Trump could testify next week in the final stretch of his criminal trial

The defense of the former president of USA donald trump (2017-2021) said this Thursday that the magnate has not yet decided whether he will take the stand to testify next week, a date that the judge in the case wants to be the final stretch for this criminal trial that began a month ago with the selection of jury.

There will be no session on Friday and next Monday Michael Cohen, who was the former president’s lawyer and right-hand man and is the last witness for the Prosecutor’s Office, is expected to continue his testimony after having already spent three days on the stand.

Trump’s lawyers also left the door open to calling more witnesses and said it would not take long. “a lot” in making the announcement of who they would be.

For his part, Judge Juan M. Merchan considered it appropriate to warn both sides to be prepared for final arguments on Tuesday. That could mean the case will go to the jury for a verdict next week.

This week, Cohen testified that Trump ordered him to pay $130,000 to silence Stormy Daniels, a porn star who claims to have had an affair with Trump in 2006, during the campaign, and detailed how Trump later reimbursed him for his expenses.

An energy defense

During the examination of the Prosecutor’s star witness this Thursday, Trump’s main lawyer, Todd Blanche, appeared more agitated than the witness, who, for his part, answered calmly and at times extremely slowly.

Trump’s defense focused on questioning Cohen’s honesty and morality before the jury and reviewing in detail some of the evidence that has been shown so far in the trial.

Thus, he asked Cohen to tell the lies he told the House Intelligence Committee in 2017, where he lied under oath, which cost him being accused of perjury in 2018.

The defense also analyzed Cohen’s relationship with the press, who explained that journalists came to him to ask him to confirm or deny information about Trump during the almost ten years he worked for him, and acknowledged that he established a relationship with some of them. friendship relationship.

The former lawyer said that he never gave any statement without first consulting the Republican politician.

Blanche attacked Cohen’s professionalism by pointing out that he secretly recorded some of his conversations with the press, including about forty with The New York Times journalist Maggie Haberman, who has written 38 articles about him and was in the courtroom today. Manhattan Penitentiary following the case.

To which the former lawyer, who can no longer practice, justified – without being asked – that in the state of New York it is legal to record a telephone call without letting the other person know. However, Trump’s lawyer reproached him for also recording conversations with clients, something that is not allowed for lawyers in this state.

He also recorded conversations with Trump, one of them in 2016 that has been used as evidence in this trial.

Regarding other conversations with the former president and his circle during the last stretch of the 2016 presidential elections, in which Cohen points out that the issue of payment to silence the extramarital relationship was discussed, Blanche questioned Cohen’s memory by pointing out that in At that time I received an average of 50 calls a day.

Trump, who is in the middle of the election campaign but has to attend the trial four days a week, paid attention during his former employee’s testimony, thus breaking with his habit of “listen with eyes closed” the testimonies, especially after eating.

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