of new york criminal case The case against former President Donald Trump continued into its 11th day Friday, with Hope Hicks, one of the prosecution’s so-called key witnesses, taking the stand. Hicks is a former White House communications director and campaign aide to President Trump.
Prosecutor Matthew Colangelo questioned Hicks. Mr. Hicks said in his testimony that he was “concerned” when he received an email from the Washington Post requesting comment regarding portions of the “Access Hollywood” tape.
“I was worried about the content of the email. I was worried that I wouldn’t have time to respond. I was worried that I wouldn’t have the tape recording. There was a lot going on,” she said.
“I knew very well that this was going to be a huge story,” Hicks told the jury, adding that it was a “detrimental development” to the presidential campaign.
“The next 36 hours were all about Trump,” Hicks said, referring to media coverage after the tape was released.
Ms. Hicks said in a phone call that former National Enquirer publisher David Pecker told her that the contract the tabloid had signed with former Playboy model Karen McDougall, who the tabloid alleges had an affair with President Trump, was a “magazine.” It’s for the cover of the magazine and a fitness column, and that’s all there is to it.” It’s very legal. ”
She said Trump “would have liked to hear that from David as well.”
“I think I remember us making the call and David repeating it to Mr. Trump,” Hicks added.
Hicks claims that Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, told her that the story about a so-called $130,000 hush money payment to porn actress Stormy Daniels was untrue and that no payment was made. did. She noted that it was “against common sense” for Mr. Cohen to make the payments himself.
Before cross-examination by Trump’s lawyer Emile Bove began, Hicks began crying on stage and was forced to take a short break.
Upon her return, she told jurors that Cohen had “infiltrated” Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and attempted to “misconduct” it by taking actions not approved by the campaign. She noted that his unauthorized activities irritated the Trump team.
“He tried to insert himself at certain moments, but he was not supposed to participate in the campaign in an official capacity,” she said of Cohen. “There were also things he did voluntarily out of interest.”
“He liked to call himself the fixer, or ‘Mr. Fix-It,’ because he broke things first so he could fix them later,” she told jurors. Ta.
anything else?
On Friday morning, prosecutors introduced recordings from Cohen’s cell phone as evidence at trial.
Bove noted that between 2016 and 2023, “all sorts of things happened” with Cohen’s cell phone that “raised questions about the reliability of the evidence.”
Prosecutor Chris Conroy asked witness Douglas Dowse, a forensics and technology expert, if he had seen “evidence of falsification or manipulation of data retrieved in relation to the recordings in evidence.” . Daus replied that this was not the case.
During Bove’s second cross-examination, Bove asked Daus if he noticed “gaps in the handling of the data that created this risk of falsification,” to which Daus replied, “Yes.”
House Republicans, led by House Judiciary Chairman Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), recently launched an investigation into Colangelo, a former senior Justice Department official. blaze news Previously reported. In a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland, Jordan said New York County District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s decision to hire Colangelo as the lead prosecutor in the criminal case against Trump was a result of the Justice Department’s decision to hire Colangelo as the lead prosecutor in the criminal case against Trump. It claimed it gave the “perception” that it was supporting a “politicized prosecution”. Former president.
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