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"the beat" with ari melber starts right now. hi, ari. >> hi, nicolle. thank you so much. welcome to "the beat." i am ari melber. i'm happy to be back with you. out for a couple of days. did anything happen? it seemed like a lot happened. i want to catch up with you, because we have a lot of developments out of these first two official days of the trial with the jury impanelled, and everyone hearing from both sides. and that star witness david pecker. what are we learning out of this case? the court today was off, but we have so much that we're learning from, including the prosecution's opening statements. i can show you some of that right here. the first witness as mentioned was the tabloid star witness david pecker. by the on the other hand of this hour, i'm also going to get into trump's defense arguments which are important to understand and draw on what we learn from his own lawyers, what they've said in court, in public and sometimes even on this program. right now we look at what the d.a.'s team is telling the jury, that they will prove trump committed a type of election fraud.

we'll start with what they said in court. the d.a. thinks they can nail this defendant because, quote, this case is about criminal conspiracy and a cover-up. plain english, and people know cover-ups can get you in trouble. quote, this was a planned, coordinated, long-running conspiracy to influence the 2016 election, prosecutor says, to help trump get elected. it was election fraud, pure and simple. note the use of the word "fraud." that's something donald trump faces in civil court, where he has been found liable for business fraud, but more importantly on the election fraud claim which they're arguing makes ate felony. led to the scheme to cook the books to hide the secret payments to stormy daniels, and that the hiding showed he knew he was up to no good. they say that violated the key new york state election law. i'm going read this to you. it's become more and more important.

if you watched our "the beat" coverage, we've reported on the road leading to. this it's not until this week that the prosecutors and the d.a.'s office went beyond the general indictment to show exactly what they mean. any two or more persons who conspire to promote or prevent the election of any person to public office by ununlawful means. this is the way the d.a. wants to make it a felony. i mentioned there are other avenues, like tax law. this is the main one. prosecutors say they can prove those unlawful means to distort the election with very clear evidence. now in a trial there is generally two types of evidence. the star witnesses like we started to hear from, that's testimonial evidence. and all the other stuff, what they call hard evidence, receipts, paper, records, all of that is the goods. the d.a. in this opening statement that we followed all through this week here told the jury they're going to hear not only the goods through the receipts and the records i mentioned and the finances that prove the fraud, but also an

actual recorded conversation. that's out-of-court statements that can be confirmed about the payments from cohen that went on trump's behalf, they say. and that dates back to december 2016. this is interesting as we take it all in and we've had a couple of days to make sense of it. the d.a.'s team notes "you will even here mr. trump suggest in his own voice paying in cash." here's what's interesting about witnessing a trial. if you have been around american life even before we got a presidential level defendant trial you may know that trials have always captivated us. we had o.j. pass recently, and everyone thought back that was old enough to what was going on when that came came. in when you're on the outside, you actually have a better seat han the jurors. what i mean by that is they're limited to the evidence in court, and they're limited to the timeline in court, and all of us following it. i don't just say this as a nerdy legal reporter or lawyer, but

all of us who are interested enough to follow this can then learn more and know more in realtime that the jurors are actually going to know. i guarantee you there are people on the jury, and we watch the screening process who may not remember what was in the news all those years back, may not have been following us as closely as you or us. they may not have heard what i'm about to play. they haven't heard it yet. opening statements is what you're going to get. later, a good lawyer on either side, defense or prosecution will pay off those promise. but you dent have to wait. if you were this the jury, you would. we can remember now what the d.a.'s team is talking about. we have that recording. >> i need to open up a company for the transfer of all of that info regarding our friend david. i spoke to allen about it. when it comes time for the financing -- >> what financing? >> well have to pay. >> pay cash? >> no, no, no, no. >> "pay with cash?

