Discover the inner workings of the legal system as we navigate the turbulent waters of Donald Trump's Manhattan trial with former prosecutor Eric Lisann.
This episode peels back the layers of complex legal strategies and the spectacle of courtroom drama. We explore how Trump's repeated contempt charges for violating a gag order could reshape the judicial landscape, with Eric providing his seasoned perspective on the rare nature of such violations and their ramifications. The balance between legal proceedings and the political narrative becomes a focal point, as we address the court's measured response to Trump's defiance without stoking the fires of his fervent support base.
Turn the page to a chapter where storytelling in the courtroom takes center stage; this isn't just about the dry recitation of facts but the art of persuasion. With Eric's insight, we scrutinize the roles that Michael Cohen and David Pecker play in Trump's legal saga, their testimonies potentially pivoting misdemeanors into felonies. Amidst the serious legal discussions, we share a lighter moment, musing over "Don Snorleone" and the image of courtroom drowsiness in the political theater. Yet, we quickly return to the gravity of the situation, considering the implications of a defendant's lack of engagement for the judge and jury and what that might signal about their view of the legal process.
Our final act traverses the broader investigations into Trump's affairs by the Southern District of New York. The narrative unfolds to expose the undercurrents of political influence within the Department of Justice, casting a long shadow over the pursuit of justice. As we bid farewell to Eric Lasan and his invaluable contributions, the episode extends an invitation to join us in further dialogues across the social media sphere. We're not just here to discuss; we're here to connect and enrich the conversation with our community of listeners, eager for the next chapter in this unfolding political and legal drama.
Discover the inner workings of the legal system as we navigate the turbulent waters of Donald Trump's Manhattan trial with former prosecutor Eric Lisann.
This episode peels back the layers of complex legal strategies and the spectacle of courtroom drama. We explore how Trump's repeated contempt charges for violating a gag order could reshape the judicial landscape, with Eric providing his seasoned perspective on the rare nature of such violations and their ramifications. The balance between legal proceedings and the political narrative becomes a focal point, as we address the court's measured response to Trump's defiance without stoking the fires of his fervent support base.
Turn the page to a chapter where storytelling in the courtroom takes center stage; this isn't just about the dry recitation of facts but the art of persuasion. With Eric's insight, we scrutinize the roles that Michael Cohen and David Pecker play in Trump's legal saga, their testimonies potentially pivoting misdemeanors into felonies. Amidst the serious legal discussions, we share a lighter moment, musing over "Don Snorleone" and the image of courtroom drowsiness in the political theater. Yet, we quickly return to the gravity of the situation, considering the implications of a defendant's lack of engagement for the judge and jury and what that might signal about their view of the legal process.
Our final act traverses the broader investigations into Trump's affairs by the Southern District of New York. The narrative unfolds to expose the undercurrents of political influence within the Department of Justice, casting a long shadow over the pursuit of justice. As we bid farewell to Eric Lasan and his invaluable contributions, the episode extends an invitation to join us in further dialogues across the social media sphere. We're not just here to discuss; we're here to connect and enrich the conversation with our community of listeners, eager for the next chapter in this unfolding political and legal drama.
one, two, three, four, hi. This is d night and I am speaking to former prosecutor eric lasan. I'd like to welcome him to the show. Uh, he is going to be providing us some information and some analysis on the developments over the course of this trump trial here in Manhattan. Eric, it's a pleasure to meet you Likewise, and so earlier today there was a contempt hearing for Donald Trump's numerous violations of his gag order, his court-imposed gag order. Out of 10 proposed violations, the judge found that he met the standard of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt for nine of them. And just, you know, is part of your experience as a former prosecutor, I guess. Generally speaking, like, how often is it that you even see an individual being held in contempt in violation of a gag order, not just once, but multiple times?
Speaker 2:
Very rare, I mean, I've never seen it at all actually. I've seen threats by the judge and I've seen a few cases where there's been sort of a summary contempt, where it happens in the courtroom, which under most state laws the judge can immediately act upon without a separate proceeding, where somebody's been locked up for a day I once saw it overnight. But I've never seen this type of continuous back and forth and really a daring by the defendant of the judge to do anything. And in fact it's worked for Mr Trump in all of his cases so far, because nobody's ever called him out for him. In the civil fraud trial. He was fined by the judge there in Goran but even though the judge was furious and Mr Trump had brazenly crossed the line, there was no sanction. And I, among many people, have always pointed out that unless and until there's detention, it's really unlikely that Trump is going to stop or modify his behavior. So we'll see here.
