Missouri AG Andrew Bailey: Trump trial an ‘illicit witch hunt,' jury 'a roving commission'



Jurors in former president Donald Trump’s New York hush-money trial have deliberated on whether or not to convict him — and they did.

However, Glenn Beck believes there are some major issues.

“Four of them can say, ‘I think you know he falsified checks,’ whatever they think the crime is because it wasn’t really defined. Even if they don’t agree on the crime, if 12 of them think he committed some crime, well, then he’s guilty. I’ve never heard that before,” Glenn says.

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey is in agreement.

“This reeks of desperation by the prosecutor and the judge to obtain a conviction. If people were not previously convinced that this was an illicit witch hunt prosecution, they should be so now,” Bailey says. “This is insane.”

Bailey notes that this violates the Sixth Amendment as well as the former president’s Due Process rights.

“How’s he supposed to know how to offer a defense if he doesn’t even know what the target crime is?” Bailey says.

“It empowers this jury to become a roving commission, and again, that reeks of desperation.”

“That violates the basic constitutional tenets that underpin the Due Process Clause and the Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial,” he says.

What has happened reminds Bailey of a story from the past.

“There was a Roman emperor who used to nail the laws to the highest point on the columns so that the Roman citizens wouldn’t be able to read them. And that’s what this is like. I mean, the judge is saying, ‘Jury, I’m going to charge you to find a crime, any crime you want, and I’m not gonna let you read the jury instructions. Trust me, you guys, just go back and pick something you want to convict him of,’” Bailey tells Glenn.

“How is the jury supposed to apply facts to the law if they can’t see the law in front of them?"


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Ex-attorney for Daniels, McDougal says clients wanted to revive careers — and he never saw Trump’s signature on agreement



The New York criminal case against former President Donald Trump continued Thursday with a hearing on additional alleged gag order violations and testimony from the prosecution's witness attorney, Keith Davidson. Davidson previously represented porn actress Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal, both of whom allegedly had an affair with Trump.

Davidson testified that he never saw a copy of the so-called hush money agreement between "David Dennison," allegedly Donald Trump, and "Peggy Peterson," allegedly Stormy Daniels, that was actually signed by Trump. He saw only an agreement signed by Cohen, allegedly on Trump's behalf.

Additionally, Davidson noted that there was a side agreement that did use the parties' real names. That agreement listed Peggy Peterson as Stephanie Gregory Clifford, Daniels' legal name. However, it read, "David Dennison a.k.a." followed by a blank line.

According to prosecutor Joshua Steinglass, the side agreement did include Trump's name, but Davidson admittedly was the one who handwrote it. Davidson noted that he has never met Trump and had never even been in the same room as him until these court proceedings.

Davidson claimed that he received a call from Cohen after Trump won the 2016 presidential election, expressing frustration and anger that he was "not going to Washington" with Trump "after everything I've done for that f**king guy."

"That f**king guy is not even paying me the $130,000 back," Cohen allegedly stated, according to Davidson. The money referred to the payment Cohen sent to Daniels for the alleged agreement between Trump and her.

According to Davidson, per the agreement, Cohen instructed him to tell the Wall Street Journal that the allegation of an affair between Daniels and Trump was not true.

Davidson made a statement to the WSJ in 2018 on behalf of Daniels that read, "I am saying with complete clarity that this is absolutely false."

The attorney rejected the corporate media's use of the terms "hush money" and "payout."

"It wasn't a 'payout,' and it wasn't 'hush money.' It was consideration in a civil settlement," Davidson argued.

He noted that Daniels made plans to appear on Jimmy Kimmel's show despite the settlement agreement because she wanted to "talk about her life and reinvigorate her career."

Trump's lawyer, Emil Bove, played a recording of Davidson telling Cohen that Daniels wanted the money "more than you could ever imagine."

Davidson went on to say in the recording, "If [Trump] loses this election, and he's going to lose, we all lose all f***ing leverage. ... This case is worth zero."

Davidson testified that like Daniels, former Playboy model McDougal was also attempting to revive her career.

According to Davidson, McDougal said selling her story of having an alleged affair with Trump to the National Enquirer was her "dream deal." He stated the contract between the tabloid and McDougal promised her a monthly column on aging and fitness in Star and OK magazines.

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Trump's attorneys cross-examine David Pecker, poke holes in alleged 'catch-and-kill' scheme



The prosecution wrapped up its direct examination of its first witness, former publisher at National Enquirer David Pecker, on Thursday, leaving the defense team some time to begin its cross-examination the same day.

On Friday, Emil Bove, an attorney for Donald Trump, continued questioning Pecker, who claimed during his testimony that he purchased the rights to multiple unfavorable stories about Trump to ensure they never went to publication. Pecker's actions were referred to as a "catch-and-kill" scheme.