no, no, no." it is fair to say michael cohen was making furtive tapes of his own. you can expect on cross-examination the defense to attack him for that. trials are not supposed about getting someone or going after someone you like for other reasons. they're supposed to be about finding facts beyond a reasonable doubt, for getting to the truth that is some really, really strong evidence that is why the d.a. mentioned it in their opening. they might have 100 exhibits. they don't go through 100. that would bore a jury to tears. it matters so much because it shows the d.a. argue criminal intent. you don't pay large sums in cash, even in new york, even in real estate when you get up to ones of thousands of dollars. that would be bizarre indeed. donald trump has been around the block. he may know, and you may know when you take out a sum of over 10, 15k, it already creates an alert. you take 15k cash out of the atm, it creates a banking alert. that's how suspicious it is.

if you take 130k out, authorities are on to it. that's not always the best idea if you don't want to get caught, but it also is suspicious. and that's not all. the d.a. prosecution team telling the jury they will also have an extensive paper trail, bank records, emails, technology messages, phone logs and business records and others that the d.a. says they will show the jury to show that trump reimbursed cohen through those monthly checks. and again, we know what they're talking about. donald trump's big loopy signature on each of those checks. and more, his star witness i mentioned, tabloid publisher david pecker, well, he is the first witness as you probably know from following this trial. they brought him right out. and he said, this again is part of the prosecution's case, he is their witness. if the defense has witnesses to help their side, we'll be covering that. right now we're on the prosecution side. they put him out first to grab the attention and make this very clear that the d.a.'s argument

is this is much bigger than some accounting error. this is much bigger than just business fraud, even though that's not a good thing. it's alone a misdemeanor. he testified that this was a big deal, that it was a candidate level thing, not done through intermediaries or cutouts or staff, that donald trump himself worked directly with pecker on this plan that trump believed would help him win the election. and he said on the stand "i told the tabloid leadership of the engine inquirer we're going try to help the trump campaign. this was hatched in a 2015 meeting where he was would be donald trump's secret eyes and ears, and that he would publish positive stories about trump and negative stories about trump's opponents. and boy did he deliver. now remember, this is part of a larger narrative. in fairness to trump, as a defendant, we should note that the media and various types of media publish all kinds of things. and sometimes it's very clear whether they have positive or negative views on certain

people. and in media, some people will tell you that's based on the facts. others say it's based on ideology or some other alliance. so this part that i'm showing you is a pattern that the prosecution says made a crime. it itself is not necessarily a crime. we see those positive stories of trump, which is rachel and others have pointed out in our coverage this week, we're on the newsstands at every major grocery store in america, hitting people who may not follow the news as closely. this went on through the 2016 election cycle. in fact, it went on and on. pecker describing how the tabloid would then go after trump's opponents in ways that other trump friendly media might find going too far. after the debates, based on the success some of the othered had, pecker said he would receive a call from michael cohen himself who would direct which candidate and which direction we should go. now that's important because it makes it sound like something more than what i mentioned earlier that media cover things and might cover things

positively or negatively. it sounds more like orders being phoned in. like they became an arm of the trump campaign. and that included following something that donald trump is well-known for, lying and embellishing things. on the strand pecker said we would embellish. the tabloid went after ted cruz, as we covered through the week. cruz famously finished second only to trump in the primary there was a cover story that some might view as defamatory, cruz's father was somehow linked to the jfk assassination. i'm showing this to you as criminal evidence. i'm not showing this to you as true, in fairness to senator cruz. pecker testified in court that what you see on your screen was not only false, but they knew it was false from the start. in other words, sometimes you have something come out, it has to be corrected. this should have been corrected in advanced. it never should have run because they knew it was, quote,

manufactured, according to the star witness himself. and trump used all this against cruz at the time, and cruz punched back. >> all i did is point out the fact that on the cover of the "national enquirer" there is a picture him and crazy lee harvey oswald having breakfast. now ted never denied that it was his father. instead he said donald trump, i had nothing to do with it. >> donald's source for this is the "national enquirer." the "national enquirer" is tabloid trash, but it's run by his good friend david pecker, the ceo, who has endorsed donald trump. and so the "national enquirer" has become his hit piece that he uses to smear anybody and everybody. >> ted cruz was correct. let me repeat. ted cruz was correct. and people watching that at the time might have covered it like horse race politics or well,

