Hello everyone. I wanted to give you a nice summation1 of everything that happened last week (and yesterday) in Donald Trump’s Manhattan trial, which could wrap up this week. We’re here. We have beer. Get used to it!

So, I wanted to give you my overall sense of the case before I dive into what happened last week (1), what happened yesterday (2), and what I think will happen later this week.
It is hard for me to see what has fundamentally changed about the case when I last looked at it. There has been a lot of testimony (from both Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen) since then, but the actual story of this case is in the boring paperwork. The prosecution has the falsified records. They have evidence of the payments to Cohen. They have evidence Trump knew about the payments. They have evidence that Trump was not concerned about the story coming out until it became clear it could have an effect on the election. Everything is there, even without Cohen’s testimony. All that the defense can really do is fill the pot with more “reasonable doubt water” until it spills over the top.
Michael Cohen gives me the ick.
Cohen is probably where the defense got their best shot at overflowing the pot. There was a particular exchange where Trump’s attorney - Todd Blanche - caused Cohen to stumble and question his prior testimony. Specifically, Cohen had testified previously that he was positive he talked to Trump about the reimbursement plan on October 24, 2016. Cohen testified that he called Trump’s personal body guard - Keith Schiller - that day, and that the phone was then handed to Trump.
This was an opening for Trump’s team, and Blanche honed in on a series of exchanges Cohen had with a 14 year-old prank caller around the same time. Text messages from around the same time as Cohen’s phone call to Schiller do suggest it was about the prank caller and (perhaps) not Stormy Daniels. Moreover, the phone call was relatively short and Cohen’s story (that he called Schiller and Schiller handed the phone to Trump) has to fit within a tight time frame.
When Blanche confronted Cohen with this, Cohen flubbed and openly said he was less sure. Smart, non-Trumpy legal commentators said that this was a devastating moment for the prosecution, and that if the case concluded after that moment, Trump would probably be acquitted.
But the prosecution had a whole day to correct the narrative, and while we will get to that later, it is still hard for me to see a coherent argument for Blanche’s case. Like I said above, this case is mostly about the paperwork: When you look at the same timeframe, it is clear that Cohen was in frequent communications with people from the National Enquirer, Allen Weisselberg, and others, and none of it was about prank phone calls. It was all about securing a payment to Daniels to keep the story out of the Press.
Roger Parloff has a great Twitter thread about this here, and when I went through the evidence (again, helpfully made available to all of us for free by New York City), I stubbed my toe on this particular point:
If you look at the exchanges between Dylan Howard and David Pecker (the two National Enquirer guys alluded to above), they clearly were in communication with Schiller. “Per Keith: Just spoke. [Stormy’s] moving forward with the deal.”
“No change. She’s still underground per Keith.”
Schiller was intimately involved in the hush-money scheme, so I do not think the defense has raised a doubt that can be called “reasonable.” To me, that is more of an imaginary doubt. One fuzzy memory about a phone call does not negate months and months of messages, phone calls, and witness testimony. When you look at the texts between Schiller and Cohen themselves, it doesn’t seem like the harassing phone calls were considered that big of a deal. Cohen literally says it was just because the “dope” forgot to block their number, so they messaged them back and the person freaked out and apologized (again, they were 14).
So, what happened today?
Well, the defense cleaned it up anyway. They brought out a photo showing that Schiller and Trump were, in fact, together on October 24, 2016. I’m not sure how convincing this is on its own, but it does help the prosecution’s argument that Cohen could have simply had Schiller pass the phone to Trump and tell him, “The Stormy deal is a wrap.”
There is also a direct phone call from Cohen to Trump on October 26th (the date the actual money was paid to Daniels), and literally within several minutes of that phone call, Cohen begins the LLC process so that he can pay Daniels. It does not take a rocket science degree to put the pieces together. The prosecution is going to go through all of this in its closing argument, and I have a hard time seeing how it won’t be super convincing.
Here is the thing about Todd Blanche: I think he is a good attorney and he has lots of experience at a big firm. He’s also a former prosecutor. He also attended a super underrated law school, for what it’s worth. But at times, his cross examination can be meandering and boring (I’m not the only one who thinks so). This is less of a problem if he is able to tie all of his wild theories into a neat little bow at the end for the jurors, and maybe that is his plan. But the defense had way bigger problems today.
Who is Robert Costello?
Hooooooooo man. So, today, the defense called Robert Costello to testify and, in fairness, he landed a few blows. Some background: Costello was angling to be Cohen’s personal attorney after all of Cohen’s legal troubles surfaced. Cohen ultimately rejected Costello and went with someone else, but they did communicate about the Stormy Daniels payment, and Costello testified that Cohen never mentioned anything about Trump himself paying it.
