The next witness is Rebecca Manocio - the Trump Org’s bookkeeper. You’d think that her testimony might be a little…erm…dry, after Stormy Daniels’, but no.
Manochio was responsible for preparing checks for Trump to sign. However, when she drew up the checks for payments to Cohen, while Trump was president in 2017, she sent them to Keith Schiller, not Trump. Yes, the same Keith Schiller who was standing guard outside Trump’s hotel room when he and Stormy were together.
But wait, there’s more! She didn’t send them to Keith’s Schiller in the White House - where he worked at that time - she sent them to his home address in DC. He would courier them into the Oval Office for Trump to sign and then return the signed checks to Manochio.
Team The People has the FedEx receipts for the to-ings and fro-ings of the checks!
Asked if she ever, before or since, sent to Schiller a check to be signed by Trump: “No.”
I’ve sat on juries that convicted and I thought that the judges instructions were of paramount importance. “If this, then that. If not, then no.” I will be interested in the instructions given to this jury.
It is, however, difficult to see how any key element of the alleged crime has not been proven beyond a reasonable doubt. I mean, actual testimony in an actual courtroom under oath that he paid Daniels. How do you refute that?
That’s why it’s such a coup de grâce. He’d have to swear under oath now that he is telling the truth about how he was lying under oath then. Also, it would mean Trump taking the stand; good fucking luck with that.
Lastly, it pulls the rug out completely from under Team Trump, because in their opening they stated that no such reimbursement took place. In its summation, Team The People can show that the defense was lying to them from the very beginning.
Even our extraordinarily relaxed campaign finance laws have to have been broken here, right? You can ask for money, but you can’t promise favors in exchange for money.
He asked for a mistrial after direct testimony, and now he wants a mistrial after his own cross-examination? Team Trump is hilariously bad at this.
Fun Fact: Susan Necheles was on the defense team for the Trump Org when it was found guilty of being “Crime Org”. This was the criminal prosecution of the company for fraud, not to be confused with the civil case against Trump for fraud (which he lost to the tune of half-a-billion dollars), or this criminal trial of Trump for election fraud, or the pending criminal case in GA for election fraud.
Confused? Well then tune into next week’s episode of “Trump”.
Next witness is a double-whammy. Madeleine Westerhout worked for the publisher of some of Trump’s books, where she is the vessel to introduce excerpts from Trump’s screeds about how amazingingly loyal his employees are.
But she also worked at the RNC during the 2016 campaign and in the Trump White House in 2017, and confirmed that there were discussions about replacing Trump as the candidate after the Access Hollywood tape came out.
She also used to type up his tweets. On paper. For him to proof read.
Team Trump’s motion regarding the potential testimony of Karen McDougal is rendered moot; Team The People said they would not be calling her as a witness.
Team Trump want the gag order lifted with regard to Stormy Daniels because Trump wants to be able to respond to her testimony in a limited way for the sake of his campaign. Team The People responded [paraphrasing] “pull the other one, it’s got bells on”. Merchan, expressed concern about all witnesses here (the obvious inference that Trump being let loose on Daniels after her testimony had the potential to chill future witnesses) said, “denied”.
Team Trump is basically re-hashing the mistrial argument from earlier this week. Repeating the same behavior expecting a different result. They claim Daniels’ testimony is too salacious and has tainted the jury.
Taint. Huh-huh-huh.
Team The People argued, again, that the nature of the encounter is the fucking point you dumbasses. It is this story that Trump was paying to keep from getting out to the voters. Moreover, they said that Daniels has a ton more information that’s way more salacious than what they elicited from her in testimony. They kept this back deliberately for this very reason, but they offered to enter it into the record under seal so the judge and Team Trump can see all the shit they know and didn’t tell to spare the defendant’s blushes.
I do not believe anyone other than Trump is subject to the gag order (because he’s the only one out on bail). If she goes too far, I imagine Team Trump will argue very bigly for her to be removed from protected status, which the judge would have to seriously consider.