these are just two politicians fighting, or okay, they dragged the enquirer into it. but what was not well exposed at the time, what it only took a federal case, the separate investigation at sdny and this then this case and pecker's immunity and him coming to the stand, what we now learn many years later is that ted cruz was right about that very point. and that it was more than just unfair and inaccurate, that it was a kind of political deal. and you can't rerun the primary, and you can't rerun the general, but you can imagine for all the talk about whether this is somehow unfair to trump from the left or the democrats, and look, people have every right to criticize the justice system. i mentioned o.j. that happened in that case too. if you're not under a gag order, if you're not the defendant, other people could weigh. in that's fine. that's america. but what's interesting here, even from within the republican party, what if at the time more republicans simply had the facts, that those kind of attacks which might have been

dragging down cruz, he obviously felt they were big enough to actually respond, were coming from this secret deal. it was david pecker not just having fun with tabloid stories, but actually trying to do something to distort that election. pretty interesting. we're also going to hear more testimony from pecker tomorrow. it is all in all has been a big and tough time for defendant trump in this case. >> prosecution in donald trump's hush money trial drew the sharp outlines of its case against the former president. >> prosecution started. they laid out a dispassionate, straight forward very linear, very blunt -- >> telling the jury of seven men and five women today, it was election fraud, pure and simple. >> the defense gets right up, and the defense says the story you just heard isn't true. >> you heard the prosecution lay out a clear road map. >> you had a reference to the tape recording. that's a terrible tape for donald trump. >> the defense was like a circus

leader. >> it has been striking that there is no family. he is by himself. >> the defendant is by himself. and in court he was quiet. and there is a ruling coming on his gag order that could make him even quieter in public. and the d.a. got off to a very strong start here. let's remember that many experts who have been around new york court where they're doing this four days a week said it could take weeks to pick the jury. and donald trump could do all these things meantime to make it more chaotic. well, just as he failed to delay the start of this thing, he also failed to drag out the jury process more than four day, workdays, failed to move this case. he said oh, he could never get a fair trial there failed in many ways to stop what has now begun as of monday. everything up to this was set up. but starting monday, going through the last two days and what will resume again tomorrow is a methodical evidence-backed detailed case with a lot of star witnesses who know trump or

worked for him or worked privately for him for years. this is not resistance theater, and that is not supposed to be politics, although it may be deeming with a lot of campaign political history. this is a 2 x 4 against a very silent, very cowed defendant who is just learning what life is like on that side of the table. and according to the d.a. and what i mentioned, the way they gave the opening arguments as a preview, according to the d.a. for this defendant, the worst is yet to come. and we have two legal experts who know exactly how this works. we'll be back together in 90 seconds. seconds.

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possible starts with you. become a monthly donor today. think about how insane it is that our president had a mutually beneficial relationship with the "national enquirer." there were only two people on the planet who can say that, donald trump and big foot. >> you knew sasquatch was going to come up at some point. that's jimmy kimmel talking about the testimony from star witness and tab employed executive david pecker. i'm joined by david kelly who ran the southern district of new york and in private practice is my former boss, full disclosure, and emily bassum. welcome to both of you. i don't want to go too far into history, but some of this goes back to evidence gathered by sdny. it seems mr. pecker now has immunity from any type of case

in new york. so let's start there. what does it tell you with all the choices that the d.a. had, including starting smaller, more boring, accountants, that they started with this witness, and is it working? >> well, i think it is working because i think, look, there are challenges associated with proving the payments. there is a challenge proving that he had sex with a porn star. those mechanics of the case, but i think they have the evidence to do it. i think the big challenge here for the prosecution is to prove the so what. that's not a legal requirement. it's really something i think they need to demonstrate to the jury. and they need to be very careful here to not oversell that. i think with david pecker, they did a really nice job of proving what they needed to prove. i think to demonstrate that this is about corrupting a particular election and violating the law

