The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today
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Always remember, Operation Valkyrie was an act of sedition.
Warning: I post things that interest me. Read and comment at your own discretion. -
The judge might have committed a reversible error yesterday.
Remember, this is not about sex, this is about money that was allegedly used to secure an NDA and claim it was a "campaign expense."
Last week, Harvey Weinstein's trial was declared a mistrial because the state had women testify about what a loathsome creature Weinstein is. The problem is that these women were NOT part of the lawsuit. The appellate court ruled that their testimony was prejudicial, since they had nothing to do with the case at hand. Mistrial.
In the Trump case, the judge allowed Clifford to testify about her sexual encounter with Trump. He permitted it over the objections of the defense which asserted that the fact that Trump was in his underwear has nothing to do with campaign finance and had no probative value. It is salacious, tawdry and prejudicial. The objection was overruled.
However...after the jury was dismissed, the Merchan upbraided Bragg's counsel saying that this kind of testimony has nothing to do with the case and "we didn't need to hear about any of that."
But he allowed it, in front of the jury.
As the saying goes, you can't put the shit back into the horse.
As McCarthy said, "Merchan scolds prosecutors for doing what he allowed them to do."
California’s Minimum Wage Wipes Out Thousands of Jobs
Stormy Testimony Shows: Trump’s Humiliation Is the Point of Bragg’s Prosecution
For nothing more than the purpose of humiliating the Democrats’ political nemesis and their opponent in the 2024 presidential election, Manhattan’s elected progressive Democratic district attorney, Alvin Bragg, has proffered Stormy Daniels’s sensational story of a sexual encounter with Donald Trump in the unprecedented, media-saturated first-ever trial against a former U.S. president.Trump’s lawyers objected to the testimony, which — as I’ve previously contended, here, here and here — is not relevant to the business-records falsification charges in the case. In particular, Team Trump strenuously objected to graphic details of the sexual encounter that Daniels claims she had with Trump in 2006. As we’ve come to expect, Judge Juan Merchan overruled Trump’s counsel.
But then, quite remarkably, after allowing the jury to hear the salacious testimony — a minute-by-minute account of the alleged tryst — Merchan had the jury leave the courtroom and proceeded to dress down the prosecutors for doing what he allowed them to do.
“I think the degree of detail we’ve been going into here is just unnecessary,” Merchan admonished Bragg’s assistants. Well, yeah, that’s why the defense objected. The judge’s job is to prevent inadmissible and/or unduly prejudicial evidence from being exposed to the jury — not to admit it and then whine about its admission.
On this point, New York’s governing test is set out in Rule 4.06 (“exclusion of relevant evidence”), which instructs a judge to forbid the introduction of evidence if its probative value is merely “outweighed” by the “danger” that it would “create undue prejudice to a party” or “confuse the issues and mislead the jury.” New York’s rule — at least if it is applied as written — is more favorable to criminal defendants than is the federal analogue, Rule 403, which directs that evidence be precluded only if such dangers as unfair prejudice and jury confusion “substantially outweigh” probative value.
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The judge knew what he was doing. The introduction of tawdry details is just political fodder and he knew it. He promoted it. Shucks, the whole trial is nothing but a political circus with everything but Tom Thumb thrown at the wall.
The finger-wagging at the prosecution is simply a little bit of face saving. Where do you go when you know you've gone too far?
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@Jolly said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
Why do you think they put Stormy Weather on the stand today?
Because Stormy is party to the hush money deal that is at the center of the allegations.
You should be surprised and suspicious if Stormy is not put on the stand. -
@George-K said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
The "felony" part of this trial is that there was an election crime (funds diverted to cover up a crime). No crime has been adjudicated.
“No crime has been adjudicated … yet.” The trial is on-going.
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@Jolly said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
What coverup?
My understanding of the case is:
- President Trump had an affair with a porn actor
- President Trump paid the actor to keep silent about the affair
- President Trump said that the payments were business expenses
So, #2 and #3 seem to for sure have happened. To most people, #1 is pretty much a sure thing also.
The coverup is #3. You cant claim "business expenses" when paying off a porn actor to keep quiet. If he had paid her out of his personal funds, this whole trial would not be happening.
I have gotten memos before outlining what is acceptable to expense, and #2 is definitely not on the list. I always assumed that it was for tax reasons that things like that are illegal.
Are they "targeting" President Trump because of who he is? Of course! That is obvious. But as has been discussed before, if your defense is that "other people did this crime and didnt get charged" is not much of a defense.
