Over three days of testimony this week, Donald Trump’s hush money trial in Manhattan has spawned subplots inside and outside the courtroom.
With a decision on one contempt motion pending, Judge Juan Merchan has scheduled a hearing on Thursday for prosecutors to argue that Trump has committed more violations of the judge’s gag order against disparaging or intimidating witnesses, jurors and other trial participants.
At the first contempt hearing on Tuesday, prosecutors sought fines for ten Trump online posts blasting witnesses Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen and calling prospective jurors “liberal activists.” Assistant Manhattan District Attorney Chris Conroy said that next week’s hearing will cover four more alleged gag-order violations.
The last was at a construction site in Midtown Manhattan on Thursday where Trump visited with workers before heading to court. There, Trump addressed himself to the prosecution’s first witness, David Pecker, the former CEO of National Enquirer publisher American Media. “This is a message to Pecker: Be nice,” Trump said.
Trump appeared happy with Pecker’s testimony at the end of the day, calling it “breathtaking and amazing” afterwards. Defense lawyers got their turn to question Pecker, who agreed with Trump lawyer Emil Bove that long before Pecker did editorial favors for Trump, it was “standard operating procedure” at the company to buy exclusive rights to scandalous stories about celebrities and politicians, either to kill the stories or use them them as leverage.
Pecker gave several examples of stories buried through a “catch and kill” strategy: women coming forward with claims that they dated or were harassed by actor-turned-governor Arnold Schwarzenegger; a romantic affair involving Chicago mayoral candidate Rahm Emanuel, at the request of Rahm’s Hollywood agent brother, Ari Emanuel; an argument between actor Mark Wahlberg and his wife, who was represented by Ari Emanuel; and photographs of golfer Tiger Woods meeting with a woman.
In Woods’ case, Pecker testified, the idea was to hold the photos over Woods in order to persuade him to sit for a Men’s Fitness cover story.
However ironclad or previously secret these exclusivity agreements were, they dissolved under oath on Thursday as the defense’s strategy emerged. Bove was seeking to show that $130,000 paid by Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, to adult film actor Stormy Daniels for her silence about an alleged sexual encounter was no different than other story buyouts, including ones for political candidates — Schwarzenegger and Emanuel — that never led to criminal charges.
Asking a series of yes or no questions, Bove explored Pecker’s relationship with Trump, a driver of tabloid newsstand sales since his days as a real estate magnate and Celebrity Apprentice reality star. “And it was always your intention not to publish negative stories about President Trump?” Bove asked. Pecker said it was. Bove brought up a failed attempt by Pecker in 1998 to stop an American Media outlet from publishing a story about Trump paramour Marla Maples.
“Seventeen years of providing Trump with a heads up about potentially negative publicity,” Bove said.
Pecker testified for the prosecution, however, that he never paid sources or tipsters in order to kill off stories about Trump until after an August 2015 meeting with Trump where Pecker offered to be the candidate’s “eyes and ears” on the lookout for negative stories. He paid $30,000 to a Trump Tower doorman and $150,000 to a former Playboy model, Karen McDougal. He persuaded Cohen to pay Daniels — a secret payment that prosecutors have identified as the first act in an illegal effort by Trump to influence the 2016 presidential election.
Pecker testified that although he declined an invitation to Trump’s inauguration in January 2017, he attended a White House dinner that July with his top deputy and editorial fixer, Dylan Howard. Jurors saw a photograph of Howard grinning in the Oval Office, and one of Pecker and President Trump walking together along an outdoor White House corridor, backs to the camera. Pecker testified they were heading to dinner, and on that stroll, Trump asked him, “How is Karen doing?”
Pecker’s testimony will continue today.
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