that you cited a moment ago as opposed to i think an oversell would be getting too much into the rule of law and ruining democracy. let's just focus on the case at hand. and i think david pecker did a really good job. his testimony i think really speaks to the so what. and i think by reay laying that out at the outset, i think it was a really good start for the government, and it really gives context for what the jury is likely to hear going forward. i think it was a very important step. i liked from a prosecutor's perspective, i really liked the way they approached this at the outset. >> emily? >> yeah, trials are stories. they're narratives that prosecutors get to create kind of the way we get to write stories. and this is a good opening. it's attention-grabbing. it gets the stakes across as david was just making really

clear, and it sets up all the mother routine testimony that is t jury is going to have to hear about these business records and how they were falsified. i also think that david pecker, talking about how trump was benefitting from the "national enquirer," that also sets out michael cohen's testimony too, because cohen is of course the person making it happen. but pecker is the one who can show yes, we were in on this. and here is all the effects it had in terms of trying to influence the election. >> yeah, and both of you talk about the story. david, this guess back to 2015. so as we enter the ninth year of covering trump as a political figure, of all the evidence i've seen, including journalistically, the most damning has been emotional texts from within trump's circle, people who stayed with him through the end of the first term, for example. and when we got the teches in the jan 6 probe, wow, i didn't

know we were working for a violent authoritarian, and this is terrible, and we'll never live this down. they wrote that at 1:00, 2:00 in the morning on jan 6. some of them recanted. but we have the record of their emotional truth. and i say that deliberately, because it's pretty striking. and that's different from the legal requirements. with that in mind, our colleague rachel maddow and others quoted this line, "what have we done." you'll see evidence election night. the lawyers thought we'll figure it out. text in the "national enquirer," dylan howard saying, quote, we'll put it on the screen, "what have we done?" what does that do, david? because that's no in and of itself a crime, it is more the realization that they buried enough stuff to get trump close enough to lose the popular vote and eek out an electoral college win. and if some of this had come out earl will any the primary, heck,

cruz might have been the nominee to begin with. we might not have had any of this. >> i think it does a couple of things. one, it helps demonstrate the kind of thinking around the conspiracy, that this was -- they were really propping this guy up and trying to promote him, which is really what they need to show as part of this conspiracy. but i also think it brings to it an emotional element, a recognition by the people involved that there is something going on really bad here. and if the people close to him and in that circle had that feeling, it also helps demonstrate i think implicitly a sense of knowledge and intent by the defendant. >> emily, we don't usually hear "what have we done?" outside of the movies. >> right. but i think in this case, it makes you think what might have been were it not for the role of the enquirer, that the prosecution is going to try to

show trump paid for and they have him on tape saying paying cash. so that puts into the jury's mind the idea that the consequences here were starkly clear as the people who were involved in all this. and when you think of the conspiracy, the idea that afterward people would say what have we done, it seems to all fit together. >> yeah. and in that sense, it's damning. emily and david, thanks to both of you. if you've been watching the program right now and you have eagle eyes, you may have noticed our promotional tab here, because we have one of our special breakdowns coming up. this tabloid legal breakdown. my thoughts then part of the case and some special guests and i'm back at work with you. that's after the break. that's after the break is some freakin' torque. what? the dodge hornet r/t... the totally torqued-out crossover. (♪♪) (♪♪)

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and we could all un-experience this whole session. okay, that's uncalled for. we now know a lot more about defendant trump's defense strategy in this new york trial than any time in the past year. he and his team have spoken out, but those arguments were not binding, meaning they might be interesting, but they have no legal effect. and unlike the d.a., defendants do not have to write out any of

their arguments before trial. so these new opening statements that we got this week are actually the very first time trump's lawyers have committed to a legal defense in court. the d.a., as i'm emphasizing, had already committed to certain things by filing the indictment in the first place. that was a long time ago. but now, with the jury listening, we actually hear the trump defense lawyers arguing. right now i'm going break them down with you. the first defense is simple. they claim nothing happened. that is a factual defense. nothing happened. very simple. and the idea that nothing happened means, basically, this defendant didn't do anything wrong, period. a simple defense. and by the way, trump's lawyers began telegraphing that they will rely more heavily on these kind of factual defenses. and don't underestimate simplicity. it is an important tool and lens when you're dealing with a jury. in fact, trump defense attorney will scharf said they'd be doing this on the eve of the trial.

