The Conversation -- May 30, 2024

DONALD TRUMP FOUND GUILTY ON ALL COUNTS

Michael Sisak, et al., of the AP: "Donald Trump became the first former president to be convicted of felony crimes Thursday as a New York jury found him guilty of falsifying business records in a scheme to illegally influence the 2016 election through hush money payments to a porn actor who said the two had sex. Jurors deliberated for 9.5 hours over two days before convicting Trump of all 34 counts he faced. Trump sat stone-faced while the verdict was read as cheering from the street below -- where supporters and detractors of the former president were gathered -- could be heard in the hallway on courthouse's 15th floor where the decision was revealed."

THERE'S A VERDICT in the Manhattan criminal case against Donald Trump. @4:38 pm ET, jury has asked for half an hour to fill out the verdict form. ~~~

~~~ Here's the latest from the New York Times liveblog: ~~~

Jonah Bromwich: "The judge says that he has received a note from the jury foreperson at 4:20. They have a verdict.... They request 30 minutes to fill out the forms."

Kate Christobek: "Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan district attorney, is now in the courtroom, seated in the audience behind the prosecutors who tried this case for his office."

Maggie Haberman: "Justice Merchan is back on the bench."

** Benjamin Protess: "Donald J. Trump was just convicted of all 34 counts of falsifying business records. He is the first American president to become a felon."

Bromwich: "Trump is unresponsive, sitting slack at the defense table."

Jesse McKinley: "Trump now looking at the jury as each juror is polled to confirm their decision of guilty on all counts."

Bromwich: "All of the jurors have individually confirmed their verdicts.... The judge is thanking the jury. He tells them he admires and appreciates their hard work, and praises them for their engagement and their investment.... Justice Merchan tells the jurors they can discuss the case if they;d like, but do not have to. The choice is theirs, but they are no longer barred from discussing the case. He asks to meet with them to discuss their work, though not the facts of the case."

Haberman: "Todd Blanche, Trump's lawyer, is arguing, with the jurors gone, that the verdict is improper and should be tossed because it relied on Michael Cohen's testimony." ~~~

~~~ Bromwich: "The judge immediately denies the motion.... As expected, Trump will have to receive a probation report, as is standard in state court. That report typically takes four to six weeks."

McKinley: "Sentencing is set for July 11."

Michael Gold: "Trump looks fairly defeated as he walks up to the cameras and reporters stationed in the hallway outside the courtroom.... 'This was a disgrace,' Trump says. 'This was a rigged trial by a conflicted judge who was corrupt.'... Trump is now listing a litany of complaints he has made for the last several months: that Justice Merchan was biased, that Alvin Bragg brought his case as an effort to keep Trump out of the White House, and that he should have gotten a venue change because of how liberal-leaning Manhattan is. 'The real verdict is going to be Nov. 5, by the people,' he says.... He closes by saying, 'We will fight for our Constitution. This is long from over.' Then, looking more somber than I have seen him at any point in the last several months, he walks away from the cameras and does not answer questions.... Trump spoke for less than three minutes in total. He did not answer a shouted question by a reporter who asked why Americans should vote for a convicted felon."

Reid Epstein: "President Biden's campaign spokesman said Trump's conviction shows 'no one is above the law.' 'There is still only one way to keep Donald Trump out of the Oval Office: at the ballot box,' said Michael Tyler, the campaign's communications director. 'Convicted felon or not, Trump will be the Republican nominee for president.'"

Michael Grynbaum: "MSNBC's Rachel Maddow said the jury 'deserves to be thanked for their efforts,' and warned that Trump and his allies would try to seed doubts about the guilty verdict, calling it a test 'of the rule of law in our country.'... Fox News pundits quickly denounced the verdict on air. 'It's inconceivable in New York that anyone else other than Donald Trump would be indicted in this way,' said Andy McCarthy, a legal analyst. Jeanine Pirro called the case 'riddled with errors' and declared, 'We have gone over a cliff in America.'"

Nicholas Nehamas: "Shortly after Trump's guilty verdict was read aloud in court, President Biden posted a fundraising appeal on X from his campaign account: 'There's only one way to keep Donald Trump out of the Oval Office: At the ballot box,' Biden wrote. 'Donate to our campaign today.'"

Shane Goldmacher: "The WinRed portal that Trump's campaign uses to process campaign donations appears to have gone offline shortly after his guilty verdict."

Ken Bensinger: "Tucker Carlson responded to today's verdict in what can only be described as an apocalyptic tone, stating on X that the jury's decision marked 'the end of the fairest justice system in the world.' The former Fox News host said that Trump would still win the election 'if he's not killed first,' and closed by saying that 'anyone who defends this verdict is a danger to you and your family.'"

Zolan Kanno-Youngs: "While the Biden campaign responds to the guilty verdict by encouraging people to vote, the Biden White House is choosing to keep its reactions to a minimum. 'We respect the rule of law, and have no additional comment,' said Ian Sams, a spokesman for the White House Counsel's Office. President Biden is currently in Rehoboth Beach, Del., with his family. He has no public appearances on his schedule the rest of the day."

Bromwich: "Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan district attorney, will hold a news conference at 6:30 to discuss the verdict."

Gold: "Just minutes after the verdict was announced, the Trump campaign sent out a fund-raising email in which Trump said, in all capital letters, 'I am a political prisoner!'"

New York Times Editors: "The jury's decision, and the facts presented at the trial, offer yet another reminder -- perhaps the starkest to date -- of the many reasons Donald Trump is unfit for office.... The greatest good to come out of this sordid case is the proof that the rule of law binds everyone, even former presidents.... That 12 Americans could sit in judgment of the former and potentially future president is a remarkable display of the democratic principles that Americans prize at work.... Justice Merchan was scrupulous in ensuring that Mr. Trump received a fair trial.... And yet throughout the trial, the judge was forced to deal with Mr. Trump's attempts to undermine the legal system.... Justice Merchan put a limit on what Mr. Trump could say to prevent him from attacking and threatening jurors, witnesses, court personnel and even the judge's family.... Only the threat of a jail sentence finally seemed to keep Mr. Trump in line."

** Supreme Court Chief Justice Gives Country the Finger. Abbie VanSickle of the New York Times: "Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. on Thursday declined requests to have Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. recuse himself from cases related to the Jan. 6 Capitol attack after provocative flags flew on the justice's properties. The justices make those calls on their own, Chief Justice Roberts wrote in a letter to Democratic senators.... The chief justice also rejected a request to meet with Democratic senators to discuss ethics at the Supreme Court, writing that doing so would raise concerns about separation of powers and judicial independence."

Edward Wong of the New York Times: "The Biden administration has decided to allow Ukraine to strike inside Russia with U.S.-made weapons with the aim of blunting Russia's attacks in the Kharkiv area, senior American officials said on Thursday. The decision follows weeks of discussion with the Ukrainians after Russia began a major assault on Kharkiv, the second-largest city in Ukraine. Because Kharkiv is near Russia, in the northeast of Ukraine, the Russian military has been hitting the area around the city with artillery and missiles fired or launched from inside Russian territory, and the Ukrainians have asked the Americans to give them greater leeway in defending Kharkiv, an American official said. The permission from President Biden is intended solely for Ukraine to strike military sites in Russia being used to attack the Kharkiv area, U.S. officials said."

Ryan Reilly of NBC News: "False reports about the jury instructions in ... Donald Trump's hush money trial have been spreading across right-wing media, leading to threats against the judge overseeing the case. Several conservative news personalities, including some affiliated with Fox News, falsely claimed that Judge Juan Merchan, as one Fox News anchor put it in a viral post on X, 'told the jury that they do not need unanimity to convict' Trump. That's not true.... Jurors have to agree unanimously that Trump committed a crime by engaging in a criminal conspiracy to falsify records with the intent to commit one or more other crimes in order to convict him. But jurors can choose from three options about what those other crimes were." ~~~

     ~~~ Steve Benen of MSNBC: "'IT IS RIDICULOUS, UNCONSTITUTIONAL, AND UNAMERICAN that the highly Conflicted, Radical Left Judge is not requiring a unanimous decision on the fake charges against me,' [Donald] Trump wrote.... 'Judge in Trump case in NYC just told jury they don't have to unanimously agree on which crime was committed as long as they all at least pick one. And that among the crimes the [sic] can pick from are ones Trump WASN'T EVEN CHARGED WITH!!! This is exactly the kind of sham trial used against political opponents of the regime in the old Soviet Union [-- Sen. Marco Rubio].... Rubio is a lawyer. He went to law school. He practiced law before beginning a lengthy career as a lawmaker.... Rubio -- who ... really should've known better -- pushed a wildly misleading claim that both undermines public confidence in the judicial system and seems likely to increase threats against the judge who did nothing wrong.... No one should want to be vice president this badly."

We're back on Trump jury watch, and New York Times reporters are keeping us apprised of developments: ~~~

Jonah Bromwich: "The judge says he believes that the jury wants him to repeat a significant portion of the instructions he read to the jury yesterday. He will start with page 6 of the 55-page document and read to page 35.... This will likely take about 35 minutes....

"The jury specifically asked in its note for the judge to repeat his instructions on what are called 'evidentiary inferences' -- that is, reasonable inferences that can be drawn from what they heard at trial. They asked to hear the following analogy, which he provided yesterday and just repeated: 'Suppose you go to bed one night when it is not raining and when you wake up in the morning, you look out your window; you do not see rain, but you see that the street and sidewalk are wet, and that people are wearing raincoats and carrying umbrellas. Under those circumstances, it may be reasonable to infer, that is conclude, that it rained during the night.'"

[MB: This could be good news for the prosecution; that is, the jurors want to make sure they can reasonably infer facts that may not be in evidence or are evidence only insofar as an accomplice -- Michael Cohen -- so testified. On the other hand, maybe some jurors need to be convinced that inferences and "common sense" are valid means of reaching a verdict.]

Jesse McKinley: "As the judge has re-read his instructions to the jury, Trump has had his eyes closed, and his chin has sometimes slumped to his chest. At other times, his head has been slightly pitched back, like a man tanning." [MB: Reporters have observed almost every day incidences that indicate Trump can't stay awake during his own trial. You may remember that when he was president*, briefers reportedly said he couldn't concentrate on the Presidential Daily Briefings, so they had to simplify the PDBs. I'm thinking now "couldn't concentrate" was their polite way of saying "slept through."]

