‘Pecker laid all of the groundwork’: Inner bombshell Trump trial testimony

Andrew Weisman and Lisa Rubin are back with me Lisa so much legal news for both of you thank you for again for being here you know pecker clearly was first for a reason and you both have been part of the strategy of this now having heard it how did he lay the groundwork for the prosecutor's case as we look to the next stage brilliantly I'll say and that has.

A lot to do with the homework that the Manhattan DA's office did but remember Jen this case is not so much about the hush money scheme as it is about falsification of business records 34 counts of it but what makes it a felony is that it was done to either with the intent of concealing or committing another crime and what pecker did was.

Establish that other crime namely a conspiracy under New York election law to promote or prevent the election of a particular person through unlawful means where one or more Acts were taken in that direction pecker laid all of that groundwork the formation of the conspiracy the unlawful means meaning the Karen McDougall settlement payment.

And the way in which it was orchestrated and then thirdly the fact that the the unlawful means here was not only the agreement but the fact that they had sort of larded it up with Services an attempt to skirt campaign Finance law in other words he knew that paying her off to suppress her story with the goal of.

Promoting Trump's election was unlawful and so what he did was in that agreement to purchase up her story also provided that she would do columns for the national inquire or serve as red carpet interviewer for radar online one of their properties and the like that was all a ruse although a ruse that Karen McDougall herself took very very.

Seriously and that's what posed problems for them eventually because she wanted them to make good on that portion of the agreement and really they had done it all along to sign I mean the pecker testimony was so interesting a lot of it was I mean I can't believe it's all happen this week I wanted to just go in reverse before.

Pecker Andrew and ask you about Todd blanche's opening statement this all happened this week because he made some pretty bold statements in their hearing just even as a non- lawyer I mean he basically denied Trump's alleged affair with Daniels that's not a part of the legal argument or necessary in the legal sense but does that matter and how could.

That come back to bite him or if it could so one of the things when you are on Trials when you are either the prosecution or the defense you need to be extremely careful about what you promise a jury um and what happens is both sides listen very carefully to that and it will come back if you have promised something that did not uh come.

To play then you are going to hear that so the statement that um denying the trist with Stormy Daniels I mean I'm not really sure how that is going to come into evidence because Stormy Daniels if she testifies is clearly going to say it happened um Donald Trump who I think everyone thinks is not going to testify I mean I'm sure the prosecution would.

Love it if he did um but for the same reason he never met with us in the Mueller investigation I think there's no way in God Green Earth that he is going to testify so I don't know how that is going to come into play um as Lawrence o'donell has said you know that's the kind of thing where it may be that Todd blanch felt he had to say that for his.

But it is exactly that he needed to say it for sort of the sort of public consumption but at trial it is going to hurt him if he doesn't prove it up because in summation you were going to hear the state saying this is what he told you that is not true and the message being that don't trust him so it's very very important what people say.

In openings um obviously we remains to see what the jury makes of all of that yeah all of of all everything that's happening so leis I me one of the things we learned this week there's there's text and email exchanges for all of this some of which we learned about this week I mean we learned about a text message that Dylan Howard the top editor of the.

Inquire sent to a relative on Election night saying quote at least if he wins I'll be paron for electoral fraud I mean judge Maran if I'm correct here won't allow it in evidence but doesn't doesn't that make it really clear that they knew this was illegal I think it absolutely makes it clear that not only did David pecker know that it was illegal but that.

Dylan Howard had figured that out as well and Jen I should say you know this is sort of a close call from an evidentiary perspective because most times statements of a co-conspirator can be admitted into evidence on the other hand as michon reasoned this was a statement that he didn't make to another member of the conspiracy but rather was.

Making to a first-degree relative and moreover Dylan Howard is not coming to this trial to testify he lives in Australia now David pecker revealed in his own test that he understands that Dylan Howard has some sort of health problem that makes it untenable for him to travel and so on balance judge michan decided that this would be too explosive.

To expose the jury to but if you read the transcript and the sidebar between the lawyers where they're talking about the text messages from Howard to that first-degree relative there is more of where that's coming from a lot of other statements that indicate that Howard fully believed that Karen McDougall was telling the truth on Election night was.

Horrified to see what had gone down if those statements had come into evidence I think it would have just been one more notch in the DA's belt with respect to proving up the existence of the conspiracy and the understanding on the national inquirer's part that this was not only wrong but unlawful e.

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