>> we're focusing on the facts, because the facts show that president trump did absolutely nothing wrong. this is a business record case. those business records accurately reflected payments to one of president trump's lawyers as legal retainer fees. >> that's just a denial of the whole thing. trump's lawyers denying that trump had any tryst with stormy daniels, and that means whatever she might testify, even if, quote, salacious, they told the jury, it just does not matter. now the lawyers similarly deny that trump took any actions to try to pay her at the time and that he didn't lie about any payments that were made to her, whether on his behalf or by someone else. support that, of course, they got to deny the d.a.'s evidence that suggest trump was involved. so face with the receipts, how do you do that? well, there are answers to this. and if you hear people say oh,

it's open and shut, it's one-sided, it's all easy, that's probably not someone who is very versed in how these trials actually work. because the defense attorney todd blanche did have a strategy for this. it's important the take a look at what they're doing. he told the jury that, okay, if there are these papers in evidence, they still don't automatically implicate trump, because he had, quote, nothing to do with any of those 34 pieces of paper, except that he signed on to the checks in the white house while he was running the country. that's not a crime, he argued. so that is a denial that anything criminal happened. now, these type of denials that i'm telling you are not the only options. the next defense they have, you've certainly heard about, and i want to be clear. you can also think of this as a factual defense, because they argue if anything bad did happen, then michael cohen did it.

not defendant trump. if anything happened, cohen did it. now here is how that defense works as a counterattack, because they said, quote, unbeknownst to trump, in all the years that cohen worked for him, cohen was also a criminal. now notice that is a little different than just saying nothing happened. because if nothing bad happened, you wouldn't have to blame anyone, right? it's like are you saying nobody ate the cookies? are you saying somebody else ate the cookseys? as soon as you start saying somebody else ate the cookies, you're kind of admitting the cookies are gone, right? you don't have to call some other witness a criminal or go after all this tough talk, unless the alternative factual defense is okay, maybe something happened, but they did it, the other guy. trump's legal team has been at this one for a while, which is why i'm betting if you watch the news, this might be familiar to you, the idea that they want to go at cohen. in fact, both scharf, who i just

showed you, and then trump defense attorney joe tacopina, you may remember was sitting at that same arraignment table when trump first learned what it means or the a defendant, well, he also made this defense. >> michael cohen is a fraud, is a liar, a convicted perjurer. >> this is a man who has been found liable for perjury by a number of courts previously. >> his lawyers have been invoiced for legal service. >> not credible people. >> his lawyer at the time advised him that this was the proper way to do this to protect himself and his family from embarrassment. >> tacopina has since left that defense team. but that cohen attack clearly remains on board. so i just told you, one, nothing happened. two, well, if something happened, hey, maybe something happened, but it was that guy. and this is not specific to this defense team. those are two common defenses in criminal cases, especially when there is evidence that something did happen.

and then there is a third defense. we also heard that this week, although i think from what i can tell it's gotten a little less scrutiny. after those factual denials, if anything happened then the argument is, okay, it's still not against the law. this is a strictly legal defense. you see how the first two we stand factual, just to keep it clear. that's all about whether the thing went down or who did it. this is legal. if anything happened, maybe it's not against the law. this matters because let me tell you something, a jury could agree with this, or one or two people on a jury could get confused by this. and it has an extra benefit as a legal argument. it is stronger to help overturn even a conviction on appeal. i'm not going to get into all the weeds on that. we'll come back to this. we have weeks together if you keep watching the trial. but i'll remind you as we get into it later. it's easier to get a conviction overturned on a legal appeal than one of the factual ones.

