#TrumpTrial Thurs 9 May, 2024 đ§”
The prosecution asks that the defense be precluded from asking #StormyDaniels whether she was arrested. Justice #Merchan agrees w/the prosecutors, saying that âanybody can be arrestedâ & that it âdoesnât prove anything.â
The people call Stormy Daniels back to the stand
#Trump atty #Necheles begins questioning by saying that in 2011, Daniels denied having had sex w/Trump.
#law #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney
Prosecution objects & the judge instructs #StormyDaniels not to answer.
#Necheles moves on, saying that Daniels changed her account in 2016, when she was trying to sell her story.
Necheles may ask questions she knows will prompt objections. Just because something is stricken from the record, doesnât mean the jury didnât hear it. Sometimes jurors pay more attention then.
#law #Trump #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
#Necheles presses #StormyDaniels, asking if she wanted money from #Trump.
Daniels: âNo. I never asked for money from anyone in particular, I asked for money to tell my storyâ
Necheles: âThatâs what you were asking in 2016, was for money, to be able to tell your story?â
Tues Daniels said that initially, she wasnât interested in money.
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
#Necheles: âThat was your choice, right?â she says, of Daniels accepting money for silence.
#StormyDaniels fights back, but says she âaccepted an offerâ because she was ârunning out of time.â referring to the fact that the 2016 presidential election was quickly approaching.
Necheles asks Daniels why she talked to a Slate reporter, & then stopped, implying that Daniels didn't do the interview because she wasn't going to be paid.
Defense says #StormyDaniels was in conversation w/multiple reporters about the possibility of selling her story before the election, seeking to use that info to show that Daniels was using her story to threaten #Trump.
Defense, as it did w/ #KeithDavidson, Daniels's fmr lawyer, is trying to paint Daniels as not only a liar, but as an extortionist, saying that she was telling Weisberg, that she either wanted money or she wanted to hurt Trump politically.
#Necheles: âYou were threatening to try to hurt [Trump] if he didnât give you money.â
#StormyDaniels: âFalseâ
On Tues, Daniels said that she spoke w/ Slate reporter Jacob Weisberg during a period when her deal w/ #MichaelCohen seemed like it would not go through. Today, she made a similar but finer point, saying the interview w/ Weisberg was almost like an insurance policy to make certain her story would get out if the NDA collapsed.
#StormyDaniels is pushing back on #Necheles, asking for evidence when the lawyer claims that Daniels had called her lawyer weak-willed.
Daniels: âShow me where I said that,â - forcing the defense to produce exhibits to back up allegations.
Necheles pulls up the transcript & audio & Danielsâs voice is not on the tape; it is #MichaelCohen & #KeithDavidson, her lawyer at the time - so Daniels is correct, not the #Trump atty.
The jurors heard an audio recording of #KeithDavidson, #StormyDanielsâs fmr lawyer, telling #MichaelCohen that she was desperate for the money & was panicked that her leverage to get it would disappear after the 2016 election because she expected #Trump to lose. Davidson describes hearing Daniels say this to him on the phone, but Daniels denied it to the court shortly after the tape was played.
Defenseâs goal seems to be to establish that she was motivated by money.
#StormyDaniels is not on trial.
Her truthfulness about her motives may go to credibility, but itâs #Trumpâs motives in seeking to silence her story are what matters re the charges, not her truthfulness.
Remember, Trump paid off the doorman & everyone knew that story was a fiction.
Whether her story is true or not is irrelevant.
Whatâs at issue is whether Trump falsified business records to hide paying her off to keep a damaging story from the public prior to the election.
The defense showed a statement released in Jan 2018, in which #StormyDaniels said that she did not have an AFFAIR w/ #Trump. But #Necheles changed the wording to suggest she denied having SEX w/ Trump - & Daniels agreed, not splitting hairs about the wording here.
The Trump team has relied on this statement, which Daniels later rescinded
This is the statement Trump posted on social as having been "JUST FOUND," leading to a contempt ruling for violation of his #GagOrder.
#Necheles asked #StormyDaniels how, by 2018, even though she had said she wouldn't discuss this (Nechelesâs words) "supposed" story, she decided she wanted to "publicly" say she had sex w/ #Trump.
Daniels: "No. Nobody would ever want to" say that publicly.
Necheles gets Daniels to confirm that her book contract â to sell her story â was valued at $800k, as she continues to try to frame this as a story of financial exploitation.
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference
#StormyDaniels, smartly, has taken issue w/ #Nechelesâs word choices, including at the start that she had undergone "mock" cross-examination to prepare.