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@taiwan_girl said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
President Trump said that the payments were business expenses
Bradley Smith is a former chairman of the FEC, and on many occasions, including long before Trump, he has argued that there are all sorts of things a candidate can spend money on that are not legally classifiable as “for the purpose of influencing any election.” ... Smith, having headed the FEC, has many examples from the commission’s enforcement of federal election law that illustrate his point. He knows what he is talking about, and it seems clear that his expert opinion is that paying off Daniels, no matter what one might think of it, is not a campaign expenditure or donation that FECA requires a candidate to disclose. The Trump defense plans to call Smith as a witness. Not because he has any personal knowledge of the Trump transaction but because he understands, and has enforced, the campaign law that Bragg’s prosecutors appear to be planning to use against Trump. But Merchan has forbidden Smith from testifying about most of the issues involved in the case.
So the judge bans the expert on the FEC laws, a former FEC chairman, from explaining what is, and what is not, a violation of campaign laws.
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I dont know the "ins and outs", I did not think that this trail was about campaign laws, it was more about business transactions. I dont think that President Trump has ever said this was about his campaign, but I am not sure.
On another note, do you think that President Trump will testify in this case? My guess is pretty much a NO. He is certainly a person that would do himself more harm than good I believe.
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@taiwan_girl said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
I did not think that this trail was about campaign laws, it was more about business transactions. I dont think that President Trump has ever said this was about his campaign, but I am not sure.
That's right. Trump never said it. Bragg did.
Also, remember the allegations that Bragg is proposing, at worst, are misdemeanors. The statute of limitations for that has long past. However, by adding those misdemeanors to ANOTHER crime it becomes a felony with a statute of limitations that's a year longer.
As I said earlier, Bragg STILL hasn't told us what crime he's charging Trump with to make it the felony.
do you think that President Trump will testify in this case
You can bet he'd want to. If I were his lawyer, I'd threaten him with my resignation if he insists.
"Now look here, you Baltic gas passer... " - Mik, 6/14/08
The saying, "Lite is just one damn thing after another," is a gross understatement. The damn things overlap.
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@George-K said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
As I said earlier, Bragg STILL hasn't told us what crime he's charging Trump with to make it the felony.
That seems kind of weird. I cant believe that there are not rules that would allow a case to go to trial without charges???
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@taiwan_girl said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
That seems kind of weird. I cant believe that there are not rules that would allow a case to go to trial without charges???
https://reason.com/2024/04/15/alvin-bragg-says-trump-tried-to-conceal-another-crime-what-crime/
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@George-K said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
As I said earlier, Bragg STILL hasn't told us what crime he's charging Trump with to make it the felony.
Indictment enumerates 34 COUNTS of "FALSIFYING BUSINESS RECORDS IN THE FIRST DEGREE, in violation of Penal Law §175.10" https://manhattanda.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Donald-J.-Trump-Indictment.pdf.
About the "crimes" that the falsified business records have allegedly been made to conceal, see https://manhattanda.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/2023-04-04-SOF.pdf , also a court filing.
This "Statement of Facts" ("SOF") document shows how the prosecutor ties the "falsifying business records" charges to other established "crimes" (these are adjudicated "federal crimes" for which Trump's former lawyer Michael Cohen has pleaded guilty and served jail time).
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@Axtremus said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
@Jolly said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
Why do you think they put Stormy Weather on the stand today?
Because Stormy is party to the hush money deal that is at the center of the allegations.
You should be surprised and suspicious if Stormy is not put on the stand.Uh, no.
The basis of this trial is how an expense with Cohen was billed.
Always remember, Operation Valkyrie was an act of sedition.
Warning: I post things that interest me. Read and comment at your own discretion. -
@Jolly said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
@Axtremus said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
@Jolly said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
Why do you think they put Stormy Weather on the stand today?
Because Stormy is party to the hush money deal that is at the center of the allegations.
You should be surprised and suspicious if Stormy is not put on the stand.Uh, no.
The basis of this trial is how an expense with Cohen was billed.
It's not just "any expense," but "specific expenses" tied to certain established "crimes," and those "crimes" involve payments to Stormy.
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@George-K said in The Trump "Hush Money" Trial starts today:
Remember, this trial isn't about sex. If that were the case we'd be talking about
JFKClinton. It's about an NDA, which somehow they've managed to contort into an election finance violation - even though the event occurred a decade before the election.The payment happened in 2006?
DON’T let them eat cake.
- RFK Jr -
That’s not the relevant event for the trial.
When did the hush-money payment happen?
DON’T let them eat cake.
- RFK Jr -