Maggie Haberman: "Justice Merchan is now at the point of the instructions where he's describing 'accessorial liability,' the portion that suggests the defendant doesn't need to have actively participated in the commission of the crime to be found guilty, as long as he in some way directed or intentionally aided the criminal conduct of someone else. In this case, that relates to the alleged falsification of business records."

Bromwich: "The judge is concluding his readback..., and now we will hear the testimony again... Two court reporters will read these together. The first, sitting in her typical chair, explains that she is the 'lawyer' and that her colleague, on the witness stand is 'David Pecker.' They start with testimony pertaining to a phone call that Pecker and Trump had in June 2016, according to Pecker's testimony.... This testimony is fairly good for the prosecution's case. Trump acknowledges having spoken to Michael Cohen -- per David Pecker -- and knowing Karen McDougal, one of the women who was eventually paid to keep quiet during the 2016 campaign.... David Pecker testified that he recommended that Trump buy Karen McDougal's story....

"We have moved onto the second part of David Pecker's testimony that the jurors asked to hear, where he explains that he decided he did not want to be repaid for Karen McDougal's story after purchasing it. The implication was that he was concerned about the legal consequences of accepting a reimbursement.... We've moved on to the third and final portion of testimony that the jurors wanted to hear from David Pecker. This excerpt pertains to the August 2015 Trump Tower meeting in which prosecutors say, Pecker, Michael Cohen and Trump entered a conspiracy to suppress negative news about Trump during the 2016 election.... David Pecker's testimony here is key to the prosecution's case."

Haberman: "David Pecker was a very damaging witness for the defense. And the efforts to detract from his testimony during cross-examination only seemed to make him more defiant as a witness."

Bromwich: "The jurors just again heard David Pecker's testimony that the reason he was purchasing negative stories on Trump's behalf was to benefit his presidential campaign. That is the prosecution's theory of the election conspiracy in a nutshell....

"Emil Bove, a defense lawyer, cross-examined David Pecker, and jurors are hearing part of that cross-examination now. In the cross, Bove elicited testimony that Pecker misremembered the exact date of the August 2015 meeting, and more generally that Pecker was testifying about events from a long time ago.... During readbacks, we also see the importance of objections. Any objection that was sustained by the judge -- and several were in this cross examination of David Pecker -- is not read aloud as the jury considers a potential verdict....

"The end of the cross-examination of David Pecker -- when, as Maggie wrote earlier, the witness turned defiant -- was less good for the defense. It was just read aloud again. 'There was a discussion about that I was going to be the eyes and ears of the campaign,' Pecker testified. 'And there was a discussion that I would be notifying Michael Cohen of any women that were in the process of or going to be selling stories.'...

"We move on to the fourth and final portion of testimony that jurors asked to hear yesterday: Michael Cohen's recounting of that same Trump Tower meeting.... Michael Cohen's testimony matches David Pecker's account fairly closely. Pecker testified that he had said he would be Trump's 'eyes and ears' and watch out for negative stories. Cohen recalls him saying he would 'keep an eye out for anything negative.'"

"The readback is complete, and the jurors are being excused to continue their deliberations. They have asked to use both headphones and speakers to listen to evidence that includes an audio portion."

[Marie: While the jury is deliberating, Trump has to wait in a courthouse holding room so he will be available should the jury come back with a question or to render its verdict. According to MSNBC, Trump asked the court that a TV set be put in the holding room, and Judge Merchan agreed. How many criminal defendants do you suppose get TVs installed so they're not too bored waiting for the jury to come back? And Trump complains every day about how bent the judge is.]

~~~ Links to courtroom proceedings in the Trump criminal case, up through May 28, are here. Links to evidence are here. All via the New York courts system.

~~~~~~~~~~

Michael Sisak, et al., of the AP: "The jury in Donald Trump's hush money trial ended its first day of deliberations without a verdict Wednesday but asked to rehear testimony from key witnesses about the alleged hush money scheme at the heart of the history-making case. The 12-person jury was sent home around 4 p.m. after about 4 1/2 hours of deliberations. The process is to resume Thursday, when jurors are expected to rehear the requested testimony and at least part of the judge's legal instructions meant to guide them on the law." This is an update of a story linked yesterday. The New York Times story is here. ~~~

~~~ New York Times: reporters liveblogged Wednesday's proceedings in Donald Trump's 2016 election interference case. For details, see yesterday's Conversation.

Dana Milbank of the Washington Post: "Donald Trump's lawyers ended their defense of the former president in a way uniquely suited to their client: with a ludicrous and easily debunked lie.... Trump lawyer Todd Blanche told the jury that the revelation of the 'Access Hollywood' tapes -- Trump's 'grab 'em by the p---y' moment, which set off the fateful effort to buy Stormy Daniels's silence -- was not the earthshaking event we all remember it being for the 2016 Trump campaign. Rather, Blanche said, it was just one of those things 'that happens all the time in campaigns.'... Blanche was also suggesting that Trump's own former White House assistant, Madeleine Westerhout, perjured herself in the trial when she testified about conversations at the Republican National Committee, where she then worked, about replacing Trump on the ticket." Read on. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Milbank doesn't say so, but Trump fan-girl Hope Hicks also testified during the trial that the Access Hollywood tape put the campaign in crisis mode, and that the story knocked a Cat 4 hurricane off the top of the news. Prosecutor Joshua Steinglass emphasized this in his closing. AND Jonah Bromwich wrote in yesterday's NYT liveblog: "Joshua Steinglass is showing the jurors video clips of Trump himself acknowledging that the 'Access Hollywood' tape and its aftermath could swing a very tight election. 'If 5 percent of the people think it's true, and maybe 10 percent,' Trump says in one clip, 'we don't win.'"

Tom Boggioni of the Raw Story: "Donald Trump's chief spokesman has lashed out at new revelations about Donald Trump's actions at the celebrity golf tournament he participated in where he met up with adult film star Stormy Daniels and had a brief sexual fling that has come back to haunt him. In an interview with the Daily Beast's Roger Sollenberger, a celebrity athlete who wished to remain anonymous described the former president boasting about having sex with the porn star the following day.... 'It was clear to me and everyone who heard him that he was talking about Stormy,' [the athlete] said and claimed that Trump 'encouraged other celebs to try to have sex with Daniels,' comments he called, 'crass,' 'gross,' and 'stupid.' 'He'd say all these things like, "You've gotta bang a porn star, it's incredible," and, "It added 20 yards to my drive today,"' he recalled."

** Recusal Refusal. "My Wife Is Fond of Flying Flags." Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. declined on Wednesday to recuse himself from two cases arising from the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol after reports that flags displayed outside his houses appeared to support the 'Stop the Steal' movement. Justice Alito said in letters to Democratic members of Congress who had demanded his recusal that the flags, at his home in Virginia and a beach house in New Jersey, were flown by his wife, Martha-Ann. 'My wife is fond of flying flags,' the justice wrote. 'I am not. She was solely responsible for having flagpoles put up at our residence and our vacation home and has flown a wide variety of flags over the years.'... Their beach house, on Long Beach Island in New Jersey, he wrote, was Mrs. Alito's property....

"'I had nothing whatsoever to do with the flying of the flag,' he wrote. 'I was not even aware of the upside-down flag until it was called to my attention. As soon as I saw it, I asked my wife to take it down, but for several days, she refused.' He said he had been powerless to remove the flag. 'My wife and I own our Virginia home jointly,' the justice wrote. 'She therefore has the legal right to use the property as she sees fit, and there were no additional steps that I could have taken to have the flag taken down more promptly.' Notably, Justice Alito's letter did not dispute that the upside-down flag conveyed support for the 'Stop the Steal' movement." Politico's story is here. (Also linked yesterday.)

Here are Alito's letters, via Politico. (Also linked yesterday.)

     ~~~ Marie: Do you think the reason Sam-I-Am wrote Dobbs -- which robs millions of American women of bodily autonomy -- is that he couldn't get his own wife to behave in a manner appropriate to the spouse of a federal judge? Or, as both Dahlia Lithwick & Melissa Murray posited on MSNBC, it was so maddening for Alito & Thomas to curb the rights of all American women while insisting that they own wives were independent feminists? ~~~

~~~ ** "No Man Can Be a Judge in His Own Cause." Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) in a New York Times op-ed: :Justices Alito and Thomas face a groundswell of appeals beseeching them not to participate in Trump v. United States, the case that will decide whether Mr. Trump enjoys absolute immunity from criminal prosecution, and Fischer v. United States, which will decide whether Jan. 6 insurrectionists -- and Mr. Trump -- can be charged under a statute that criminalizes 'corruptly' obstructing an official proceeding.... Everyone assumes that nothing can be done about the recusal situation because the highest court in the land has the lowest ethical standards -- no binding ethics code or process outside of personal reflection.... [BUT] The U.S. Department of Justice ... can petition the other seven justices to require Justices Alito and Thomas to recuse themselves not as a matter of grace but as a matter of law. The Justice Department and Attorney General Merrick Garland can invoke two powerful textual authorities for this motion: the Constitution of the United States, specifically the due process clause, and the federal statute mandating judicial disqualification for questionable impartiality, 28 U.S.C. Section 455.... This recusal statute, if triggered, is ... binding on the justices, just as the due process clause is." Read on. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Raskin's solution is similar to what I suggested -- in much more rudimentary form -- a week ago when I heard Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse say on the teevee that there was a statute requiring justices to disqualify themselves when a case before the court presented an appearance of partiality or conflict of interest. The difference is that Raskin knows what he's talking about and I don't. Oh, and Raskin provides lots of case law to back up his solution. ~~~

~~~ Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post: In his letters to Congress, Sam "Alito wrapped himself in an unconvincing blend of faux feminism and free speech, with an Alito-esque helping of victimhood. That is one weird marriage. A Washington marriage -- that is, a marriage involving one or more people in positions of authority or prominence -- is about respectful accommodation of competing needs in the public spotlight.... [In a letter to members of Congress, Sam Alito wrote,] 'I was not even aware of the upside-down flag until it was called to my attention. As soon as I saw it, I asked my wife to take it down, but for several days, she refused.'... His first few renditions of the incident had the flag flying 'briefly' (the statement provided to the New York Times) and 'for a short time' (his statement to Fox News host Shannon Bream.) As The Post reported, and Alito now acknowledges, it flew 'for several days.' In what world is that 'briefly'?... Why, exactly, did he think the flag was a problem?... If he was alarmed then, why doesn't the public have every reason to be alarmed now?"

Congratulations to United States Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito for showing the INTELLIGENCE, COURAGE, and 'GUTS' to refuse stepping aside from making a decision on anything January 6th related. -- Donald Trump, in a social media post ~~~

~~~ Meredith McGraw & Josh Gerstein of Politico: "Donald Trump praised Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito for rejecting calls to recuse himself from two pending cases involving the former president or January 6 attack on the Capitol after the conservative justice faced criticism over flags his wife flew over their private residences that called into question judicial ethics.... Trump continued to applaud Alito as 'great' on The Dan Bongino show later on Wednesday and suggested that recent stories about controversial flags were efforts by critics to 'play the ref.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: One interesting thing about Alito's letter to Dick Durbin & Sheldon Whitehouse is this: McGraw & Gerstein: "Democratic Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island and Dick Durbin of Illinois last week wrote a letter to Chief Justice John Roberts questioning whether Alito could remain impartial in the upcoming cases and accusing him of engaging in political activity." What's wrong with this picture? The Senators wrote to Roberts. Roberts let Alito respond. Roberts seems to have completely abdicated his job as Chief Justice. The inmates are running the Roberts Asylum.