She's continued to do so, arguing about whether she accepted money to keep silent, while also insisting she wanted her story told.
Necheles has been relentless in painting Daniels as doing all of this - the NDA, the media appearances, her book, a strip club tour - to make money.
Ironic given that #Trump has always lauded the pursuit of money.
#Necheles put on screen an advertisement for an event from #StormyDaniels's strip club tour. The title: "Make America Horny Again." Daniels says that she "hated" that tagline.
#Trumpâs goal seems less to make people think he's pure, but more to suggest his antagonists are all impure.
To that end, Necheles then went after Daniels for having a sexual relationship w/a camera operator on her documentary. Who cares?
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney
The defense's playbook:
Portray #StormyDaniels as a money-grubbing, sleazy, dishonest operator who tried to use #Trump to get fame & riches from the anti-Trump resistance. Every aspect of her questioning hits at one of these themes.
This is similar to the arguments used by Trumpâs lawyers in his trial over #EJeanCarroll's defamation suit: that people who opposed Trump had perverse financial incentives.
It didnât work in the Carroll case.
Letâs hope it fails again.
#StormyDaniels takes a page from the Trumpian playbook & says that she is allowed to punch back at social media jousts from her adversaries. Sheâs not under a #GagOrder.
If they want to make fun of me, then I can make fun of them, Daniels says as she explains why she responded to a tweet attacking her by calling #Trump an "orange turd."
Necheles is working hard to show the jury how much Daniels hates Trump & is prejudiced.
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference
#StormyDaniels continues to avoid being caught in a contradiction, taking issue w/ #Necheles's word choices. When the defense showed the tweet in which Daniels called #Trump an "orange turd," Daniels, several times, refused to say that she was talking about Trump. Eventually, Necheles said, "You don't want to admit that you meant President Trump."
âOh, I absolutely meant ... Mr. Trump," Daniels said, refusing to call the defendant
"president" as his lawyers do.
We saw #Trump's social media posts used against him repeatedly in this trial. The defense is focusing closely now on Daniels's past statements. Given #MichaelCohen's social media use, this is undoubtedly what we will see when he is cross-examined.
#Necheles noted that #StormyDaniels has "an online store where you sell merchandise," accusing her of "shilling" online.
Daniels: "Not unlike Mr. Trump."
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
#StormyDaniels smiled as she looked at tweets she sent on 30 March, 2023, the day #Trump was criminally indicted for the first time. She posted about drinking champagne & selling "Team Stormy" merchandise.
A defense lawyer for Donald Trump, one of the world's great vendors of branded products, is trying to discredit Daniels for selling her "merch" in the wake of Trump's indictment.
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
Many of #StormyDaniels's retorts are versions of "so did Trump." He calls her âhorseface," so why can't she call him an âorange turd"? He sells his merchandise, so why can't she sell hers?
As said, it's clear the defense is seeking to smear Daniels. But theyâve carefully avoided, her story of sex w/ #Trump.
That's what Trump is accused of covering up before the election thru a #HushMoney payment, & afterward thru disguised repayments to #MichaelCohen.
#Trump leans forward & stares at the screen w/the exhibits of #StormyDaniels's merch, including T-shirts & comic books. He seems very interested in her efforts to make money off the liaison w/him.
Trump has sold merch w/his name on it for years - steaks, vodka, water & sneakers to name a few.
#Necheles brings up a "$40 Stormy Saint of Indictments Candle," w/Daniels draped in a Christ-like robe. Trump recently made news by hawking a Bible for $59.99.
Irony is dead.
#Necheles now brings up something inevitable: #StormyDaniels's work as a medium. "You've made a show & a podcast claiming you can speak w/ dead people, right?"
So now Necheles is trying to make Daniels look crazy by bringing up her beliefs in the paranormal & communicating w/dead people.
Keeping score, Necheles has tried to discredit Daniels by suggesting she is
1. crazy,
2. dishonest,
3. money-grubbing,
4. desperate &
5. fame-hungry.
In an important exchange, #Necheles asks #StormyDaniels about her experience making porn films.
Necheles: âYou have a lot of experience in making phony stories about sex appear to be realâ
Daniels: "That's not how I would put it."
She is momentarily taken aback, then adds, "The sex in the films is very much real, just like what happened to me in that room."
Necheles belittles Daniels's work & suggesting she is lying about having had sex w/ #Trump.
#StormyDaniels responds quickly to this particular line of questioning & used a very memorable line.
