Attorneys for former President Donald Trump hinted Thursday that ex-lawyer Michael Cohen isn’t the only witness they plan to prove has an issue with telling the truth during the criminal hush money trial.
Trump and his attorneys have made clear they intend to use Cohen’s history of lying to Congress and his recent admonishment by a judge over perjury concerns to discredit Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg‘s 34-count indictment against the former president. But already less than a half-day into witness cross-examination, defense attorneys are aiming to discredit other witnesses before they even get to the stand, such as former White House communications director Hope Hicks.
Bragg’s team of prosecutors finished their third day of interviewing David Pecker, the legendary National Enquirer publishing executive who prosecutors say helped Trump and his former fixer Cohen hatch a plan for a “catch and kill” scheme to silence bad press about Trump during his 2016 presidential campaign.
Trump lawyer Emil Bove began his cross-examination just before the day’s end, pressing Pecker about an inconsistency as to whether Hicks was at a 2015 Trump Tower meeting, where the media mogul says he first agreed to suppress stories on Trump’s behalf.
Bove’s line of questioning suggested that Pecker informed federal prosecutors that Hicks was not at the meeting — but told state prosecutors that she was.
During that meeting with federal prosecutors, Bove asked, “You did not tell anyone that Hope Hicks participated in the August 2015 meeting, correct?” Pecker said that was the case.
The media mogul’s admission could become a strain on prosecutors as they seek to bring in more witnesses to prove that Trump instructed Cohen to work with Pecker to kill porn star Stormy Daniels’s story alleging she had an affair with Trump in 2006.
Prosecutors are using Pecker’s testimony to “set the scene for the conspiracy,” former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani told the Washington Examiner.
But Pecker is also a co-conspirator in the indictment who testified under a grant of immunity, so “the defense will cross-examine him aggressively and argue that he is lying to save himself and sell more magazines,” Rahmani added.
Although Hicks hasn’t been scrutinized for perjury like Cohen and isn’t a notorious tabloid publisher like Pecker, her credibility may well come under scrutiny when she eventually testifies due to her inconsistent statements to Congress in June 2019.
One month after she testified to Congress that she wasn’t present when Trump and Cohen discussed Daniels at the Trump Tower meeting, a federal court unsealed search warrant records that were part of the Southern District of New York’s investigation into campaign finance violations tied to Trump and his attorney. The documents showed that Hicks at least spoke to both Trump and Cohen before the start of negotiations to make payments to Daniels.
Rahmani said he believes “Hicks is less concerning because she isn’t alleged to have participated in any criminal activity, but any inconsistent statements are a potential problem and something the prosecutors should prepare her for and have her explain.”
Bragg has charged Trump under New York Penal Law Section 175.10, falsifying business records in the first degree. Falsification alone is a misdemeanor under Section 175.05, but the district attorney, an elected Democrat, has boosted the charge to a felony by alleging Trump falsified the records with the “intent to commit another crime and aid and conceal the commission thereof.” However, Trump is not charged with any additional crimes.
Prosecutors over the last three days have sought to show Trump, Cohen, and Pecker’s alleged “catch and kill” scheme was done with the intent of preventing the emergence of anything damaging or “embarrassing” to the then-candidate’s 2016 campaign. But the prosecution may have hit some roadblocks on Thursday when Bove walked Pecker through ways he had engaged in very similar behavior to help Arnold Schwarzenegger’s campaign for governor with similar protection deals.
Bove even referenced Tiger Woods, which may have related to an incident in which Pecker traded information about one of the women the golfer allegedly had an affair with in exchange for an exclusive interview with Woods in one of his magazines, Men’s Fitness, in 2007.
The defense’s line of questioning to Pecker appears to reveal the Trump team’s desire to show the media mogul was willing to cut deals and do favors with a variety of celebrities and politicians, which could prove to be convincing to a jury. In essence, they would like to dispel the prosecution’s notion that Trump was only working with Pecker for campaign-related reasons.
“Trump’s attorneys will try to undercut the reliability of Pecker / Hicks / Cohen and all witnesses for that matter because that is what trial attorneys do,” Andrew Lieb, a managing partner at Lieb at Law, told the Washington Examiner.
Lieb noted that Bragg’s reliance on multiple witnesses likely intends to have a “barrage effect of compounding from every angle.”
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“So, while each, on their own, may have veracity problems, cumulatively the people intend it to be damning,” Lieb said.
Lawyers for Trump will continue questioning Pecker on Friday. It is not immediately clear when prosecutors will call Hicks to the stand.