Presidential Race. Gloves Off. Nicholas Nehamas & Maya King of the New York Times: "Speaking alongside Vice President Kamala Harris at a rally in Philadelphia, [President] Biden pressed home a series of arguments about why Black voters should choose him over Mr. Trump, who has been trying to court Americans of color. 'This is the same guy who wanted to tear-gas you as you peacefully protested George Floyd's murder,' Mr. Biden told the predominantly Black crowd.... 'The same guy who still calls the Central Park Five guilty even though they were exonerated. He's that landlord who denies housing applications because of the color of your skin.' Invoking the Capitol attack on Jan. 6, 2021, and nodding to Mr. Trump's remarks about pardoning the rioters, Mr. Biden said: 'What do you think would have happened if Black Americans had stormed the Capitol? I don't think he'd be talking about pardons.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Maya Ward of Politico: Also, "He's that guy who won't say Black lives matter and invokes neo-Nazi, Third Reich terms. We all remember, Trump is the same guy who unleashed the birtherism lie against Barack."

digby on some of Republicans' anti-democracy schemes: "With all the violence and vandalism on January 6th it's easy to forget that Trump and his henchmen's real game plan was to send the election to the House and let them decide the winner as the constitution anticipated would happen in case of a tie.... Had they persuaded Pence to twist the constitutional process for a tie vote into a process for resolving (fake) competing slates of electoral votes and had the House taken it up, Trump would have won because votes are counted by state delegation and there are more Republican delegations than Democratic.... [Last week, the Texas Republican convention adopted a platform advocating for ] a system in which every county has exactly the same vote, whether the county has 20 people in it or 5 million.... In Missouri where their ballot system was allowing some progressive policies to be passed by a majority of citizens, they tried to change the law to require that ... [policies] have a majority in five of their eight congressional districts which gives rural GOP districts the upper hand. Arizona has proposed a similar initiative."

Chelsea Janes of the Washington Post: "Baseball history will change forever Wednesday. Major League Baseball plans to officially incorporate Negro Leagues statistics into its record book.... The move comes 3½ years after MLB said it would consider the Negro Leagues as major leagues, meaning all Negro leaguers would be considered major leaguers from that point forward. On Wednesday, the players from Negro Leagues in operation from 1920 to 1948 will be fully incorporated into MLB's statistical record. Just one example: When looking up the highest career batting averages in MLB's record book, the leader will be Josh Gibson, whose average of .372 in Negro Leagues play is higher than the .367 Ty Cobb posted to lead all MLB players." (Also linked yesterday.)

Shannon Osaka of the Washington Post: "There is one big thing holding the United States back from a pollution-free electricity grid running on wind, solar and battery power: not enough power lines. As developers rush to install wind farms and solar plants to power data centers, artificial intelligence systems and electric vehicles, the nation's sagging, out-of-date power lines are being overwhelmed -- slowing the transition to clean energy and the fight against climate change. But experts say that there is a remarkably simple fix: installing new wires on the high-voltage lines that already carry power hundreds of miles across the United States. Just upgrading those wires, new reports show, could double the amount of power that can flow through America's electricity grid."

~~~~~~~~~~

Florida. Andrew Atterbury of Politico: "The Florida Board of Education approved several tweaks Wednesday to the state's standards for teaching social studies, but left intact controversial pieces on Black history that sparked widespread backlash last year.... Florida's new teaching standards include the same language that scored national blowback last year for requiring middle school students to learn 'how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.'"

~~~~~~~~~~

Israel/Palestine, et al. CNN's live updates of developments Thursday in the Israel/Hamas war are here: "The Israeli military said it had established 'operational control' over the Philadelphi Corridor, a 14-kilometer (8.7-mile) buffer zone on the Egypt-Gaza border, risking a decades-old peace treaty. At least 66 people, including children, have been killed in safe zones across Gaza over four days, according to Save the Children. Aid entering Gaza has dropped by 67% since May 7, the day after Israel began its assault on Rafah, according to a UN report. The war in Gaza will likely continue until at least the end of the year, an Israeli official warned, seemingly dismissing the idea that fighting would end after the military offensive in Rafah." ~~~

     ~~~ The New York Times' live updates for Thursday are here.

The Conversation -- May 29, 2024

** "My Wife Is Fond of Flying Flags." Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. declined on Wednesday to recuse himself from two cases arising from the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol after reports that flags displayed outside his houses appeared to support the 'Stop the Steal' movement. Justice Alito said in letters to Democratic members of Congress who had demanded his recusal that the flags, at his home in Virginia and a beach house in New Jersey were flown by his wife, Martha-Ann. 'My wife is fond of flying flags,' the justice wrote. 'I am not. She was solely responsible for having flagpoles put up at our residence and our vacation home and has flown a wide variety of flags over the years.'... Their beach house, on Long Beach Island in New Jersey, he wrote, was Mrs. Alito's property....

"'I had nothing whatsoever to do with the flying of the flag,' he wrote. 'I was not even aware of the upside-down flag until it was called to my attention. As soon as I saw it, I asked my wife to take it down, but for several days, she refused.' He said he had been powerless to remove the flag. 'My wife and I own our Virginia home jointly,' the justice wrote. 'She therefore has the legal right to use the property as she sees fit, and there were no additional steps that I could have taken to have the flag taken down more promptly.' Notably, Justice Alito's letter did not dispute that the upside-down flag conveyed support for the 'Stop the Steal' movement." Politico's story is here.

Here are Alito's letters, via Politico.

     ~~~ Marie: Do you think the reason Sam-I-Am wrote Dobbs -- which robs millions of American women of bodily autonomy -- is that he couldn't get his own wife to behave in a manner appropriate to the spouse of a federal judge? Or, as both Dahlia Lithwick & Melissa Murray posited on MSNBC, it was so maddening for Alito & Thomas to curb the rights of all American women while insisting that they own wives were independent feminists?

Dana Milbank of the Washington Post: "Donald Trump's lawyers ended their defense of the former president in a way uniquely suited to their client: with a ludicrous and easily debunked lie.... Trump lawyer Todd Blanche told the jury that the revelation of the 'Access Hollywood' tapes -- Trump's 'grab 'em by the p---y' moment, which set off the fateful effort to buy Stormy Daniels's silence -- was not the earthshaking event we all remember it being for the 2016 Trump campaign. Rather, Blanche said, it was just one of those things 'that happens all the time in campaigns.'... Blanche was also suggesting that Trump's own former White House assistant, Madeleine Westerhout, perjured herself in the trial when she testified about conversations at the Republican National Committee, where she then worked, about replacing Trump on the ticket." Read on. ~~~

     ~~~ Milbank doesn't say so, but Trump fan-girl Hope Hicks also testified during the trial that the Access Hollywood tape put the campaign in crisis mode, and that the story knocked a Cat 4 hurricane off the top of the news. Prosecutor Joshua Steinglass emphasized this in his closing. AND Jonah Bromwich wrote in yesterday's NYT liveblog: "Joshua Steinglass is showing the jurors video clips of Trump himself acknowledging that the 'Access Hollywood' tape and its aftermath could swing a very tight election. 'If 5 percent of the people think it's true, and maybe 10 percent,' Trump says in one clip, 'we don't win.'"

Chelsea Janes of the Washington Post: "Baseball history will change forever Wednesday. Major League Baseball plans to officially incorporate Negro Leagues statistics into its record book.... The move comes 3½ years after MLB said it would consider the Negro Leagues as major leagues, meaning all Negro leaguers would be considered major leaguers from that point forward. On Wednesday, the players from Negro Leagues in operation from 1920 to 1948 will be fully incorporated into MLB's statistical record. Just one example: When looking up the highest career batting averages in MLB's record book, the leader will be Josh Gibson, whose average of .372 in Negro Leagues play is higher than the .367 Ty Cobb posted to lead all MLB players."

Michael Sisak, et al., of the AP: "Jurors in Donald Trump's hush money trial are expected to begin deliberations Wednesday after receiving instructions from the judge on the law and the factors they may consider as they strive to reach a verdict.... Jurors will have the option of convicting Trump of all counts, acquitting him of all counts, or delivering a mixed verdict in which he is found guilty of some charges and not others. If they deadlock after several days of deliberations and are unable to reach a unanimous verdict, Judge Juan M. Merchan may declare a mistrial." The story also covers some of the highlights of closing arguments Tuesday. ~~~