Speaker 2:
I think Judge Mershon and the district attorney's office all understood that they couldn't do much off the bat. Even though they said these were egregious violations, they didn't act immediately. They waited a week to have the hearing and then the violations kept piling up. Obviously, the fine amount of $1,000 is irrisible. It's just symbolic. It's not going to have any effect, but maybe the warning that the next time we mean it, if the next time you do it, we won't just give you a stern talking to, we might incarcerate you. Maybe this time, among all other times alone, among all the times this has gotten Trump's attention this is something we're only going to find out as each day goes by. I note that already today he had more attacks on the judge, which is not a violation of the gag order, but he's obviously going to continue going after the judge and and I find it hard to imagine that he's going to restrain going after Michael Cohen again whenever he testifies, and I think each day is going to be a volcano.
Speaker 2:
And then, if it happens, the real test then for credibility is whether the judge actually incarcerates Trump. He clearly doesn't want to do it. The district attorney hasn't been pushing for it. Everybody recognizes that it's a dangerous situation because you know we're really talking when we're talking about Mr Trump's base. It's a lone wolf kind of a lone actor threat that's initiated. It's even though he might call for people to come down to the courthouse and nobody comes, and that kind of thing. The real danger is there's a lot of people out there that are tuning into his rantings and his social media posts. Nobody knows where they all are. They could be anywhere and it only takes one of them and we've seen many instances of this to do something because he or she feels like he's been called to do it by these posts.
Speaker 1:
So that's a big part of the danger.
Speaker 2:
The judge is just focused on the witnesses and the jurors, but it's more than that. But even the witnesses and the jurors, they're in danger. If you know, we have this continued talk by Mr Trump and then, on a separate matter I think he was talking about, if the election doesn't go his way, then he's not ruling out violence. Violence and the call to it is never far from him. So, instead of my feeling is it's inevitable. This is a slow motion train wreck in terms of coming to a reckoning with Trump and and he's going to have to be detained next time it happens. But whether Judge Merchant buys into that, I don't know. It might mean an immediate appeal, it might mean some sort of a delay in the trial, but I don't think that's a reason not to do it if it's called for.
Speaker 1:
Right. What do you think about Judge Merchant's nuanced approach to giving Trump a break on that one count in terms of his comments about Michael Cohen, given that Cohen had been publicly making statements about Trump, although I guess technically so? Cohen tweeted that he would be refraining from making any public comments about Trump in the near future, as long as the trial is proceeding.
Speaker 2:
But it was still a violation of the gag order. But it was still a violation of the gag order. So it's again. It's a. It's a case of the judge bending over backwards, trying to give Trump every possible break. So if and when the hammer ever does come down, nobody can legitimately claim that Trump wasn't warned or that there's some that it's because of some infringement on his political speech rights, although those claims will inevitably occur anyway.
Speaker 2:
But I think that the judge could have found a violation even on the on the one count of Michael Cohen. You know, if he, if the judge wanted to, he could amend again the gag order To my way of looking at it. You know it's not really what Cohen is saying is not really a threat to Trump. But when Trump responds with his much larger following and you know he's at once the leader of the Republican Party and the leader of all these other sort of off-schedule groups or militias, it's a really asymmetrical threat. But if the judge wants to equate that with Michael Cohen, he's just giving him a break.
Speaker 2:
But there's still nine other counts. The predicate is there. If the behavior continues, it's not going to matter whether that one extra count is included there. There's a basis there for the judge to exercise his discretion and detain Trump. And he knows, I'm sure the judge, and the district attorney's office as well, is thinking well, what happens when this goes up on appeal? You never know what the appellate court might do. But they can't be limited and paralyzed by that. They have to take the action that is obviously necessary to restore the legitimacy of the proceedings, which otherwise, I think, has been going well yeah.
Speaker 1:
Well, I think you know look again, I'm not a lawyer, but I would assume this is Machan going out of his way to make sure whatever the verdict is in this case is appeal proof and bending over backwards for Trump, while it shouldn't be done. I mean there's there's no appeals court. That's going to. Well, I guess in New York it's the no, it is the appeals court. They will eventually look at this and they'll be like there's no way, because Machan is going out of his way, to bend over backwards to appease Trump in every single fashion. So I mean, I guess in that sense he's he's doing his due diligence.
Speaker 1:
But so normally I feel like in in white collar cases like this, where there's the submission of evidence like documents or phone records and such, both parties typically tend to. I suppose they both stipulate that the documents are what they are. But in this instance, trump's legal team decided to make the prosecutors call witnesses, like the archivist at CNN or whatever, to validate these videos and such, and typically these things just add unnecessary delays in these trials. They drag them out forever. What is your opinion on Trump's strategy, or at least as it pertains to his legal team, in dragging this out unnecessarily?