and every defendant, including this one, has the right to appeal. now rachel emphasized this on msnbc's coverage on the first night of opening arguments, that this point that i'm talking about now, this legal defense was the exact flash point where we heard the lawyers lash the most, with the spicy and passionate objections during the opening itself. trump's defense lawyers claim whatever happened, even if the jury thinks trump did some of the things they deny, they claim that would still legally not be a crime. rachel read this out. i'm going to read it out again for you because it was an interesting moment. they said oh, cohen paying daniels 130 k for her agreeing not to publicly spread false claims about trump is not illegal, according to trump's defense lawyer. the lawyer there says the word "false." but the claim is key because it's a legal defense for the jury, even if they think daniel's claims were true. even if they think i do think they have some history or tryst, but maybe it's okay to sign an nda. maybe that's not a crime.

and that was the exact moment when the d.a.'s team objected. and then trump's lawyer had to try a different route and put it this way. an nda signing is perfectly legal. you learn companies do that all the time. and the defense there is a legal defense. ndas can be legal. ndas can also be off base. so the idea is trump can be convicted for every part of a plot carried out by others, just as the defense can attack the idea that the catch and kill plot itself was an illegal campaign activity. now take a breath. those are the three types of defenses. the reason this one matters is that without a second crime like these election law violations, there is no felony. there is no felony, then there is no felony trial, and this whole thing kind of evacuates into a smaller misdemeanor case. now earlier tonight, we were talking to a former sdny chief david kelley and we talked about this exact law, that discusses

whether you conspire to promote or prevent the election of any person to public office by unlawful means. so that could matter a lot. and it could matter on appeal if they lay the predicate, the foundation to say hey, we discussed this at trial. and we're discussing it on appeal. this doesn't seem like the right application of that law. again, that's not them saying it didn't happen. it's not them blaming cohen. they're saying even if it did happened, if he did it, that's not an election law violation. now we heard this argument before, which is why we try to go to the source around here. because long before this week's opening arguments, attorney tacopina hammered this same attack on the election law in our interview. and while we had a back and forth, and i'll show you some of it, legally, this could potentially work. the d.a. is saying the money was under the table campaign spending.

then trump lawyer tacopina and his lawyers today have basically been arguing if trump would pay that money irrespective of the campaign, if he paid other ndas or the "enquirer" did this other times, this this campaign violation could evaporate. >> if the spending were the fulfillment of a commitment or the expenditure, would exist irrespective of the campaign, it's not a campaign law violation. end of story. >> that is their third defense and how they want to end the story. and a jury might see it that way. an appeals court might take that appeal. and by the way, you're on that appeal, right, then the convicted individual might still be out free awaiting that appeal while lawyers of appeals courts look at that sand anderson say well, was this a campaign thing or not? trump's currently defense lawyer built on that same idea we heard from tacopina, and he went even

large their week, saying you can take all the talk about magazine covers, tabloids, and plots to influence the election, but what if you turn it around and argue that these kind of things in the media and deals and arrangements to influence elections, not only are they not crimes, he argued, they're actually something far more familiar. there is nothing wrong, he told the jury, with trying to influence an election. it's called democracy. now, whether the jury sees all these deals as clear intentional crimes or more like the spin and the scum that can exist at the margins of all kinds of political ploys to influence an election, that is the big question. was it, in other words, politics as usual? this is what this case could boil down to. past the receipts and a lot of the star witnesses, was this thing clearly a campaign crime,

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we're back with a veteran of the manhattan d.a.'s office, katherine christian, and a veteran criminal defense attorney brian wice. welcome to both of you. brian, from a defense perspective when i walk through exactly the type of tools they

can use, what do you think of those three main arguments and particularly the probably more obscure, but fruitful attack on the law? >> you know, ari, i'm reminded of what noted legal sage otter said in "animal house." would that work? well, i think it's probably got to work better than the truth. look, you did an outstanding job of laying out this tree-tiered layer of defense attorneys. i'm reminded of the old country lawyer in east texas defending a dog bite case. his defense was not unlike what you laid out. wait a sec, my client's dog doesn't bite. and by the way, my client doesn't have a dog. in this situation, if todd blanche's opening statement is ultimately going to track his defensive theory, i think the defense is in latt of trouble. he had a couple of good sound bites that are likely to make it on the air at 5:00, 6:00, and 10:00, but you have to underpromise and over deliver or the jury is going to hold it against you when they get to the