     ~~~ This story, linked earlier today has been updated. New Lede: "Jury deliberations began Wednesday in Donald Trump's hush money trial, putting the outcome of the historic case in the hands of a dozen New Yorkers who have vowed to be fair and impartial in the face of their unprecedented task." ~~~

~~~ Ben Protess & Jonah Bromwich of the New York Times: "The judge in the case, Juan M. Merchan, issued instructions to the jurors that serve as something of a guide to applying the law to the case. One challenge for the jury is the unusual layering of charges: The charges against Mr. Trump are felonies because prosecutors say he falsified the records to cover up another crime. Here's a look at the instructions." This is the pinned item in a liveblog. Here are some details:

Bromwich: "The judge greets the jurors and immediately begins reading them his instructions. He tells them the instructions will take at least an hour to get through....

"Justice Merchan explains the concept of 'falsus in uno,' an important concept for the defense, which tried to convince the jury that Michael Cohen's testimony was not credible. The concept says that jurors can disregard a witness's entire testimony if they find he has intentionally testified falsely to any material fact. Or, they can disregard the parts they find to be untruthful, and accept those they find truthful and accurate.... Justice Merchan says that there's no formula for evaluating someone's truthfulness, and that a person brings to the process all their varied experiences.... He tells the jurors to use the same factors they draw on outside of court when evaluating testimony in the case....

"Justice Merchan explains that the law considers Michael Cohen an accomplice 'because there is evidence that he participated in a crime based upon conduct involved in the allegations here against the defendant.' He tells the jurors that 'even if you find the testimony of Michael Cohen to be believable, you may not convict the defendant solely upon that testimony, unless you also find that it was corroborated by other evidence' connecting Trump with the crime....

"Justice Merchan explains the concept of intent. He tells the jurors that they can consider Trump's conduct 'and all of the circumstances surrounding that conduct,' including what he said, what actions followed from his conduct, and whether those actions were the 'the natural, necessary and probable consequence of that conduct.' In other words, intent can be inferred from a person's actions and the effects of those actions....

"The judge has now arrived at the reason prosecutors charged Trump with falsifying business records as a felony: Because, they say, he covered up a second crime, violating the state election law that forbids a conspiracy to aid a person's election by unlawful means.... Justice Merchan just reminded us that the prosecution won a major argument last week, when they argued that the jurors did not have to agree unanimously on the 'unlawful means' they might determine that Trump used in the election conspiracy that prosecutors allege took place.... Justice Merchan is now explaining to the jurors what I've taken to thinking of as the 'false records sandwich' prosecution theory. Under this theory, jurors could find that Trump falsified records ... to hide an election conspiracy that used the unlawful means ... of other falsified records....

"Having explained the law in abstract, the judge now illustrates how it applies to the charges in question. He says that, to find Trump guilty of the first charge, jurors would have to find that Trump, personally or acting in concert with others, made or caused a false entry in business records, specifically an invoice from Michael Cohen dated Feb. 14, 2017.... They would also have to find that Trump caused that false record with intent to defraud -- that is, with the goal of keeping it secret -- and that he either intended to commit another crime or aid the commission of another crime....

"Justice Merchan doesn't provide such a complex spiel for every count -- but he explains which document each count pertains to.... Justice Merchan arrives at the 34th and last count, which relates to a check dated Dec. 5, 2017. Having concluded, he repeats the definition of falsifying business records, again giving the jurors the chance to process these complex charges, where each single count includes within it at least two other potential crimes....

"Justice Merchan is again explaining the potential 'unlawful means' that jurors could find that Trump or the other conspirators identified by prosecutors -- Michael Cohen and David Pecker, the former publisher of The National Enquirer -- used to aid Trump's election in 2016....

"Justice Merchan ... has moved on to motive -- and the difference between motive and intent.... He explains that while intent means 'conscious objective or purpose,' motive is 'the reason why a person chooses to engage in criminal conduct.' He reminds jurors that they must consider Trump's intent, but that the prosecution did not have to prove his motive....

"The criminal case against Donald J. Trump is with the jury, which will now begin its deliberations. It's 11:28 am."

Maggie Haberman: "Justice Merchan is now talking to the alternate jurors, whose seating assignments have been confusing to people trying to figure out which jurors had which seat assignments. The alternates are not being excused, Merchan says."

Bromwich: "If one of the 12 jurors is unable to continue deliberating for any purpose, an alternate steps in. They remain on site, so they can tag in if necessary."

Michael Gold: "Trump tells reporters in the hallway that, after listening to Justice Merchan's instructions to the jury, he believes 'Mother Teresa could not beat the charges.' He again calls the judge 'corrupt' and 'conflicted' and complains that he cannot fully back up his accusations about him because of the gag order that has been imposed on him, which does not in fact limit him from speaking about the judge.... He again complains that the trial has kept him from campaigning for weeks, though he has held a handful of rallies, public appearances and fund-raisers on days that court has not been in session.... He also rails against Robert De Niro, who held a news conference outside the courthouse with the Biden campaign yesterday. 'He's a broken-down fool,' Trump said. Then, noting that De Niro got heckled, he added that the actor 'got MAGAed yesterday. He got a big dose of it.'"

Bromwich: "The judge is back on the bench. He explains that the jurors sent a note, signed by the foreperson, at 2:56 p.m. The jurors have four requests.... Three of the requests relate to testimony from David Pecker.... One of them relates to testimony from Michael Cohen. The jurors want to hear both men's testimony about the Trump Tower meeting where Pecker testified that the two men reached that agreement with Trump himself. Perhaps they are seeking to compare their stories.... The jurors asked to hear two other portions of David Pecker's testimony. The first is about the phone call he testified he had with Trump during an investor meeting, in June 2016, during which Trump acknowledged that he knew Karen McDougal.... The second appears to pertain to Pecker's decision not to collect reimbursement from Trump for his hush-money deal with McDougal."

Bromwich: "The judge returns to the bench. He addresses the lawyers, saying that the jurors sent a second note at 3:51 p.m. The jurors have also asked to hear the judge's instructions again.... The jurors have returned, and the judge is reading the two notes they sent aloud to them as they sit in the jury box.... The judge gives the jurors the guidance he typically gives them before excusing them for the day -- saying they should not talk to others about the case or read about it, along with other orders.... he dismisses them."

Bromwich: "The judge ... asks the lawyers, 'Where do we stand?' Joshua Steinglass, a proseuctor, says that while they have 'made a lot of progress,' they will need the judge to help them sort out which portions of the transcript should be read back to the jury.... There is no disagreement on the jurors' first request, for testimony from David Pecker pertaining to a call he had with Trump in June 2016.... There is no disagreement on the second request, which pertains to David Pecker's testimony about financial arrangements related to the Karen McDougal hush-money deal....

"If I'm understanding correctly, prosecutors believe that the readback should also include the portion of Pecker's testimony in which he directed [Dylan] Howard to notify other employees of The National Enquirer that they should bring any stories about Trump to him. Pecker also testified that he told Howard that the Enquirer employees would have to speak to Michael Cohen about the arrangement.... he judge notes that there was also key testimony directly after that: in which Pecker told Howard to keep the arrangement secret. This could help prosecutors show that there was intent to defraud on the part of the conspirators, who they say include Trump.... The judge seemed to make a decision here, but it was difficult to follow.... Court has adjourned for the day. The judge did not determine exactly which portions of the transcript related to David Pecker's testimony would be read aloud. We'll find out tomorrow morning. Proceedings will begin at 9:30."

Haberman: "There's also no disagreement about the fourth request from the jurors, which involves testimony from Michael Cohen about an August 2015 meeting he had at Trump Tower with David Pecker and with Trump."

~~~~~~~~~~

Ben Protess, et al., of the New York Times: "For nearly three hours on Tuesday, Donald J. Trump's lawyer [Todd Blanche] did his level best to persuade the jury to acquit his client.... Then, throughout a marathon closing argument that nearly outlasted daylight, the prosecutor delivered a sweeping rebuke of the former president, seeking to persuade the jury of 12 New Yorkers that Mr. Trump had falsified records to cover up a sex scandal involving a porn star. The prosecutor, Joshua Steinglass, wove together witness testimony and documents to drive home the key points of the weekslong case, the first criminal trial of an American president. 'Everything Mr. Trump and his cohorts did in this case was cloaked in lies,' Mr. Steinglass said.... To persuade jurors, the prosecution and defense outlined dueling versions of the same underlying story: Mr. Trump's fixer, [Michael] Cohen, struck a hush-money deal with a porn star in the waning days of the 2016 presidential campaign. He did so to silence her story of a sexual encounter with Mr. Trump. Nearly everything else is in dispute." ~~~

~~~ Mark Berman of the Washington Post reports some key moments in the closing arguments. Here are the takeaways from CNN's Jeremy Herb & other CNN reporters. ~~~

~~~ Tuesday was a marathon day in the Manhattan trial of Donald Trump, alleged criminal, as the defense & prosecution delivered their lengthy closing arguments. New York Times reporters liveblogged the proceedings. See yesterday's Conversation for details. ~~~

~~~ Charles Davis of Salon: Donald Trump is upset because he's being treated more-or-less like other criminal defendants.

** Hannah Rabinowitz of CNN: "Federal Judge Aileen Cannon on Tuesday rejected special counsel Jack Smith's request for a gag order against Donald Trump in the classified documents case, saying that prosecutors' request was 'wholly lacking in substance and professional courtesy.' In a brief order, Cannon slammed prosecutors for not following the court's rules by failing to meaningfully confer with Trump's defense lawyers about a potential gag order before making the request.... Prosecutors can ask for a gag order again, Cannon said, once they give 'sufficient time' to Trump's defense team to read the motion and discuss it with prosecutors.... Trump's campaign... sent a fundraising email on Tuesday that claimed FBI agents were 'locked and loaded' and that he 'nearly escaped death' at Mar-a-Lago." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Unbelievable. I gather from what Ken Dilanian said on MSNBC Tuesday morning that the "lack of professional courtesy" was that Smith's team filed the motion after Trump lawyers refused to meet with them because it was a holiday weekend -- and you know, maybe they had plans for a backyard BBQ. As for Cannon's determination the motion was "wholly lacking in substance," a former president*'s claim that the current POTUS* is trying to have him executed is mighty fucking substantial, IMO.

Tracey Tully & Benjamin Weiser of the New York Times: "... text exchanges, along with emails and recordings of voice mail messages and other exhibits, were part of hours of evidence that federal prosecutors presented on Tuesday, in the third week of [Sen. Robert] Menendez's corruption trial in Manhattan. Prosecutors used the volley of communications to begin to lay out an origin story of not only a romantic relationship but also what they claim was a burgeoning, five-year bribery conspiracy.... Much of Mr. Menendez's defense has hinged on blaming his wife. The senator's lawyers have said he had no key to his wife's locked closet where investigators found bars of gold and cash-stuffed envelopes. The couple maintained separate bank accounts and cellphone plans, and spent much of the week apart when he was in Washington." Some of the messages played in court Tuesday demonstrated that Nadine Menendez served as a conduit between the Senator & Wael Hana, an Egyptian businessman who also is charged.

My, My, She Looks Like Such a Sweet Old Lady. Jodi Kantor of the New York Times details the encounters between Martha-Ann Alito and the neighbors, leaving us with images like this: on Inauguration Day 2020, a young couple who had annoyed Mrs. Alito with anti-Trump yard signs, drove past the Alito house. "Mrs. Alito happened to be standing outside. According to interviews with [Emily] Baden and her husband, as well as messages they sent to friends at the time, Mrs. Alito ran toward their car and yelled something they did not understand. The couple continued driving, they said, and as they passed the Alito home again to exit the cul-de-sac, Mrs. Alito appeared to spit toward the vehicle.... On Feb. 15, the couple were pulling in trash bins when the Alitos, who seemed to be on a stroll, appeared. Mrs. Alito addressed the pair by name, used an expletive and called them 'fascists,' the couple told The Times and said in texts at the time." ~~~

     ~~~ Oh, and there's this. Husband Sam Alito's "explanations" of the contretemps don't match with the Badens' texts or with a police record of the Badens' futile call for help. For instance, Mrs. Alito could not have raised the upside-down flag in response to Emily Baden's calling her a cunt because that encounter didn't happen until after the upside-down flag appeared in the Alitos' front yard. And Baden didn't make that remark till after Mrs. Alito approached her in the Badens' front yard and called the Badens fascists.

Presidential Race

Jennifer Rubin of the Washington Post implores media to listen to Ken Burns' advice to Brandeis grads.

Ohio. Isabella Murray of ABC News: "The Democratic National Committee will move to conduct virtual proceedings to certify President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic Party nominees before Ohio's Aug. 7 ballot certification deadline, and before their in-person convention beginning Aug. 19, the party confirmed to ABC News on Tuesday.... The move came moments before the Ohio Senate convened on Tuesday for a special session to address Biden's ability to appear on the state's general election ballot in November -- which the GOP-led legislature has tied up with an effort related to campaign finance, something Democrats oppose. The bill passed in the Ohio Senate on Tuesday without any Democratic support." ~~~

