The fifteenth day of former President Donald J. Trump‘s Manhattan-based hush money trial saw the prosecution‘s case end with a catastrophic admission of theft by Michael Cohen as the prosecution rested its case. Even more troublesome for District Attorney Alvin Bragg was that Trump’s defense team brought Robert Costello, Michael Cohen’s former criminal defense attorney, as its second witness.
Costello, the former Deputy Chief of the Criminal Division for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Southern District of New York, made his career telling juries the truth. Before giving his testimony on Monday, Costello testified before Congress last week that Cohen had repeatedly said to him that he had no evidence against Donald Trump when facing criminal investigation in 2018. On Monday, he told the same recollection of events to the Manhattan jury.
COHEN CONFESSES A CRIME.
The final day of Michael Cohen’s cross-examination by Trump‘s lead counsel, Todd Blanche, ended with the serial perjurer potentially adding a new crime to his rap sheet. Cohen, on the witness stand, admitted to stealing tens of thousands of dollars from the Trump Organization.
In the course of discussing the legal services invoices that Cohen filed with the Trump Organization — allegedly reimbursing him for the hush money payment made to Stormy Daniels — Blanche dropped a bombshell on the disgraced attorney. “You did steal from the Trump Organization based upon the expected reimbursement from Red Finch?” he asked Cohen. The disbarred lawyer responded: “Yes, sir.”
Documents presented by Trump’s defense team show Cohen receiving $50,000 for a payment to a tech company called Red Finch. However, Cohen only paid the company $20,000 and pocketed the $30,000 difference. Cohen testified that while the owner of Red Finch would have preferred his invoice to be paid in full, he was “placated for the time being” with the partial $20,000 payment. The National Pulse reported earlier on Monday that CNN legal analyst Elie Honig described the exchange as a “bomb dropped right in the middle of the prosecution‘s case.”
Cohen claimed he began pocketing the money after being shorted a $100,000 bonus. Cohen’s total theft came to $60,000 when “grossed up” for taxes. It is unclear whether District Attorney Avlin Bragg will consider charges against Cohen, especially considering that he confessed to committing a crime on the witness stand while under oath.
DANIEL GOLDMAN DID PREP COHEN.
In another shocking admission, Cohen acknowledged that he was prepped for cross-examination by Representative Daniel Goldman (D-NY). The National Pulse reported last Tuesday that Goldman admitted during an appearance on MSNBC to having assisted with Cohen’s testimony and preparation for cross-examination by former President Trump’s defense team. Even more concerning is that Goldman is a client of Authentic Campaigns, a Democrat-aligned political fundraising firm where Judge Juan Merchan‘s daughter, Loren Merchan, is a partner. Goldman also served as lead counsel during the first Trump impeachment.
The connections between Goldman and Loren Merchan deepened after it was revealed on Friday that Goldman’s campaign payments to Authentic Campaigns were not sent to their office address but to Loren Merchan’s residential address in Richmond, Virginia. Goldman (D-NY) appears to have sent over $160,000 in checks to the home address of Loren Merchan, adding further credence to claims that Judge Juan Merchan should have recused himself from the case to do conflicts of interest.
BACK TO STORMY.
As the morning wore on, Blanche returned to Cohen‘s payment to Stormy Daniels. “You told multiple people when it first leaked that President Trump knew nothing about the payment, correct?” the lead defense counsel asked Cohen, who confirmed that was the case.
Pressing on, Blanched asked Cohen: “You even called Melania, the first lady, and told her that President Trump didn’t know about it?” Cohen confirmed to Blanche that he had told New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman on the record that the former President was unaware of the payment when it was made.
Cohen went on to testify that he recorded conversations with reports in which he stated that Trump was unaware of the Daniels payment until it had already been made. Blanche asked the serial perjurer if it was correct that he “had told anybody who asked that President Trump knew nothing about the payment at the time.”
“That’s what I said, yes,” Cohen replied.
PRELUDE TO COSTELLO.
The defense’s cross-examination of Cohen began to wind down with Blanche pivoting to the disgraced attorney’s conversations with his then-legal counsel, Robert Costello. Blanche presented the jury with documentation of 75 phone conversations between Cohen and Costello. He asked Cohen if he’d be surprised to know that he communicated with Costello for over nine hours in just two months. “No sir,” Cohen responded.
“So would it surprise you to learn that you actually communicated on the phone, either you calling Mr Costello or Mr Costello calling you 75 times?” Blanche asked again, with Cohen responding: “Seems excessive but possible.” The serial perjurer also acknowledged meeting with Costello several times in person.
MORE MONEY, MORE PROBLEMS.
Moving on from Costello, Blanche again pressed Cohen on his finances. The disgraced attorney said he stopped making money after pleading guilty to tax crimes in 2018. “Did you stop making money when you plead guilty in 2018?” Blanche asked. Cohen confirmed this was the case.
Pushing further, Blanche asked Cohen if he made any income between is incarceration and the publication of his book. Cohen acknowledged he did not. However, since 2020, Cohen testified he’s earned over $4.4 million from his attacks on former President Trump and the Biden government’s lawfare campaign against the 2024 Republican presidential nominee. He said he’s made at least $1 million from his MeidasTouch-hosted Mea Culpa podcast and $3.4 million from the two books he published.