jury room and it's going to be a road map to a one-word -- >> but let's slow down, though. the third one i have, if anything happened, it's not against the law. we can have this convo now or have it again in a year or two. that is a nonfrivolous, that is to say nonbananas defense, unlike some of what we might hear tomorrow where they claim a license to kill at the supreme court. that appeals courts might hear. can you walk us through why they're even bringing that up, even if you don't think it's the best argument in the world? >> sure. and again, it's because of the point that you made that todd blanche is not just trying this case to a jury of 12 new yorkers. he is trying to it the appellate division, uptown. he is trying to it the court of appeals in albany, and he is doing what he can to make a record, because he recognizes at some point that there are some cases that just can't be won. now, if he concentrates on doing a couple of things, number one, he's not going to get a not guilty.

i think i've got a better shot of winning a daytime emmy for this block than that happening. if he can get just one juror, if he can hang this jury, if he gets the mistrial, it's a huge w. it's a win. and by the same token, building a record, ari, as you said for an appeal a year, two years down the road where ultimately he can snatch victory from the jaws of a guilty verdict. >> katherine, you've spent a lot more time in these exact courthouse rooms in new york than many of the people we talk to, given your extensive experience in that office. what did you think as well of those types of defenses and the fact that some are factual and some are legal? >> i think you're right on target, because what they're looking for, obviously they want an acquittal. but that's not going to happen. i don't think you're going to find 12 people. but i do think you can find one or two people who will have reasonable doubt because of this -- let me just tell you, this charge falsifying business records is charged all the time

in new york in white collar prosecutions in state d.a.'s offices. however, it's usually charged as a lesser offense to a grand larceny, the person has looted the company, tax fraud, insurance fraud. so it's very easy for the jury to see he stole money from the company and he falsified the business records. he committed insurance fraud, and he falsified the business records. here it's what is the crime? so the prosecutors are going to have to, and we've only been through half of the direct examination from the first witness. it is way too early. but the prosecution, when they rest, they had better have those jurors in their head saying oh, i get it. donald trump intended to commit or conceal the crime of conspiracy to promote an election by an awful means. and if they're at the end of the people's case going what is that crime again? was there a crime?

that's it. so that's what makes this case. people keep saying oh, it's easy, easy, easy. sorry about that. they're not familiar with falsifying business records prosecutions, because they would know that it's usually a charge that's charged with something else. but, again, it's just the first witness in the middle of direct examination. >> yeah. and you say that because you've done these keeps up of cases and been in that courtroom. i think it's important because we want to understand what the jury is going to hear. and if we come back in however many weeks and discuss the fact that there is all this evidence but there is a mistrial because one or two jurors couldn't get their head around what this unlawful election thing is, that would be what i'm calling defense number three. >> yes. >> it's not that trump didn't do this, it's not that they didn't have the receipts. it's someone saying i have reasonable doubt as to whether this second thing that i got confused by was the motivating factor, right?

and if that happens, you get a mistrial. and a mistrial is all they can hope for, really. they would see that as a great out. we'll have plenty of time to come back to both of you. i appreciate you joining. >> katherine and brian on this breakdown. it is a busy day here with the trump trial. tomorrow we have the supreme court hearing on presidential immunity and whether jack smith might put donald trump on trial by the election as well. we have a lot to get to. stay with me. i'll be right back. ♪ limu emu ♪ ♪ and doug ♪ hello, ghostbusters. it's doug... ... of doug and limu. we help people customize and save hundreds on car insurance

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being like, oh hes found liable of the horrible things an not really sitting in the moment. >> so this is a huge platform for how people express thes. but it's also now about to face tremendous pressure. tiktok is owned by a chinese company. and there are concerns among the national security community that the chinese government, now that it has so much power inside our country and influence, could use it to do all kinds of things, including to distort discourse or elections and gather information on americans. tiktok says the data is not in china and won't do that. there's reports of chinese government and other groups trying to access data this way and there's a lot of other aspects we don't know. the news tonight is big. president biden just signed a new crackdown bill which basically forces that chinese parent company to sell its stake in tiktok within basically a

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