~~~ Morgan Trau of the Ohio Capital Journal: "The [Ohio] House, which has been holding up the progress, said it will compromise with the Senate, but only if the 'anti-democratic' provisions are taken out of the bill."

~~~~~~~~~~

Texas Primary Races. Jim Vertuno of the AP: "Republican Rep. Tony Gonzales of Texas narrowly won his primary Tuesday against a gun-rights activist who pushed the border congressman into a bruising runoff that threatened to unseat a U.S. House incumbent. Another prominent Texas Republican, state House Speaker Dade Phelan, also edged out a challenger from the right who was backed by ... Donald Trump. Both won by razor-thin margins, reflecting the anger of hard-line conservatives and a wave of party turbulence in America's biggest red state...." ~~~

     ~~~ Here are Texas primary run-off results, via the New York Times.

~~~~~~~~~~

Haiti. David Adams of the New York Times: "An experienced international aid official, Garry Conille, was unanimously appointed prime minister of Haiti by a Presidential Transition Council on Tuesday, which tasked him with leading the country out of its current crisis until elections for a new president can be held. Mr. Conille will take on his new role just as a U.N.-backed security mission led by Kenyan police is scheduled to begin operations in the violence-torn Caribbean nation, which is battling to restore political stability and tackle armed gangs who control large parts of the capital, Port-au-Prince. Fluent in English, French and Creole, Mr. Conille's credentials include a 25-year career working for the United Nations and other aid agencies. He also briefly led Haiti as prime minister over a decade ago during another period of crisis following the devastating 2010 earthquake."

Israel/Palestine, et al.

CNN's live updates of developments Wednesday in the Israel/Hamas war are here: "US-made munitions were used in an Israeli strike that killed more than 45 people in Rafah, a CNN analysis of video from the scene and a review by weapons experts has found. President Joe Biden is not altering his policy toward Israel following the strike, and the attack did not cross a red line that would affect US support, the White House said. Israeli tanks have been seen in central Rafah for the first time, eyewitnesses told CNN, as Israel deepens its assault on the southern Gaza city despite mounting global condemnation. North of Rafah in the town of Al-Mawasi, an Israeli strike on a camp killed at least 21 people on Tuesday, Gaza's Ministry of Health said. The Israeli military denied striking a humanitarian area in the town." ~~~

     ~~~ The New York Times' live updates Wednesday are here.

Oren Liebermann & Natasha Bertrand of CNN: "The temporary pier constructed by the US military to transport aid into Gaza broke apart and sustained damage in heavy seas on Tuesday in a major blow to the American-led effort to create a maritime corridor for humanitarian supplies into the war-torn enclave, the Pentagon said. The pier was 'damaged and sections of the pier need rebuilding and repairing,' Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh said on Tuesday. The pier will be removed from its location on the Gaza coast over the next 48 hours and taken to the Israeli port of Ashdod, where US Central Command will carry out repairs, Singh said. The repairs will take more than a week, further delaying the effort to get the maritime corridor fully operating."

U.N. Ambassador AND Bloodthirsty Warmonger. Robert Tait of the Guardian: "Nikki Haley, the failed Republican presidential nominee, signed Israeli artillery shells with the inscription 'Finish Them!' on a Memorial Day visit to Israel. The former South Carolina governor's graphic display of support came on a trip to Israel's northern border with Lebanon, where she was accompanied by Danny Danon, a former Israeli ambassador to the United Nations and a noted hawkish member of Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party in the Knesset.... Talking to reporters, Haley was unapologetic, criticising Joe Biden's administration for temporarily withholding weapons as a means of discouraging an Israeli attack on the southern Gaza city of Rafah, and aiming barbs at the international criminal court (ICC) -- which is seeking Netanyahu's arrest -- and the international court of justice (ICJ), which is considering charges of genocide against Israel." Thanks to RAS for the lead.

The Conversation -- May 28, 2024

** Hannah Rabinowitz of CNN: "Federal Judge Aileen Cannon on Tuesday rejected special counsel Jack Smith's request for a gag order against Donald Trump in the classified documents case, saying that prosecutors' request was 'wholly lacking in substance and professional courtesy.' In a brief order, Cannon slammed prosecutors for not following the court's rules by failing to meaningfully confer with Trump's defense lawyers about a potential gag order before making the request.... Prosecutors can ask for a gag order again, Cannon said, once they give 'sufficient time' to Trump's defense team to read the motion and discuss it with prosecutors.... Trump's campaign... sent a fundraising email on Tuesday that claimed FBI agents were 'locked and loaded' and that he 'nearly escaped death' at Mar-a-Lago." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Unbelievable. I gather from what Ken Dilanian said on MSNBC Tuesday morning that the "lack of professional courtesy" was that Smith's team filed the motion after Trump lawyers refused to meet with them because it was a holiday weekend -- and you know, maybe they had plans for a backyard BBQ. As for Cannon's determination the motion was "wholly lacking in substance," a former president*'s claim that the current POTUS* is trying to have him executed is mighty fucking substantial, IMO.

This may be the last day of the Manhattan trial of Donald Trump, alleged criminal. New York Times reporters are liveblogging the proceedings:

Matthew Haag: "Closing arguments are expected to last for most or all of Tuesday and perhaps beyond. After closing arguments, the judge, Juan M. Merchan, will provide instructions to the 12 members of the jury that are meant to guide their deliberations."

Jonah Bromwich: "The defense wil go first this morning, seeking to seed doubt in at least one juror."

Maggie Haberman: "Trump spent Monday both posting on Truth Social about this case and attacking E. Jean Carroll, the New York writer whom Trump was found liable for defaming and sexually abusing. Trump also falsely claimed the prosecutors in this case were somehow getting an undue edge by getting to deliver their closing arguments after the defense; that is actually the law here."

Michael Gold: "Trump will be joined by several members of his family in court today: his sons Donald Jr. and Eric; Lara Trump, Eric's wife and the co-chair of the Republican National Committee; and his daughter Tiffany and her husband, Michael Boulos.... Also joining Trump's entourage of supporters in court today as closing arguments begin are Steve Witkoff, a real-estate investor and longtime friend; Will Scharf, a Republican candidate for attorney general in Missouri and one of Trump's lawyers in another case; and Deroy Murdock, a conservative political commentator."

Haberman: "Boris Epshteyn, his indicted top legal adviser, is here again too."

Bromwich: "Todd Blanche, the defense lawyer, says his closing argument will take about two and a half hours, and Joshua Steinglass, the prosecutor, responds that his will be between four and four and a half hours. The judge says that means we may or may not finish at 4:30, and that he will ask the jurors if they can stay late in order to finish closing arguments if necessary."

Gold: "Trump will be joined by several members of his family in court today: his sons Donald Jr. and Eric; Lara Trump, Eric's wife and the co-chair of the Republican National Committee; and his daughter Tiffany and her husband, Michael Boulos.... Also joining Trump's entourage of supporters in court today as closing arguments begin are Steve Witkoff, a real-estate investor and longtime friend; Will Scharf, a Republican candidate for attorney general in Missouri and one of Trump's lawyers in another case; and Deroy Murdock, a conservative political commentator."

Haberman: "Todd Blanche says that this case 'is about documents. It's a paper case.' It is not, he says, about an encounter with Stormy Daniels, noting -- something the client likes hearing -- that the defendant has denied it occurred."

Bromwich: "Blanche is seeking to narrow the aperture of the case for the jury, saying ... it's about whether Trump, 'while he was living in the White House and was the leader of the free world,' had anything to do with the way that financial documents were processed at the Trump Organization.... Todd Blanche is focusing on the 34 documents that led to the 34 felony charges.... Todd Blanche is ... [arguing] that the documents weren't false because Michael Cohen really was doing legal work for Trump in 2017. He's casting aspersions on the government's theory of Cohen being repaid for his payment to Stormy Daniels, saying that if that were so, Cohen would have been doing unremunerated legal work."

Jesse McKinley: "Blanche is making a classic horses, not zebras argument, saying that the simplest explanation of behaivor is usually the right one, as he argues that Cohen was simply being paid for legal work, not repayment for a cover-up scheme."

Bromwich: "Todd Blanche just argued that the 12 ledger entries at issue in the case were classified as legal services because the Trump Organization's software used a dropdown menu in which one of the limited options provided is: 'legal expense.' Needless to say, the dropdown menu does not have a 'repayment for hush-money deal' option.... Blanche is moving through the three categories of financial documents that prosecutors say are false, and seeking to provide an explanation for each. He started with the invoices, saying they were disqualified because they were sent by Michael Cohen. He followed up with the internal ledger entries, which he said were generated by the Trump Organization's software and its limited dropdown menu."

Haberman: "Todd Blanche is talking about Trump signing the other nine checks in the White House, recalling that 'two witnesses' -- meaning Hope Hicks and Madeleine Westerhout -- had described Trump as 'very busy. He was running the country.'"