When #Necheles implies directly that she made up her story of sex w/ #Trump, Daniels replies: [if it weren't true], "I would have written it to be a lot better.â
Trump is glowering, hunched over the defense table, as Daniels continues to insult him.
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
#StormyDaniels continues to hold her ground & seems utterly unashamed about her career in the sex trade (why should she be?)
#Trump's lawyer Todd #Blanche can't help but laugh when Daniels says she is âpretty sure we all know" how to have sex.
In a cable interview last year, #MichaelCohen predicted that Daniels would do well if she testified against Trump, saying, "She's very quick on her feet."
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
#Necheles, relying on #StormyDaniels's book, begins to question her about what the defense lawyer calls "the supposed sexual encounter" that she says "supposedly occurred 18 years ago."
Daniels is fighting back on every mischaracterization on Necheles's part - including where #Trump's bodyguard was at any given time - that she can. Now, Necheles begins to say that Daniels's story of the sex has changed.
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
#Necheles continues to be derisive of #StormyDaniels's sex work. As she asks about the golf tournament where Daniels met #Trump, she refers to "you & the other porn stars who were there." Public perceptions around adult film & sex work have changed, & it's unclear how the jury will perceive her tack.
+ Necheles is making these arguments in defense of a man whose image as a sexual aggressor has come into this same trial thru things like the #AccessHollywood tape.
#StormyDanielsâs is beginning to sound upset as #Necheles attacks her account of the story, saying she described it differently in her book & at trial.
Necheles continues to call it the "supposed" meeting at a hotel, but there was evidence that Daniels had not just #Trump's bodyguard, Keith Schiller, listed in her phone, but his gatekeeper, #RhonaGraff.
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
#Trump appears to be dozing as #Necheles questions #StormyDaniels at length about the details of her meeting w/him.
Daniels, is quizzed extensively about whether she actually ate while in Trump's hotel room in 2006, prior to the alleged sexual encounter, smiles a bit. "It was dinner" she says, "but we never got food." She adds: "I'm very food-motivated."
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
This is mostly an attempt to confuse the jury about what #StormyDaniels has actually said.
The best witnesses have vivid recall of events & tell their stories consistently over time. #Necheles is homing in on any discrepancy she can find.
Necheles is addressing something that Daniels has long said, which is that she did not eat while in #Trump's hotel room in 2006 - presenting evidence that Daniels has at times described that episode as having been a "dinner."
It may seem minor but the defense is likely hoping to show the jurors that Daniels's memory cannot be trusted in this description of something that happened just before she says she & #Trump had sex.
#StormyDaniels, though, is still fighting back, describing the encounter as a "dinner" but saying no food was ever served - which is why she's always harped on the lack of food in interviews.
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
#Necheles concludes the discussion of dinner w/a blunt question: "Your words don't mean what they say, do they?" There's an objection, but the line already landed in the room.
Necheles spent many minutes drilling down on what #StormyDaniels meant when she said she & Trump had dinner but didn't eat. It's a pretty picayune distinction that the jurors can probably pick up on. It's starting to feel like Necheles is harping on this minor semantic choice just to bully.
Part of the reason #Necheles is even able to do this sort of minor parsing of words in the first place is because #StormyDaniels has now told her story in many places many different times, & invariably there will be slight alterations in each recounting.
Defense lawyers love it when witnesses have given multiple accounts of the same event.
#law #Trump #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
#Necheles, harps on one inconsistency in #StormyDaniels's whether #Trump was watching TV when she arrived at the hotel suite.
Again none of this actually matters.
Necheles has reached the moment before the sexual encounter & is seeking to question Daniels's credibility about that account, mixing in descriptions of Daniels's previous work in porn. Necheles notes that in Daniels's book, she describes the early part of the encounter, writing that she made him her âbitch."
#Necheles suggests there's an inconsistency here, because #StormyDaniels wrote about being aggressive w/ #Trump but then testified that she was intimidated when he approached her for sex. Necheles is in extremely dangerous territory here: She could convince jurors that Daniels was inconsistent. But these jurors may also understand how complex these types of situations - & memories of them - are.
#law #Trump #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
#Necheles eventually cuts right to the point of her cross-examination about the sexual encounter: "You made all this up, right?" she asks.
#StormyDaniels responds forcefully: âNo."
"There was no more conversation,"
Daniels says, about what happened after she left the bathroom, the moment at which she says the sexual encounter began.