“Do you have a financial interest in the outcome of this case?” Blanche asked Cohen, who responded: “Yes, sir.”
Blanche continued: “Because if President Trump is convicted, that would benefit you personally and financially, right?”
“No sir,” Cohen insisted before continuing: “I talk about it on my podcasts, I talk about it on TikTok, and they make money, and that’s how I was viewing your question. Whether Mr. Trump is ultimately determined innocent or guilty is not going to affect whether I speak about it or not.”
Cohen’s cross-examination ended with a simple question posed by Blanche: “It’s true that you will lie out of loyalty, correct?”
“Yes sir,” the serial perjurer replied.
PROSECUTION GOES FOR BROKE.
Following the lunch break, Alvin Bragg‘s prosecution team went for broke and tried to convince Judge Merchan to delay the trial until Tuesday morning as they tried to recall an expert witness who had already left New York City for Louisiana. Prosecutors moved to add a series of C-SPAN photos of former President Trump and Keith Schiller into evidence, asking it be allowed to confirm the veracity of the photos with their witness, a C-SPAN archivist. Trump’s defense team raised a hearsay objection to the photo and witness.
After reviewing the prosecution’s photo evidence, Judge Mechan said, “I don’t see how the people can get past the hearsay objection.” At this point, a back-and-forth erupted between the defense and prosecution over delaying the trial, with Trump‘s lead counsel, Todd Blanche, telling Judge Merchan that the defense only had a few witnesses who were ready to testify and that they aimed to rest their case shortly after the prosecution potentially.
Eventually, however, the two sides agreed on a process to enter one photo of Trump and Schiller into evidence without the C-SPAN archivist. Michael Cohen again briefly took the stand to confirm the photo. Judge Merchan excluded the other. Following this, the prosecution rested its case.
In hindsight, the prosecution‘s attempt to delay the trial a day was likely in anticipation of the second witness the defense would bring in the afternoon — hoping to buy time to prepare for testimony from the one man who could undercut almost all of Cohen‘s claims.
COSTELLO TAKES THE STAND.
By late afternoon, it was time for former President Donald Trump‘s defense team to mount this case. The first witness was a paralegal from Todd Blanche’s law office named Daniel Sitko. His primary role was to confirm the process by which he compiled the log of phone calls between Cohen and Robert Costello. At this point, everyone in the courtroom had an inkling of who the defense would call next.
Trump’s defense attorney, Emil Bove, stood and announced: “The defense calls Robert Costello.” This was met with an immediate request to approach the bench for the prosecution. During the sidebar, Judge Merchan told Trump‘s defense team: “I do wish that we had discussed this earlier.”
The prosecution asked Merchan to limit Costello’s testimony, with Susan Hoffinger arguing: “They should be restricted to two questions frankly that Cohen testified he didn’t recall. He didn’t recall Costello telling him that he should cooperate against Trump. He didn’t recall the words saying that he said to Mr. Costello that he had nothing on President Trump.”
Merchan eventually determined that Costello could testify on two of Cohen‘s statements but did give Trump’s defense team some latitude on additional topics.
COSTELLO ON COHEN.
Michael Cohen‘s former defense attorney’s testimony was met with a series of furious objections by the prosecution, which sought to prevent the decorated attorney and former federal prosecutor from completely undercutting its star witness. Much of Costello’s testimony repeated what he had already said under oath before Congress last week.
The National Pulse reported last Wednesday that Costello told Congress that Cohen had repeatedly told him in 2018: “I swear to God, Bob, I don’t have anything on Donald Trump.” He also testified that he met Cohen at the Regency Hotel on April 17, 2018, and found the serial perjurer to be manic and suicidal.
As Costello’s testimony in the hush money trial continued, the prosecution challenged his every word with objections. Before the witness could even finish a sentence, Judge Merchan would often sustain the objection. This caused Costello to become annoyed and add a bit of his own commentary to the judge’s rulings, muttering “Jesus” and “Geez” several times under his breath.
After Judge Merchan called the prosecution and the defense to the bench for a sidebar, Costello leaned into his microphone and uttered, “Ridiculous.” Merchan met Costello’s exasperations several times on the stand, asking the witness, “Sorry?”
COSTELLO VERSUS MERCHAN.
Following additional back-and-forths between Costello and Merchan, the judge asked the jury to leave the courtroom. He turned to Costello and said: “Mr. Costello, you’re to remain seated.” Costello audibly sighed and rolled his eyes at the judge.
“I want to discuss proper decorum in my courtroom,” Merchan said, now visibly annoyed, before chastising Costello further: “You don’t give me a side eye, and you don’t roll your eyes.” He continued: “When there’s a witness on the stand, if you don’t like my ruling, you don’t say ‘jeez,’ and you don’t say strike it.”
Costello, now as equally annoyed as Merchan, stared the judge down. “Are you staring me down?” Judge Merchan asked before promptly clearing the whole courtroom.
After a brief break, the defense continued direct examination of Costello. After a few more questions, the prosecution began its cross-examination, which was uneventful. Just after 4:30PM, the court adjourned for the day with further cross-examination of Costello set for Tuesday.
You can read The National Pulse’s Day Fourteen trial coverage here, and if you find our work worthwhile, consider joining as a supporter.
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