Speaker 2:
Your observation is absolutely right. Often these things are stipulated to much more often than not and it does drag it out. But my sense is that Trump isn't viewing this as a conventional case and it isn't. He's not a conventional defendant and I think he knows if it goes down in any sort of a conventional way he's cooked. The evidence here seems to be, so far it's very strong, and he doesn't really, I mean other than maybe hoping you know one or more jurors just is so sympathetic to him that they're going to reject the evidence. I don't think he's going to be able to meet the evidence, no matter what his lawyers do. So I think you know this is all part and parcel of his sort of reptilian resistance and his delay tactics, which overall have served him well, and even on a micro scale of this individual trial, he's going to try to drag it out. You know if he's going to make these custodians come in and just testify as to administrative or clerical things that aren't really an issue and it's going to inconvenience the jury and the judge.
Speaker 2:
I think he views it as a good thing, and I don't know that he's wrong, because I think otherwise— he's going to be convicted. So he's got to do everything he can to. You know, throw a monkey wrench into the works and and he's going to call the shots and he's trying to tell his attorneys what to do and of course it's risking pushing the attorneys into areas where they can themselves get into trouble, pushing the attorneys into areas where they can themselves get into trouble. But they knew that when they signed on for this and I think they are getting paid. People used to joke that as his attorney you wouldn't get paid. But we know now that all these attorneys are getting paid and they're getting paid good money and that's what you know.
Speaker 2:
Trump's not paying it, but he's getting other people to pay it. So I think the you know that increases the possibility that attorneys will just do what Trump says. Even Todd Blanch, who you know supposedly was claimed by many to be, you know, more of a buy the book guy and could be effective. I don't think that's going to be the case here. I don't think Trump cares if Blanche has any credibility with the court and I don't think he cares if he has any credibility with most of the jury. His strategy is just to try to get that pick off, that one juror who can cause a hung jury, and so I think we might see a lot of you know we're not out of the woods yet in seeing certain disruptions and things of that nature.
Speaker 1:
Right. So one more thing along this line of like these unusual delay tactics. Now, I know some prosecutors were concerned about the idea that there are numerous I believe three lawyers on the jury. Three lawyers on the jury and in this case, with these delay tactics, typically the prosecution is not allowed to allude to the fact that Trump's lawyers are basically wasting the jury's time. But I think if you have a couple of lawyers on the jury who are familiar with how this process typically plays out, they might actually look at this as pretty annoying and have an effect on some of the deliberations with the jury. But again, I'm not a lawyer. I wouldn't necessarily know that to be the case, but just my personal insight.
Speaker 2:
I think that's probably right. I agree with you there. Now there's many different types of lawyers. I don't recall what these particular ones that are on the jury actually practiced in whether they did litigation or something totally unrelated but there's a good chance that they'll understand what this is. But you're also right They'll be instructed not to legitimately factor that in in applying the law to the facts. Now, whether that's strictly followed or not, we don't ever really know, but the judge will give them an instruction that all of these legal rulings and other things that don't come into evidence are not to be considered by them. So there'll be that type of limiting instruction too, and I think all that again is going to contribute to Trump seeking to draw this out If he could. I don't think he. You know, if this goes another month, I don't think he cares.
Speaker 1:
No, yeah, despite his claims that he'd rather be out campaigning. I'm sure the last thing he wants is a conviction on his record. So we can rewind back a little bit to some of the first witness in the case. What do you think about the prosecution's game plan here of, in all intents and purposes, making David Pecker their star witness? Is this like an attempt to to minimize some of the problems that might come with Michael Cohen's testimony, or the testimony of Stormy Daniels and such, or the testimony?
Speaker 2:
of Stormy Daniels and such. I think so, but I think, even more than that, it worked out really well because he you know, as a prosecutor you rarely get everything out without a hiccup, and that happened here. I mean, obviously Pecker has his own implication in this. He could have been charged criminally but he didn't shy away from that fact. He openly discussed the fact that he had signed non-prosecution agreements and he obviously doesn't really come across as somebody that bears an animus to Trump. He still considers themselves to be friends and allies transactional of sort I think Pecker himself is sort of like Trump the transactional guy and probably to be friends and allies transactional of sort. I think Pecker himself is sort of like Trump the transactional guy and probably to be in that business that he was in.
Speaker 1:
I think Pecker specifically referred to Trump as a mentor, which is a strange comparison, but okay, I don't think I'd want to look at it tells you a lot about the relationship between the two and and I think it works for the prosecution because he didn't have an axe to grind.