#law #Trump #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
#Necheles questions #StormyDanielsâs assertion that she felt a #power imbalance w/ #Trump before their sexual encounter. Necheles cuts Daniels off as she's talking, prompting prosecutors to ask the judge to permit the witness to answer.
Necheles insinuates that Daniels is making up her feeling that Trump was overpowering her. Daniels gives perhaps her strongest testimony of the morning:
âMy own insecurities made me feel that way," she says, her voice never wavering.
#Necheles has taken a risky tack in cross-examination. She accused #StormyDaniels of making up the sexual encounter w/ #Trump in part by pointing out the idea of a power imbalance. The imbalance is obvious to anyone.
It's worth noting, that the defense only need to convince one of the jurors to distrust Daniels, or to buy into the idea that her word affects the case. It doesnât.
"You are trying to make me say it's changed, but it hasn't changed," Daniels says about her story.
After a break, Necheles continued her cross-examination. She introduced a story about #StormyDaniels being at a nightclub w/ #Trump & the football player Ben Roethlisberger.
#Necheles then asked about Daniels promoting her "Make America Horny Again" tour on her Instagram account.
She's still trying to catch Daniels in very small contradictions. Daniels is fighting back, but w/ less energy.
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney
#Necheles returned to #StormyDaniels's account of the sex, seeking to draw a contrast between Daniels's testimony on Tues & a 2018 interview she gave to Vogue. But Daniels's story sounded consistent w/her testimony, w/a key detail repeated - that #Trump may have let her leave if she had wanted to.
Cross-examination concluded.
Necheles outright accused Stormy Daniels of lying about her story again. There was a sustained objection, & the lawyers discussed the issue w/the judge.
#StormyDaniels continued to insult #Trump up until the end of her cross-examination, at one point even questioning which #indictment of his #Necheles was referring to. She quipped: "There were a lot of indictments."
The defense moved it to strike that comment from the record, but the judge said no: he said Daniels's testimony had been responsive to the questioning.
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
Whatever jurors think about #StormyDaniels's testimony & Trump's lawyers' attempts to
discredit her, none of them were unfamiliar w/ #Trump before they were chosen. And Trump has spent decades boasting about sexual conquests & sitting on Howard Stern's couch for his radio show, saying lurid things about women.
#law #TrumpTrial #CatchAndKill #conspiracy #ElectionInterference #HushMoney #MobTactics
#Hoffinger, the prosecutor, is on redirect.
She asks #StormyDaniels whether the #legal language in her #NDA was difficult to understand.
Daniels says, w/some reluctance, that it was.
Throughout Daniels testimony she has shown she takes pride in her intelligence & her ability to be fast on her feet. She appeared unhappy to admit that there was something she had trouble understanding (many women feel this way as they are often dismissed).
#Hoffinger, the prosecutor, is doing a classic example of a redirect examination, calmly pointing to facts the defense left out in cross.
E.G. #Necheles spent a lot of time on discrepancies between #StormyDaniels's testimony & an interview she gave in 2011 to InTouch mag. But, Hoffinger drew Daniels's attention - & the jury's - to the fine print at the bottom of the article saying it had been lightly edited.
Implying that the story did not contain every detail of Daniels's account.
#Hoffinger asks #StormyDaniels if she tweeted in response to an attack by a stranger who called her "a disgusting degenerate prostitute" & wished her luck walking down the street.
Defense had asked her about responding to this tweet by saying she would "dance down the street" if #Trump found himself in #legal trouble. But Hoffinger is showing the full #context of that exchange, & it's different from what the jury had been led to understand by defense.
This is where Necheles made her exam sound like every rape defence, ever. Reading it made my skin crawl. She is a woman, does she not know that women recognize this pattern for what it is?
Precisely this. The jurors are more or less half Trump's age, thus closer to the MeToo movement or at least aware of how fucking terrible Daniels encounter must've been. Trump, on the other hand, has instructed his lawyers to blame the victim. What could possibly go wrong??
Not to mention their own lived experiences.
I really felt it painted Trump worse and more truly.
He was as never planning on dinner, not even as foreplay.
@Nonilex if I remember correctly, this all started because she was impressed on meeting him. She voluntarily had sex, & then Trump left while she was in the bathroom & left money on the night stand, indicating that he thought she was a prostitute.
David Pecker got ruffled when Trump tried to stiff him on one of the first catch & kill stories.
Stormy keeps talking about this as she tries to make the distinction between adult film star & hooker.
This was all caused by how Trump treated people.
Nonilex
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Edelruth, PBS Passport Holder
RalfMaximus
Urban Hermit