Trump Hush-Money Trial in Jury’s Hands after Heated Marathon Closing Arguments Wrap Up

The prosecution rested Tuesday evening after delivering closing arguments in Donald Trump’s hush-money trial, sending the case to the jury to decide the fate of the presumptive Republican nominee for president after a weeks-long trial that took him off the campaign trail and placed him inside a Manhattan courtroom.

As chaotic scenes unfolded outside the courthouse in lower Manhattan, including an appearance from actor and Biden campaign surrogate Robert De Niro, Trump’s defense team and District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s prosecutors summed up their respective arguments, both of which focused heavily on the credibility of Michael Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer and fixer.

Cohen testified for the prosecution earlier this month, explaining that he orchestrated a series of hush-money payments to women with whom Trump had sexual encounters, including former Playboy model Karen McDougal and porn star Stormy Daniels. The disbarred former lawyer testified that Trump had approved a $130,000 payment to Daniels during the 2016 campaign in order to protect his political career from unsavory stories about his alleged dalliance with a porn star.

The defense team sought to divert jurors’ attention from Trump’s sexual scandals in closing arguments on Tuesday, insisting instead that they should focus on the underlying allegation: that Trump defrauded the voting public by concealing the hush-money payment through the falsification of business records.

“It is a paper case,” Trump attorney Todd Blanche told the jury.

Blanche also raised the possibility that the jurors could be sending Trump to prison if they convicted him, prompting Judge Juan Merchan to direct the jurors to disregard the prejudicial statement, which he called “outrageous.”

“You cannot send someone to prison based on the words of Michael Cohen,” Blanche had said.

Making his closing argument, prosecutor Joshua Steinglass acknowledged Cohen’s unsavory history but insisted that he’s telling the truth about his role in covering up Trump’s affairs, based on the evidence and testimony presented at trial.

“We didn’t pick [Cohen] up at the witness store,” Steinglass said at the start of his closing arguments.

“The defendant chose Michael Cohen to be his fixer. He picked him for the same qualities that the defense now urges you to reject his testimony over.”

Steinglass went on to explain how National Enquirer publisher David Pecker tried to help Trump conceal his affair with McDougal through a “catch-and-kill” scheme in which Pecker purchased exclusive rights to McDougal’s story only to prevent it from being published elsewhere. The scheme began with a meeting at Trump Tower in August 2015 between Cohen, Trump, and Pecker at which they agreed Pecker would bury negative stories about Trump.

Steinglass argued that Pecker’s testimony in the trial provided “powerful evidence” that Trump was intimately involved with orchestrating the catch-and-kill scheme, including American Media Incorporated’s payment to McDougal.

Over the course of his closing argument, Steinglass cast the “catch-and-kill” system and Cohen’s payment to Daniels as a cover-up to influence the outcome of the 2016 presidential election by deceiving voters.

When going through the reimbursements that Trump sent Cohen, Steinglass argued that the prosecution did not have to show that Trump himself created the alleged falsified business records. Steinglass said the reimbursement scheme involving Cohen and former Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg spoke for itself.

Weisselberg did not testify in the trial and previously pleaded guilty to perjury and financial crimes tied to his work for the Trump Organization. Steinglass noted that Trump’s signature was on the checks for the reimbursements.

“The defendant didn’t actually pay a lawyer; he paid a porn star by funneling money through a lawyer,” Steinglass said.

Steinglass spent hours delivering his closing argument. Jury deliberations will begin on Wednesday.

The jury instructions provided by Merchan last week included an expansive definition of intent to defraud.

“In order to prove an intent to defraud, the People need not prove that the defendant acted with the intent to defraud any particular person or entity,” the jury-instruction document reads. “A general intent to defraud any person or entity — including the government or the voting public — suffices.”

The defense has argued that Trump did not orchestrate a deceptive scheme to deprive people of money or tangible property, the traditional understanding of fraud. On the other hand, Bragg’s prosecution has applied an expansive legal interpretation of fraud to accuse Trump of defrauding all American voters by concealing from the public his alleged sexual encounter with Daniels.

Blanche argued before the jury Tuesday that the story of Daniels and Trump’s alleged affair was published in 2011, long before the 2016 election, but that Daniels, her attorney, and her agent wanted to profit from it years later by extorting money from Trump.

Cohen said Trump knew about his payment to Daniels, Blanche reminded, but “you cannot, cannot believe his words.” Blanche accused Cohen of lying about whether he did legal work for Trump in 2017, telling the jury: “Cohen lied to you. He lied to you.” The prosecution’s star witness in the case, Cohen admitted last week to stealing tens of thousands of dollars from the Trump Organization.

While on the witness stand, Cohen was grilled over his history of lies and public criticisms of his old boss. Portrayed by the defense as a resentful, obsessive ex-employee, Cohen is a now disbarred, convicted felon who pleaded guilty to perjury and various financial crimes connected to his work for Trump.

Ahead of closing arguments on Tuesday, Trump spoke to the media in a hallway of the courthouse: “This is all election hunting, election interference. It’s going after Joe Biden’s political opponent because he can’t do it himself, and they’re helping out.”

De Niro spoke to the press outside the trial on Tuesday, invoking September 11, 2001, while rebuking Trump.

“The Twin Towers fell over here . . .” he said. “We vowed we would not allow terrorists to change our way of life. . . . Donald Trump wants to destroy not only this city, but the country, and eventually he could destroy the world.”

Last week, House Republican Conference Chairwoman Elise Stefanik filed an ethics complaint against Judge Merchan, alleging he is politically compromised because of his daughter’s work as a Democratic operative. The New York State Commission on Judicial Conduct “privately cautioned” Merchan in July for ethics concerns over his illegal political donations to Biden and Democrats in 2020.