with Trump. He says it never happened.
Adult film actress Stormy Daniels arrives for the opening of the adult entertainment fair Venus in Berlin, on Oct. 11, 2018.
Prosecutors’ characterizations appear designed to combat suggestions by some pundits that the case — perhaps the only one that will go to trial before the November election — isn’t as serious as the other three prosecutions he’s facing. Those cases accuse Trump of trying to overturn the 2020 election he lost to President Joe Biden and illegally retaining classified documents after he left the White House.
Trump, meanwhile, sought to downplay the accusations while leaving the courtroom on Monday, calling it all a “bookkeeping” case and “a very minor thing.” But he, too, has said it’s all about an election — the one this November. Trump has repeatedly claimed that the case is part of a sweeping Democratic attempt to harm his chances at reclaiming the presidency.
Trump’s defense comes into view
Trump’s attorney used his opening statement to attack the case as baseless, saying the former president did nothing illegal.
The attorney, Todd Blanche, challenged prosecutors’ claim that Trump agreed to pay Daniels to aid his campaign, saying Trump was trying to “protect his family, his reputation and his brand.”
Blanche indicated the defense will argue that after all the very point of a presidential campaign is to try to influence an election.
“It’s called democracy,” Blanche told jurors. “They put something sinister on this idea, as if it was a crime. You’ll learn it’s not.”
Blanche also portrayed the ledger entries at issue in the case as pro forma actions performed by a Trump Organization employee. Trump “had nothing to do with” the allegedly false business records, “except that he signed the checks, in the White House, while he was running the country,” Blanche said. And he argued that the records’ references to legal expenses weren’t false, since Cohen was Trump’s personal lawyer at the time.
Prosecutors aim to put Trump at the center
The 34 counts in the indictment are related to the payment to Daniels. But prosecutors plan to introduce evidence about a payoff to another woman — former Playboy model Karen McDougal — who claimed a sexual encounter with Trump, as well as to a Trump Tower doorman who claimed to have a story about Trump having a child out of wedlock. Trump says they were all lies.
Karen McDougal attends Playboy’s Super Saturday Night Party at Sagamore Hotel on February 6, 2010 in Miami Beach, Florida.
Prosecutors said they will show Trump was at the center of the scheme to silence the women, telling jurors they will hear Trump in his voice talking about the plan to pay McDougal. Cohen arranged for the publisher of the National Enquirer supermarket tabloid to pay McDougal $150,000 but not print the story in a practice known as “catch-and-kill.”
Colangelo told jurors that prosecutors will play for them a recording Cohen secretly made during a meeting with Trump weeks before the 2016 election. In the recording, which first became public in 2018, Trump is heard saying: “What do we got to pay for this? One-fifty?”
Trump “desperately did not want this information about Karen McDougal to become public because he was worried about its effect on the election,” Colangelo said.
Michael Cohen, the former personal attorney to President Donald Trump, prepares to speak to the media before departing his Manhattan apartment for prison on May 06, 2019 in New York City.
Cohen’s credibility in the spotlight
The defense’s opening statement previewed what will be a key strategy of the defense: trying to discredit Cohen, a Trump loyalist turned critic and expected star witness for the prosecution. Cohen pleaded guilty to federal charges related to the hush money payments in 2018 and and served prison time.
Whether jurors believe Cohen, who says he arranged the payments to the women at Trump’s direction, could make or break the case for Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office.
Trump’s lawyer highlighted Cohen’s criminal record, describing him as a serial liar who turned against Trump after he was not given a job in the administration and found himself in legal trouble. Blanche said Cohen’s “entire financial livelihood depends on President Trump’s destruction,” noting he hosts podcasts and has written books bashing his ex-boss.
“He has a goal and an obsession with getting Trump,” Blanche said. “I submit to you that he cannot be trusted.”
Anticipating the defense attacks on Cohen, the prosecution promised to be upfront about the “mistakes” the former Trump attorney has made. But Colangelo said “you can credit Michael Cohen’s testimony” despite his past.
“I suspect the defense will go to great lengths to get you to reject his testimony precisely because it is so damning,” the prosecutor said.
David Pecker, Chairman and CEO of American Media, addresses those attending the Shape & Men’s Fitness Super Bowl Party in New York, on Jan. 31, 2014.
But up first: David Pecker
Former National Enquirer publisher David Pecker is the first witness for prosecutors, who say that Trump’s alleged scheme to conceal potentially damaging information from voters began with a 2015 Trump Tower meeting among the then-candidate, Pecker and Cohen. Pecker took the witness stand Monday before court broke for the day and his testimony is expected to continue Tuesday.
At the meeting, Pecker — a longtime Trump friend — agreed to aid Trump’s campaign by running favorable pieces about him, smearing his opponents, scouting unflattering stories about him and flagging them to Cohen for “catch-and-kill” deals. Those included the claims made by Daniels, McDougal and the former Trump Tower doorman, Dino Sajudin, prosecutors say. Trump says all were false.
Pecker will likely be asked about all the alleged efforts made by the Enquirer’s then-owner, American Media Inc., on Trump’s behalf. Federal prosecutors agreed in 2018 not to prosecute American Media in exchange for its cooperation in a campaign finance investigation that led to Cohen’s guilty plea, and the Federal Election Commission fined the company $187,500, calling the McDougal deal a “prohibited corporate in-kind contribution.”
Pecker’s brief turn on the stand Monday was mainly just about his background and other basic facts, though he did say the Enquirer practiced “checkbook journalism” — paying for stories — and that he had the final say on any story about a famous person.
‘The defendant’ or ’President Trump’?
The prosecutor referred to Trump during his opening statement as “the defendant.” Trump’s lawyer took a different tack, calling him “President Trump.”
“We will call him President Trump, out of respect for the office that he held,” Blanche said. At the same time, Trump’s lawyer sought to portray Trump as an everyman, describing him as a husband, father and fellow New Yorker.
“He’s, in some ways, larger than life. But he’s also here in this courtroom, doing what any of us would do: defending himself,” Blanche said.
Trump sat quietly while listening to opening statements, occasionally passing notes to his lawyers and whispering in their ears. But outside of the courtroom, he continued his pattern of trying to capitalize politically on the case that will require him to spend his days in a courtroom rather than on the campaign trail.
“This is what they’re trying to take me off the trail for. Checks being paid to a lawyer,” Trump said.