That’s interesting testimony and it’s helpful to the defense, but Costello sort of blew the whole thing up with his other antics. We now have the transcript of Costello’s testimony and what went down, and I just want to repeat myself: Hooooooooo man. Things did not go well for the defense:
Justice Merchan was PISSED:
And Costello made it worse:
I think everyone was expecting Costello’s testimony to be somewhat insane, but this is a couple steps worse than expected. Generally, you do not want the jury to see, hear, or possibly get word that one of your witnesses was chastised by the judge.
This perfectly highlights the weaknesses of Trump’s defense. They can ultimately say whatever they want about Cohen. Yes, he lied in the past. Yes, he has a criminal history. Yes, he stole actual money from the Trump Organization. But he did all of those things (except the stealing) in service to Trump. Lots of pro-Trump people are calling Cohen a sleaze bag, but that is what attracted Trump to him in the first place. Costello is, similarly, a sleaze bag and a poor witness! If anything, his time on the stand strengthened Cohen’s testimony, because it became crystal clear why Cohen wanted to avoid this guy, and declined to tell him anything of significant importance.
What’s going to happen today?
My guess is that the defense will either wrap up today or on Thursday. I cannot see them bringing a lot of witnesses, but who knows? I will repeat what I said before: Right now it is hard to see anything other than a guilty verdict happening in this case. The evidence is pretty overwhelming. Maybe, maybe the defense has done enough to tarnish Cohen’s testimony? But then you have to leave all of the other evidence aside, including the huge number of text messages between Cohen and seemingly every person on the planet trying to cover up Trump’s Stormy Night™.
It is conceivable that we could get a verdict this week. I don’t think that will be the case, but we are that close to the end.
You haven’t said one thing about Trump falling asleep.
This is true. I know everything I wrote above is boring legal stuff and Trump with his head tilted back and a big bubble in his nose is what everyone actually wants to hear about. I have gotten messages about this. Yes, there were reports that Trump fell asleep in court today, as he has reportedly done almost every day since the trial began.
I will say this: In the context of how the Press would cover this if it were Joe Biden falling asleep, I think it is fair to bring up Trump’s naps. But aside from that, I don’t really care. Court is boring. I have listened to hours upon hours of hearing testimony and I will tell you this right now: It is better than any ASMR video on YouTube. I would fall asleep too.
Of course, I am not running for President. Trump somewhat infamously slept in while he was in the Oval Office, and blocked out almost his entire morning with “Executive Time.” People close to Trump concede that he is not an early riser (which is not surprising, given his late night tweeting), so the New York trial’s early start could be throwing him for a loop. I still think that all the laws of political correctness should apply to him if we are going to apply them everywhere else. It is true that some people are night owls and do better work right before bedtime. 👀 I think the focus should be on the bigger issues, like Trump’s actual illegal payments to Cohen and his falsification of business records (or his Campaign using Nazi language in its ads, for starters). Most importantly: I am vehemently pro-nap.
Keep your eye on the ball and let the man nap.
Should-Reads:
Chris Geidner over at Law Dork got a huge, impressive scoop: Justice Sam Alito sold his Bud Light stock during the Dylan Mulvaney controversy. Ultimately, I don’t think this is a big deal. In fact, if Alito’s money is being managed by some sort of private wealth management firm (I would hope so, Sam), then it would be surprising if they had not sold the stock during - what looked like - a major hit for Bud Light’s brand. But, Geidner is an independent journalist on SubStack with a ton of great writing. Lots of other outlets have written about the Bud Light story and I wanted to give Chris the original credit. I am a subscriber to his Substack, which covers national legal issues, and I recommend it.
On the other hand, Alito’s upside-down flag controversy is really bad. Jonathan Chait has a good piece on it here. I do not think anyone suspects that the Justices are apolitical, innocent cherubs. Liberal justices made plenty of comments about Trump while he was running for office. But the upside-down flag - raised at Alito’s home after January 6th and close to Biden’s inauguration - is as clear of an ethical violation as you will see on the Court. And it’s double gross that Alito blamed his wife for the stunt.
David French does not seem convinced by the Manhattan case. I like him a lot, so I will say this: I think people unfamiliar with New York’s laws have a hard time getting their arms around this case. But I do think that the main vulnerability in this case is on appeal, as French states in his piece.
Memorial Day weekend is coming, which normally means a layoff. But if the trial wraps up this week, you know I’ll be writing about it. See you all then.
This is a play on an actual summation, which is essentially a closing argument. It is less about presenting evidence (that’s what the trial is for) and more about persuading the jurors. All the loose ends - like Cohen’s testimony - will be tied up nicely for the jury to process.