Bromwich: "Todd Blanche seemed to be describing why Trump could not be held accountable for checks he had signed. But then, somewhat confusingly, he returned to the Michael Cohen invoices, saying that jurors cannot assume that because Trump looked at invoices, 'somehow he had full knowledge of what was happening.'... Todd Blanche is now saying that Trump was not known for overpaying, and that testimony suggested that Michael Cohen did not deserve to be paid all that much for his campaign work, particularly Hope Hicks's remarks that Cohen went 'rogue' at times.... But at the same time, Blanche has argued that the $420,000 Trump did pay Cohen was for unspecified legal work. So there's a contradiction in the logic of his closing that may leave him vulnerable."

Haberman: "It's been striking to hear Todd Blanche depict Trump as too distracted to focus on the matters of the checks and the payments."

Susanne Craig: "Todd Blanche is now showing the jury the tax documents sent to Michael Cohen and the I.R.S. as evidence that the payments to Cohen were all above board. It's important to remember that declaring a payment to the I.R.S. doesn't automatically make it legal."

Gold: "Meanwhile, President Biden's campaign is holding a news conference outside the courthouse in Manhattan, a guarantee of attention since the media has been stationed here for week. The speakers have focused not on the trial, but largely on the riot at the Capitol by Trump supporters on Jan. 6, 2021, and the threats the Biden campaign argues Trump poses to democracy and the nation's future."

Bromwich: "Todd Blanche has moved on to the three specific catch-and-kill deals that prosecutors allege David Pecker was involved in, all of which they say were designed to protect Trump. He characterizes the first, involving a doorman at a Trump Organization building, as 'literally a made up story designed to harm President Trump.'"

Reid Epstein & Neil Vigdor: "The Biden campaign on Tuesday dispatched Robert De Niro..., along with Harry Dunn and Michael Fanone, two former U.S. Capitol Police officers who have since become spokesmen for the Democratic effort to attack Mr. Trump over his role in the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021, to hold a news conference outside the courthouse in Manhattan where Mr. Trump's trial was concluding. 'This is not a threat,' Mr. De Niro said of the prospect that Mr. Trump could return to the White House. 'This is a reality.'"

Bromwich: "Todd Blanche just claimed that Michael Cohen had fully fabricated an encounter that he had with David Pecker in which Pecker expressed anger that he had not been repaid for one of the hush-money deals. 'Ladies and gentlemen, that lunch did not happen,' Blanche said. 'Cohen made it up.'"

Haberman: "Todd Blanche has now turned back to the recording that Michael Cohen secretly made of a conversation he had with Trump about the Karen McDougal payment. Blanche suggests there is some kind of dispute over the authenticity of this recording."

Bromwich: "Todd Blanche lays the groundwork for his most important attack on Michael Cohen, saying he is the only witness who testified that Trump knew everything about the hush-money payment that was made to Stormy Daniels.... 'There is no way that you can find that President Trump knew about this payment at the time it was made without believing the words of Michael Cohen -- period,' Blanche says."

Haberman: "Todd Blanche is making one of his most coherent arguments of the morning, which is that if Stormy Daniels's allegations were so scary to the Trump campaign, why didn't it swing into action in April 2016, when a woman working with Daniels got in touch with The National Enquirer's parent company"

Kate Christobek: "Prosecutors are expected to argue that the release of the Access Hollywood tape in October 2016 sent the campaign into damage control mode to confront the intense fallout."

McKinley: "Todd Blanche has twice noted that Stormy Daniels had denied having sex with Trump. While technically true -- she did put out a statement denying they had an affair in early 2018 -- she subsequently provided her account of the sexual encounter to '60 Minutes,' in a book, in a documentary and here, on the stand, where she testified under oath. Trump ... has repeatedly denied the tryst occurred."

Bromwich: "Todd Blanche, drawing on a 2018 recording in which Stormy Daniels's lawyer at the time said that his client had 'settler's remorse' for having agreed not to tell her story, says that Daniels eventually changed not because she had decided to tell the truth, but because she wanted to make money. Now, he is introducing what he calls a 'separate conspiracy' between Daniels, Gina Rodriguez, her manager at the time, and Dylan Howard, who was the editor of The National Enquirer."

Haberman: "Todd Blanche is now arguing the publication of the 'Access Hollywood' tape, in which Trump boasted about grabbing women by the genitals, is being portrayed by prosecutors as something it wasn't: a 'doomsday event' for his presidential campaign. Having covered that race, I can tell you that the view of a lot of people around Trump -- and in the broader G.O.P. -- was that it could be catastrophic for his electoral chances. That was so much the case that there were discussions about asking Trump to drop out of the race."

Bromwich: "Todd Blanche has moved on to Michael Cohen's relationship with Robert Costello, a lawyer who Cohen testified had been part of a pressure campaign to keep him from turning against Trump in 2018. Blanche argues that there is 'no doubt' that Costello, who is one of only two witnesses the defense lawyers called, served Cohen as a lawyer.... Blanche is now mocking Michael Cohen's testimony about the evening of Oct. 24, 2016. This was testimony on which the defense lawyers felt they had scored a key point, because they found evidence that Cohen had talked to Keith Schiller, Trump's bodyguard, about a 14-year-old who was pranking him. Cohen later testified that he had talked to both Schiller and Trump during the call. But the defense clearly thinks it has a winning argument here."

Haberman: "Todd Blanche is now digging into Michael Cohen's lengthy list of lies. The challenge here for the defense team is that the defendant, Trump, is a very known commodity with his own credibility issues."

Gold: "Todd Blanche listed 10 reasons that he believed the jury should have reasonable doubt as to Trump' guilt. But the list was hard to follow. He misstated the fourth point, which he then broke into three parts. And he gave all of the points equal weight, even as he only glanced over some of them in the rest of his summation."

Bromwich: "Todd Blanche introduces the acronym G.O.A.T., commonly used to stand for 'greatest of all time.'" He then applies the acronym to Michael Cohen. 'Michael Cohen is the G.L.O.A.T.,' Blanche says. The 'greatest liar of all time.'... Todd Blanche concludes, again thanking the jurors. He tells them that if they pay close attention to the evidence they heard in the courtroom, 'this is a very quick and easy not guilty verdict.'... Before he concluded, Todd Blanche asked that the jurors not send his client to prison. Now, with the jury excused, Joshua Steinglass, the prosecutor who will give his side's closing argument, stands up and objects. 'That was a blatant and wholly inappropriate effort to call sympathy for their client,' Steinglass says, asking for a curative instruction.... 'Making a comment like that is highly inappropriate,' the judge said. 'It is simply not allowed, period.'"

Haberman: "Justice Merchan is now excoriating Todd Blanche for making an 'outrageous' statement. Merchan is clearly furious, and reminds Blanche, and not for the first time, that he was a prosecutor for long enough to know that it was out of bounds." [MB: According to reporters on MSNBC, the judge will give the jury a "curative instruction" after lunch, striking Blanche's remark about sending Trump to jail.]

Bromwich: "As proceedings resume, a prosecutor, Susan Hoffinger, reminds the judge that before the trial began, he himself precluded the jury from hearing anything about potential punishments for Trump. 'Mr. Blanche was certainly on notice that this was an improper argument,' Hoffinger says."

Haberman: "Justice Merchan is now instructing the jurors that Todd Blanche's comment about sending Trump 'to prison' was 'improper' and that they must disregard it. He reminds them that a prison sentence is not required in the event of a guilty verdict."

Bromwich: "Joshua Steinglass opens by reminding the jury that during opening statements, his colleague said that the case, at its core, is about 'a conspiracy and a coverup.' He then delineates three elements that the prosecution must prove: That there were false business records, that they were used as part of the conspiracy and that Trump himself was involved.... Joshua Steinglass says that the defense seemed to question the prosecution's integrity when referring to certain documentary evidence. 'There's nothing sinister here, no manipulation,' Steinglass says, explaining that all relevant calls are in evidence. Then he turns the tables, arguing that in a defense exhibit showing calls between Michael Cohen and another lawyer, Robert Costello, the defense 'double counted half the calls.'... Steinglass is dealing in quick succession with some of the arguments that Todd Blanche laid out toward the end of his closing, including the idea that there was an alternative conspiracy involving Stormy Daniels, her manager and a National Enquirer editor. He says that the defense is trying to distract from a key issue in the case, adding, 'In the end, all of this doesn't really matter.'...

“Steinglass is listing a number of witnesses who testified and who are loyal to Trump: Hope Hicks, Madeleine Westerhout, Jeffrey McConney, Rhona Graff and David Pecker. Steinglass says that Pecker has 'absolutely no reason to lie here,' and adds, 'and yet, his testimony is utterly devastating.'... Joshua Steinglass is now speaking about Stormy Daniels, saying that while she does not like Trump -- and, candidly, wants to see him convicted -- her testimony about her sexual encounter with him was credible, with details that had the ring of truth. Then, he says, the encounter itself was important, because if the jury finds Daniels's testimony credible, it explains why Trump would have sought to buy her silence.... 'If her testimony was so irrelevant, why did they work so hard to try to discredit her?' Steinglass asks, adding, 'Stormy Daniels is the motive.'...

"Joshua Steinglass has now moved onto Michael Cohen. He agrees that Cohen wants Trump convicted, but says that Cohen is 'understandably angry that to date, he's the only one who's paid the price for his role in this conspiracy.'... Steinglass just took a potshot at the defendant. 'Mr. Trump decided, like he often does, "I'm not going to pay this bill,"' he said, of the payment to the technology firm for which Michael Cohen was eventually overpaid when he was reimbursed in 2017.... He's noting that the defense accused Cohen of stealing for overstating the amount he was owed for paying the technology firm. Steinglass acknowledges that Cohen was wrong to steal. But, he says, 'it's not a defense to a false business records charge that one of the conspirators is also guilty for stealing from another.'...

"... Steinglass ... harps on a disparity between one portion of the defense's argument that suggests Trump didn't know about the reimbursement and another that suggests that he did.... Steinglass comments on Trump's 'chutzpah,' saying that Michael Cohen lied to help Trump, and now Trump's lawyers are using those lies to try to undermine Cohen....

"Joshua Steinglass ... sought to counter the defense's argument that Michael Cohen called Trump's bodyguard, Keith Schiller, not Trump himself, on the evening of Oct. 24. The defense argued that the call was about a teenage prank caller who had been bothering him, not about arranging the hush-money payment, as prosecutors had said.... Steinglass just started a timer and pretended to have the exact same conversation, adding plenty of asides and silences as he played the role of Cohen, talking first to Schiller and then to Trump. The call felt as if it lasted a long time. But when Steinglass stopped the timer, it had only been about 49 seconds, about as long as the call in question. The point he was seeking to illustrate was simple: That Cohen could have easily talked to both men, just like he testified.... This was a real piece of showmanship -- clever and useful at the same time. Moments like these show Steinglass's experience....