Pecker claimed that he had an arrangement with Trump's former attorney Michael Cohen to ensure the stories never saw the light of day. Also, during his testimony, he said he expected to be reimbursed directly by Trump or the Trump Organization for the scheme.

Pecker gave former Playboy playmate Karen McDougal $150,000 for her story. She claimed that she had had an extramarital affair with Trump. Pecker admitted that Trump never reimbursed him for his purchase of the story. Bove attempted to poke holes in Pecker's testimony, noting that the story would have been beneficial for the tabloid to run, and McDougal was trying to restart her career at the time she made the allegations.

Additionally, Pecker said he paid $30,000 for the exclusive rights to another story that turned out to be untrue, though he admitted he would have run the article if it had been accurate. He also did not receive any money from Trump for that story.

Despite previously being interested in McDougal's story, Pecker claimed that he "didn't want anything to do" with porn actress Stormy Daniels' story. She also claimed she had an affair with Trump.

"I said to Michael Cohen that after paying for the doorman story and the Karen McDougal story, I wasn't going to pay anything further and I wasn't a bank," Pecker testified.

During his testimony earlier this week, Pecker claimed that Trump had thanked him for not running the unfavorable stories. However, Bove pointed out that in a 2018 interview with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Pecker did not state that Trump had expressed any gratitude toward him or the tabloid for such actions.

"Are you suggesting the FBI made a mistake here?" Bove asked Pecker.

Pecker acknowledged that the bureau's notes were inconsistent with his testimony.

"I know what the truth is, I can't state why this is written this way. I know what was said to me," he responded.

Bove questioned whether Pecker still has equity in the National Enquirer's parent company, AMI. Pecker replied that he does.

"Part of AMI's business model was to purchase stories, correct?" Bove questioned.

Pecker confirmed that the company did regularly buy the rights to news stories and that the practice was not unique to Trump. The former publisher noted that there were other celebrities who were promoted by the tabloid and provided a warning when negative press was about to be published. Pecker previously said that he had a similar arrangement with Arnold Schwarzenegger.

He admitted that publishing negative stories about Trump dating back to the 1990s was "not good for business." Pecker further acknowledged that he had never heard the term "catch and kill" prior to the case. Additionally, many of the negative articles about Trump's presidential opponents published by the National Enquirer were "not exclusive" to the tabloid, indicating that other media outlets had first reported the stories.

Rhona Graff, Trump's former executive assistant and former vice president of the Trump Organization, was briefly called to the stand as the prosecution's second witness.

Graff testified that she saw Stormy Daniels in the reception area at Trump Tower before Trump declared his presidential run.

During the defense's cross-examination, Graff told Trump's attorney, Susan Necheles, that Trump was a "fair" and "respectful" boss over her 34 years with the company.

"Sometimes he would peek his head in and say, 'Go home to your family,' which I thought was very thoughtful of him," Graff stated.

She noted that she "vaguely recall[ed]" Trump saying that Daniels was at Trump Tower because she was considering being a contestant on "Celebrity Apprentice."

The prosecution called its third witness to the stand, Gary Farro, a finance executive who worked at First Republic Bank for 15 years. Farro was employed at the bank when Cohen took out a home equity loan to cover the $130,000 payment to Daniels.

"Michael Cohen was assigned to me after a colleague left in 2015," Farro stated, adding that he was "very excited to be working for him."

Farro received an email on October 11, 2016, requesting that he contact Cohen. The email was shown to the jury, along with correspondence written a couple of days later by Farro, which read, "Need an account opened for Mike Cohen immediately. He wants no address on the checks. Calling you now to discuss."

Farro said that Cohen wanted to open a new LLC, Resolution Consultants, claiming it was for "capital real estate." He noted that it was not unusual for an LLC not to put an address on its checks.

"A deposit was never made in the account, so the account never went live," Farro explained. He testified that he received an email roughly two weeks later that said Cohen no longer wanted to open Resolution Consultants but wanted to open a different LLC, Essential Consultants — the account Cohen allegedly used to pay Daniels.

The court will reconvene on Tuesday. Farro will return to the stand to conclude his direct examination and cross-examination.

Anything else?

At the start of Friday's trial, acting Justice Juan Merchan stated that the court would hold a hearing on Thursday regarding allegations that Trump had violated the judge's gag order.

Merchan previously placed the order on Trump, preventing the former president from making any public statements about those involved in the trial or their family members.

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and the prosecution accused Trump of violating that order approximately a dozen times, citing posts he wrote on social media as comments he made to the press outside the trial. Prosecutors asked the judge to hold Trump in contempt and order him to pay a $1,000 fine for each alleged violation. Bragg also requested that Merchan remind Trump that he could face jail time for repeatedly violating the order.

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