The New York jury deciding on the indictment against former President Donald Trump ended its first day of deliberations on Wednesday after asking to play key portions of testimony from Trump's former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen and the previous editor of The National Enquirer.
The jury also asked Judge Juan Merchan to repeat the instructions the judge gave them on Wednesday morning.
The motions were the primary communications that the twelve-member jury sent to Merchan after several hours of deliberation.
Jurors will hear the judge's testimony and directions again after they return to Manhattan Supreme Court Thursday morning to proceed deliberations.
Trump is accused within the case of falsifying business records related to the repayment of the $130,000 hush money that Cohen paid to porn star Stormy Daniels shortly before the 2016 presidential election.
Jurors asked Enquirer publisher David Pecker to testify a few phone call he had with Trump during an investor meeting. They also asked Pecker to testify in regards to the purchase of life rights from Karen McDougal, who said she was Trump's mistress.
The panel also asked for a repetition of Pecker's testimony a few meeting at Trump Tower in New York, in addition to Cohen's testimony about that meeting.
On Wednesday, Trump had expressed his anger over the case, through which he’s accused of 34 charges.
“Mother Teresa could not refute these allegations,” Trump told reporters outside the Supreme Court courtroom in Manhattan.
“These charges are rigged. The whole thing is rigged,” the previous president said.
“The whole country is a mess,” Trump continued, apparently referring to a surge in immigration to the U.S. and his loss to President Joe Biden within the 2020 election, before repeating his attacks on Judge Merchan.
“Between the borders and rigged elections and a trial like this where the judge is so torn he can hardly breathe,” he said. “It's a disgrace.”
Jury instructions
Before Trump left the courtroom, Merchan spent nearly 90 minutes giving the jury instructions on find out how to evaluate the fees.
If the jury finds guilty on any of those charges, Trump could be the primary former U.S. president ever to be convicted of against the law.
The judge reminded them that of their deliberations they need to put aside “any personal opinion or bias” against Trump.
He also told them that Trump's decision to not testify in court shouldn’t be held against him, noting that it was not the defense's job to prove his innocence.
“On the contrary, the burden of proof is on the people to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant committed the crime,” Merchan said.
“And if you fail to meet your burden of proof, you must find him not guilty.”
Merchan also informed them about Cohen, the prosecution's star witness.
The judge said Cohen was “an accomplice” to the alleged crimes for which Trump is on trial.
As for the fees against Trump, Merchan told jurors that under New York state law, the crime of falsifying business records “must involve the intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission of another crime.”
He added that prosecutors “do not have to prove that the crime was actually committed.”
The crime that Trump attempted to cover up, in response to prosecutors, is a violation of New York Election Law 17-152, The law prohibits “a conspiracy to promote or prevent the election of any person to public office by any unlawful means.” The election was the 2016 presidential election.
Trump also faces three other criminal charges, none of that are currently expected to go to trial before November, when the Republican shall be on course to face President Joe Biden in a rematch of his 2020 race.
Trump didn’t speak to reporters on his way into court Wednesday morning, breaking along with his usual tactic of railing against the case and Merchan before every day of the trial. Trump also avoided talking to the press after leaving the courthouse Tuesday evening.
Closing argument
Trump's lawyer and a prosecutor made their closing arguments throughout the day and into the early evening on Tuesday.
Cohen testified in court that he paid Daniels on Trump's instructions to purchase her silence about an alleged one-time sexual encounter with Trump in 2006. Trump has denied having sex with Daniels.
Prosecutors allege that Trump falsely declared the reimbursements to Cohen as legal expenses, thereby criminally concealing their true nature. The reason for this was that Trump wanted to avoid wasting his then-faltering campaign from an election defeat to Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton in 2016.
When the payment to Daniels was made, Trump's candidacy had just been shaken by the discharge of the so-called “Access Hollywood” tape, through which he was seen bragging to a television host about groping and kissing women without their consent and getting away with it because he was a “star.”
In his closing argument on Tuesday, Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Joshua Steinglass linked the payment to Daniels to hush money paid before the election to Trump's alleged former mistress McDougal and to the doorman at a Trump estate who circulated a story that Trump had impregnated a housekeeper.
The bouncer's story later turned out to be false, and Trump denied having an extramarital affair with McDougal.
“Everything Trump and his colleagues did in this case was cloaked in lies,” Steinglass said. “The game was one of obfuscation, and all roads led to the man who benefited most: Donald Trump.”
Trump's lawyers argue that Trump did nothing incorrect and that Cohen is a notorious liar motivated by anger at his former client.
“The story Mr. Cohen told you on the witness stand is not true,” defense attorney Todd Blanche said in his closing statement.
“There is no evidence that President Trump knew about the payment before it was made to Daniels,” Blanche said.
“As I told you in my opening speech, it does not matter whether there was a conspiracy to win the election,” Blanche argued.
“Every election campaign is a conspiracy to promote a candidate.”
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