"Steinglass is ... pointing out that had Cohen been more predisposed to lie, he could have told whoppers about Trump or attributed more damaging comments to him. Steinglass says that Cohen didn't do any of that 'because he's limited by what actually happened.' ... [Steinglass] asks jurors to remember that 'we didn't choose Michael Cohen to be our witness. We didn't pick him up at the witness store.' Then he raises his voice and says that Trump chose Cohen 'for the same qualities that his attorneys now urge you to reject his testimony because of.'...

"The argument that Joshua Steinglass is making about Michael Cohen right now is a prosecutorial classic when it comes to cooperating witnesses: if you want to know what happens in the gutter, you have to talk to the rats. But here, prosecutors are not talking about classic street crime, but about a plot to defraud the American people. 'This case is not about Michael Cohen,' Steinglass says. 'It's about Donald Trump.'"

Haberman: "It's hard to stress the significance of what Steinglass is saying -- both that this case is not about Michael Cohen, and that Cohen was exactly what Trump wanted in a lawyer."

Bromwich: "Joshua Steinglass is outlining the prosecution's theory of the August 2015 meeting between Trump, Michael Cohen, and David Pecker, who was the publisher of The National Enquirer, in which they agreed to a plot to suppress negative stories about Trump and promote negative stories about his opponents."

Haberman: "Joshua Steinglass is now puncturing one of Todd Blanche's favorite arguments -- that The National Enquirer is just like all other publications and that David Pecker's arrangement with Trump wasn't unusual. It may not have been unusual for The Enquirer, but there i nothing normal or standard about what the tabloid was doing with Trump."

Bromwich: "Joshua Steinglass addresses Todd Blanche's interest in 'catch and kill,' drawing a distinction between the phrase and the actual practice. Steinglass ... argues that suppressing those stories amounted to committing fraud toward American voters, pulling the wool over their eyes 'in a coordinated fashion.' He calls The National Enquirer 'a covert arm' of Trump's 2016 campaign."

Christobek: "Steinglass further notes that non-disclosure agreements are not inherently criminal, but they are 'indeed illegal when they serve an unlawful purpose.'"

Bromwich: "'This scheme, cooked up by these men, at this time, could very well be what got President Trump elected,' Joshua Steinglass says, concluding the portion of his closing that refers specifically to the Trump Tower meeting.... Todd Blanche had noted that David Pecker said he would print the doorman's story, about Trump fathering a child out of wedlock, regardless of whether it was true. But Steinglass shows the jurors that Pecker added that he would wait until after the election to do so. 'Because that was what they agreed to do,' Steinglass says, taking another chance to nod back toward the alleged conspiracy....

"Joshua Steinglass is highlighting David Pecker's testimony that he discussed Karen McDougal with Trump. Steinglass says it offered 'powerful evidence' of Trump's involvement in her hush-money deal, and showed he knew about the payment and was actively involved in arranging it. Steinglass also notes that the testimony does not rely on Michael Cohen in any way."

Haberman: "What's striking about Joshua Steinglass's closing argument is that unlike Todd Blanche, he is telling a story with a narrative arc as he seeks to dismantle Blanche's arguments. Blanche raised and dropped so many different things that ultimately had nothing to do with his argument that it was hard to keep track of."

Bromwich: "Joshua Steinglass notes that after closing the hush-money deal with Karen McDougal, the editor of The National Enquirer did not immediately call his boss. Instead he placed a call to Michael Cohen, whom Steinglass connects to Trump, underscoring, again, that The Enquirer was working on Trump's behalf."

Christobek: "Joshua Steinglass's voice is booming as he tells the jury that David Pecker, the former publisher of The National Enquirer, was willing to sacrifice his bottom line in service of Trump's campaign, adding that this deal was 'the very antithesis of a normal legitimate press function.'"

Haberman: "Joshua Steinglass has been showing the degree to which Trump, based on call records, would have had knowledge of the discussions around acquiring Karen McDougal's life rights. This cuts against Todd Blanche's portrayal of Trump as essentially a dupe who people took advantage of."

Bromwich: "Joshua Steinglass resumes after the break with the release of the 'Access Hollywood' tape in October 2016, and describes Trump's comments in that tape as having discussed 'grabbing women by the genitals.' He reminds the jurors that Hope Hicks testified that the news eclipsed that of a Category 4 hurricane bearing down on the East Coast, and then jokes that the tape must have been like a Category 5 hurricane.... Joshua Steinglass is showing the jurors video clips of Trump himself acknowledging that the 'Access Hollywood' tape and its aftermath could swing a very tight election. 'If 5 percent of the people think it's true, and maybe 10 percent,' Trump says in one clip, 'we don't win.'... And now, having painted a picture of just how desperate the Trump campaign was as it spun the 'Access Hollywood' tape, Joshua Steinglass reintroduces the jurors to Stormy Daniels. 'During the exact same month that the defendant was desperately trying to sell the distinction between words and actions, he was negotiating to muzzle a porn star who was preparing to go public,' the prosecutor says....

"As Steinglass takes the jurors through a wealth of documentary evidence, he tries to signal to them that he is not wasting their time. 'We don't need to show all these calls and emails back and forth, they're in evidence if you want to see them,' he says, before continuing to show more calls and emails.... This closing is proceeding so neatly -- and yes, slowly -- through the timeline that we can tell you exactly what day in October 2016 Joshua Steinglass is talking about during any given moment. Right now, in the courtroom, it's Oct. 23, 2016. Which, if you're keeping track, is four days away from when Michael Cohen actually sent $130,000 to a lawyer for Stormy Daniels....

"Joshua Steinglass is now onto evidence from Oct. 25, 2016, two days before the hush-money payment was made. 'There's this crazy flurry of phone activity among the co-conspirators here,' Steinglass points out, and then rattles off the proper names -- Michael Cohen to David Pecker, Pecker to Cohen, Cohen to Keith Davidson -- to illustrate just how much phone activity there was in the course of half an hour.... On Oct. 26, one day before making the hush-money payment to Stormy Daniels's lawyer, Michael Cohen talks to Trump on the phone twice. 'This is damning, right?' Joshua Steinglass says, using a conversational tone as he points toward these records and arguing to the jurors that Cohen was getting a final sign-off from Trump before he initiated the sequence of financial transactions that would conclude with him wiring $130,000.... 'As part of this process, yet another false business record is created,' Steinglass says, leaving a trail of potential unlawful means that jurors could draw on during deliberations as they seek to determine whether Trump unlawfully influenced his election victory....

And now we hear that on Oct. 27, the money was sent, and on Oct. 28, just 11 days before the election, Stormy Daniels signed the non-disclosure agreement."

Haberman: "A lot of the back-and-forth about who called who around the Stormy Daniels payoff felt dizzying, but the jurors have generally seemed quite engaged. And Joshua Steinglass landed his argument by saying that while the sex between Daniels and Trump allegedly took place in 2006, the payoff wasn't until 2016 because his concern wasn't actually his family, as his lawyers have suggested, but the election."

Bromwich: "We're now hearing about Nov. 4, 2016, four days before the election, the day that The Wall Street Journal -- with a reporting team that included our colleague Michael Rothfeld -- broke a story about The National Enquirer's deal with Karen McDougal on Trump's behalf.... Steinglass reminds the jurors that Hope Hicks sent over a statement for the story on behalf of Trump, and that Trump lied in the statement, saying he didn't know anything about the Karen McDougal deal. Steinglass says Trump did in fact know about it because, as we've heard, he was on tape two months earlier talking about it. 'Why, why would Mr. Trump lie about that?' Steinglass asked, raising his voice and punctuating his argument....

"'And then, on Nov. 8, the defendant was elected president,' Joshua Steinglass says. He notes that some of the players in the drama he just described were conscious of the roles they had played in Trump's election. 'What have we done?' Stormy Daniels's lawyer texted a National Enquirer editor as the results came in. Steinglass says that 'we'll never know if this effort to hoodwink the American voter' made the difference in 2016. But he reminds jurors that prosecutors don't have to prove that it did -- they just have to show that Trump was a part of a conspiracy to aid his victory.

"Joshua Steinglass has moved the action to January 2017, the month that Trump was inaugurated. He is describing a meeting between Michael Cohen and Allen Weisselberg, then the Trump Organization's chief financial officer, who Cohen testified had made the arrangements to reimburse Cohen for the hush-money payment. 'Right on the bank statement, Weisselberg and Cohen calculated all the money that was owed to Cohen,' Steinglass says.... Steinglass then highlights Michael Cohen's testimony implicating Trump in the charged crimes. He shows jurors, using highlighted transcript pages, Cohen's testimony that Trump not only approved the arrangement but was aware that the reimbursements would be classified as payments for legal services.

"... Steinglass ... moved very quickly over some of the testimony most damning to Trump, because it came from Michael Cohen. And now he is referring to exhibits that Jeffrey McConney, a longtime loyal Trump employee, testified about: Allen Weisselberg's notes setting up the repayments. Steinglass refers to these exhibits as 'the smoking guns' of the prosecution's argument, saying they 'completely blow out of the water the claim the money paid to Cohen' was for legal services."

Haberman: "Joshua Steinglass is now focusing on the so-called 'gross-up' of the amount that Michael Cohen was paid for tax purposes. Typically, legitimate legal fees are not 'grossed up.'"

Christobek: "Steinglass reminds the jury that Jeffrey McConney, the former controller of the Trump Organization, testified that in 50 years he was never aware of a payment being doubled for taxes. He then argues that this gross-up was made because the reimbursement was disguised as income."

Bromwich: "Joshua Steinglass puts his own spin on one of the defense's closing arguments, that the existence at the Trump Organization of financial documents related to the charged crimes shows that they were not crimes.... If that logic held, Steinglass says, no charge of falsifying business records would ever be successful because 'The existence of the false business record in the first place would prove there was no intent to defraud.'"

Christobek: "Joshua Steinglass is addressing Todd Blanche's claim from this morning that Michael Cohen did other legal work for Trump in 2017. He argues that Cohen did less than 10 hours of legal work that year. Steinglass points out that Cohen spent more time being cross-examined during this trial than he spent doing legal work in 2017." ~~~

~~~ Bromwich: "Steinglass argues that, if the defense's arguments that Cohen was being paid for legal services held up, Trump would have ended up paying Cohen at a rate that would have added up to more than $100 million annually.... Steinglass notes that Trump himself has, several times in several places, 'admitted' that the payments to Cohen were reimbursements, not payments for legal services."

Haberman: "Joshua Steinglass is now showing Trump's filing with the federal government's Office of Government Ethics in May 2018 that revealed Trump had made a payment to Michael Cohen. The filing came a few days after Rudy Giuliani, one of Trump's lawyers, said on Fox News that Trump had reimbursed Cohen for the Stormy Daniels payment."

Bromwich: "[Steinglass] said that the defense was arguing that Allen Weisselberg and Michael Cohen were assuming authority over large amounts of Trump's money. 'That's crazy,' Steinglass says. 'Neither one had anywhere near that kind of authority.'... Steinglass is again attacking the defense for what he says was a 'false narrative' about Trump ceasing to attend to his personal financial matters once he assumed the presidency. He notes that an assistant in the White House, Madeleine Westerhout, testified that Trump paid close attention to his personal expenses as president....

"Steinglass points the jurors to testimony from Hope Hicks, in which Hicks said that Trump had expressed it 'would have been bad' to have the Stormy Daniels story come out before the election. He argues that this comment shows that Trump was less focused on protecting his family and his wife than he was on winning the election....

"The prosecutors have argued that a lawyer named Robert Costello was dispatched to attend to Cohen. Steinglass now begins to talk about Costello, who was the only substantive witness called by the defense, and chuckles as he does so: Costello's appearance was a bit of a circus....

"Joshua Steinglass, describing how Michael Cohen discussed having pleaded guilty to federal crimes, hews very close to the trial transcript. When Steinglass's colleague Susan Hoffinger questioned Cohen about those pleas, she made sure to ask him if he had committed crimes at Trump's behest. Cohen said that he had, and Steinglass just read significant portions of that testimony aloud, before pivoting to Trump's tweets blasting Cohen shortly after he pleaded guilty.... Steinglass argues that the tweets were meant to send a clear message to other potential witnesses. 'Cooperate, and you will face the wrath of Donald Trump.'...

" Steinglass continues the argument about witness intimidation, noting that Trump attacked Stormy Daniels on social media the same day she had an interview with the Manhattan district attorney's office. Steinglass argues that the post contains a lie -- in it, Trump said that he hadn't seen or spoken to Daniels since meeting her on a golf course in 2006.... Steinglass says that the jury knows it to be a lie because Rhona Graff, Trump's loyal assistant, testified that Daniels had met with Trump at Trump Tower." ~~~

~~~ Haberman: "Steinglass asks why, if Trump simply had a business relationship with Daniels, he attacked her in March 2023 when she made public that she had appeared before the grand jury."

Bromwich: "Reviewing the evidence from that month that corroborates Cohen's testimony, including his calls with Trump, Steinglass asks: 'Is this timing just all a coincidence, every single one of these things?' No, is his implied answer, so obvious he doesn't say it. Instead, he asserts: 'Mr. Trump is being kept abreast of every development.'"

Haberman: "Joshua Steinglass is now walking the jurors through Trump's own words in 2018, when he described the payments to Michael Cohen as 'reimbursements.'"

Gold: "Joshua Steinglass is offering three rebuttals of the defense's argument that Michael Cohen acted on his own, without Trump's knowledge. First, he says that Trump was a micromanager who was directly involved with the details both of his business and his political campaign." ~~~

~~~ Bromwich: "Second, Steinglass says, Cohen was and is a self-promoter and it 'defies all common sense' that he'd undertake herculean efforts on behalf of Trump and keep it to himself." ~~~

~~~ Gold: "And Steinglass's third reason is that Trump was the only one who would have benefitted from the scheme that prosecutors accused him of. Cohen, he says, just wanted to be reimbursed and had no reason to push for creating false business records. 'The defendant was the beneficiary of this entire scheme,' Steinglass says. 'He was the one trying to get elected.'"

Bromwich: "Steinglass says that Trump's intent to defraud could not be any clearer, arguing that Trump could have simply paid Daniels himself, but instead devised an elaborate scheme to pay Daniels secretly that required the involvement of at least 10 other people. 'Everything Mr. Trump and his cohorts did in this case was cloaked in lies,' Steinglass says, adding, 'The name of the game was concealment, and all roads lead to the man who benefited the most, Donald Trump.'... [He says] that the evidence [against Trump] is overwhelming and that while the former president is a former president, the law applies to him the same as it does to everyone else."

Maggie Haberman & Jonah Bromwich of the New York Times: "... with less than six months until Election Day, Mr. Trump, who has long pushed messaging about 'law and order,' is leaning into an outlaw image, surrounding himself with accused criminals and convicts.... Mr. Trump's rally last week in the Bronx wound down with appearances from the two rappers, Sheff G and Sleepy Hallow.... Both were charged in a conspiracy that Brooklyn prosecutors say led to 12 shootings. Mr. Williams also faces two counts of attempted murder. Both men pleaded not guilty and are out on bail.... Two days later, as Mr. Trump spoke to an unfriendly crowd at the Libertarian Party's national convention in Washington, he promised to commute the sentence of Ross Ulbricht, the founder of the black-market website Silk Road, who was sentenced to life in prison in 2015.” Read on for more. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Yesterday I was watching a good Scottish police procedural ("Shetland"), and one character described a character who was an aging mob boss. The old mob boss sounded just like Trump.

~~~~~~~~~~

Presidential Race

President v. Guttersnipe. Michael Shear of the New York Times: "President Biden paid tribute to veterans who died in America’s wars at Arlington National Cemetery on Monday, hailing them as 'a link in the chain of honor' who deserve recognition for protecting the nation's democracy.... His somber message was a sharp contrast to that of ... Donald J. Trump ... who posted an angry and incendiary Memorial Day message on his social media site."

Quid Pro Quo. Josh Dawsey of the Washington Post: Donald Trump has made "a series of audacious requests ... [of] big-money contributions in recent months, according to 11 donors, advisers and others close to the former president.... The pleas for millions in donations come as the presumptive Republican nominee seeks to close a cash gap with Biden and to pay for costly legal bills in his four criminal indictments.... By frequently tying the fundraising requests within seconds of promises of tax cuts, oil project infrastructure approvals and other favorable policies and asking for sums more than his campaign and the GOP can legally accept from an individual, Trump is also testing the boundaries of federal campaign finance laws, according to legal experts.... Larry Noble, a longtime campaign finance lawyer, said Trump was technically allowed to ask only for contributions of $3,300 or less for his campaign, according to federal laws. But he can appear at events for his super PAC where the price of admission is far higher -- as long as he doesn't ask for the money directly.

     ~~~ Thanks to RAS for the lead.

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Mike Allen of Axios: "It turns out that The Post's former Supreme Court reporter, Bob Barnes, did a front-yard interview with Justice Samuel Alito on Jan. 20, 2021 -- President Biden's inauguration day -- about the upside-down American flag that had flown outside the justice's home in Fairfax County, Va.... Cameron Barr, the Post's former senior managing editor, told Semafor's Ben Smith that he takes responsibility for the decision. 'I agreed with Bob Barnes and others that we should not do a single-slice story about the flag, because it seemed like the story was about Martha-Ann Alito and not her husband,' Barr said. 'In retrospect, I should have pushed harder for that story.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: You are not "taking responsibility" when you claim the reporter and unnamed others agreed with or perhaps lobbied for axing the story. It may have been your call, but you're making Barnes & "others" share the blame.

Only White People Need Apply. Daniel Wu of the Washington Post: "A Virginia-based technology company will pay more than $38,000 in penalties for posting a discriminatory job advertisement that only sought to hire White U.S. citizens, the Justice Department announced. Arthur Grand Technologies Inc., a firm that provides information technology services, in March 2023 posted a job advertisement for a business analyst position on the hiring site Indeed that asked in a bolded note for 'Only Born US Citizens [White] who are local within 60 miles from Dallas,' according to a Justice Department news release." The company blamed a disgruntled employee for the ad whom the CEO said he fired after he learned of the ad. MB: The name of the CEO suggests he is not your average U.S.-born White guy.

     ~~~ Marie: The company's defense sounds credible, at least based on the WashPo report. It's not clear from the report where the ad was posted: on its own Website?? No reputable U.S. outlet would publish an ad that so clearly violated EEOC rules. I'm not sure why DOJ fined the company instead of giving them a warning or a suspended fine.

~~~~~~~~~~

Israel/Palestine, et al.

CNN's live updates of developments Tuesday in the Israel/Hamas war are here.

Bibi Calls a Calculated Act of War "a Tragic Accident." Isabel Kershner of the New York Times: "With international condemnation mounting, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel said on Monday that the killing of dozens of people a day earlier at a camp for displaced Palestinians in Rafah was 'a tragic accident,' but gave no sign of curbing the Israeli offensive in the southern Gaza city. The deadly fire that tore through the encampment on Sunday after an airstrike came at a particularly delicate time for Israel, just days after the International Court of Justice appeared to order the country's military to halt its offensive in Rafah and as diplomats were aiming to restart negotiations for a cease-fire deal between Israel and Hamas. The Israel military said that the target of the strike in Rafah on Sunday was a Hamas compound, and that 'precise munitions' had been used to target a commander and another senior militant official there. But at least 45 people, including children, were killed by the blast and by the fires it set off, according to the Gaza health ministry. The ministry said that 249 people were wounded." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: A "tragic accident" is when you are setting off firecrackers for fun and you blow up two fingers. The tragedy is that it is a self-inflicted wound caused by your own tendency to be incautious and take stupid, unnecessary risks. The accident is that you did not intend to cause harm. An act of war is when you kill people you are aiming at with "precise munitions."

Josh Dawsey, et al., of the Washington Post: "... Donald Trump promised to crush pro-Palestinian protests on college campuses, telling a roomful of donors -- a group that he joked included '98 percent of my Jewish friends' -- that he would expel student demonstrators from the United States, according to participants in the roundtable event with him in New York. 'One thing I do is, any student that protests, I throw them out of the country. You know, there are a lot of foreign students. As soon as they hear that, they're going to behave,' Trump said on May 14, according to donors at the event.... [Trump] didn't mention Netanyahu, whom he resents for acknowledging Joe Biden's victory in 2020 and hasn't spoken to in years."