Speaker 2:
One of the criticisms of Michael Cohen is that he's got an axe to grind. But I mean Cohen's axe to grind, I think is legitimate and doesn't necessarily mean he's not telling the truth, but here with Pecker we don't have he's not grinding an ax. He does corroborate Cohen, but he also laid the whole scene out, the whole context for the illegality of it, the stakes that they understood what they were doing was illegal or they thought it well could have been. But they understood also the importance for the election. They felt like this is necessary, that this scheme they hatched and executed was necessary in order for Trump to win. Whether that's right or not, as the prosecution has said many times, we don't really know. But they certainly thought that was the case and it was not an unreasonable thought. And he also laid out the whole landscape of this type of tabloid journalism if you really want to call it journalism, but technically I guess it comes under that, even though it has no regard for what actually happened. He was very open about it and the minor sort of concessions that came out on cross-examination where he had done similar things for Arnold Schwarzenegger and Tiger Woods, you know, and other celebrities.
Speaker 2:
I don't think is a huge win for Trump. I mean it doesn't mitigate what happened here and it can be differentiated. I mean, if you thought that was bad, the thing with Trump is even a level worse so, with higher stakes. So I think and it caught the public's attention, it made people understand there is a significance to this trial. It's not just about business records being misclassified or, you know, running through something, through the company that maybe shouldn't have been. It's a lot more. This was really all about illegally influencing the election and they knew that.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, speaking of the falsification of business records. So in New York, typically these are charged as misdemeanors and you basically have to bootstrap them up to a felony by showing they were committed in furtherance of another crime. And what do you think about the prosecution's strategy of basically starting off the trial with bootstrapping them up before they even get to the idea of the payments being the records being falsified?
Speaker 2:
Well, you always want to start the trial with a witness that's going to be engaging and sort of help paint a broader picture for what comes after. So it's not always a check the box thing, it's not always necessarily strictly chronological and you have to recognize the jurors are people you know they're sitting there, you know morning to late afternoon every day and you want to give them something interesting. You don't want to start with kind of a weak witness in terms of that witness's ability to engage with the jury. So Pecker is somebody that does present a compelling story and I'm sure obviously unfortunately we don't have a camera in, but the sense is, and certainly from the reports from people who are there are, that the jury was engaged.
Speaker 2:
So I think that kind of mandated, you know Pecker is the obvious choice to to start with and they can fill in the gaps later. But they've you know they've got other videos. They've you know they've got other videos. There's going to be audio recordings presumably that'll come in and obviously bank records and other documents that's going to have to come in. But at least the jury is going to have some understanding of the broader picture when those things come in now and they won't be totally lost. So I think that was a good choice by the district attorney's office.
Speaker 1:
I think that was a good choice by the district attorney's office. Yeah right, I think the prosecution did a really good job of putting everything into a frame for the jury from the get go, so they have a lens to view every piece of evidence that's presented after the fact. But speaking of like creating an environment that's engaging for the jury, and this is like not legal analysis, but what do you think of the fact that Trump can't stay awake in the first criminal trial of a former president in the history of the United States? Like that? He can't summon the attention to even stay awake. It's, it's beyond wild.
Speaker 2:
With you on that. I like the nickname you gave him, or that you amplified don snorleone yes, that was me.
Speaker 1:
I take credit for that, yeah yeah, that was good.
Speaker 2:
That's very apt. I think if if he hadn't been calling his political opponent sleepy joe and trying to make a big deal about that, then it might not have been so devastating. But I think politically that's one of the worst things for him to come out of. This is that this guy it's not just like he's falling asleep once, I mean, I think it's like a daily event Every day.
Speaker 2:
Yes, Every day. So you know one can imagine, you know easily a situation, the famous Situation Room. You know drama, you know. Do we have to call in airstrikes or go to war in Iran or wherever the hotspots are? And everybody's, you know making these, you know detailed analyses, and Trump as commander in chief, he's falling asleep. I mean, is that a visual that you know the electorate is going to go for? I think not. So I think that's a huge, a huge negative for him. And I guess he's not taking questions in these you know kind of press announcements he's doing. But I would think that somebody's got to be questioning him about that as well. And who knows what he'll say. Maybe he'll deny that he's even doing it, but everybody's seen him doing it. So his denials, I think, will seem all the more ridiculous. But you know, what else can he say?
Speaker 1:
move this back toward some, some legal analysis, like what does it say about a defendant that won't even show, like a judge and a jury and the prosecution, the basic respect of staying awake like if you're? If you were like giving jury instructions as a judge and you're like man, this dude didn't fall asleep in my court I'll make it really tough on him, no, wiggle his way out of it. I mean, I you know, look, I know judges don't probably don't take those things personally, but at some point the level of disrespect is has to enter the minds of the judge and the jurors. Am I wrong?
Speaker 2:
Yeah, so far. In all the other cases, I think that disrespect has shown through. In the E Gene Carroll case, when he got walloped with that second judgment the first one was only $5 million but obviously his comportment in the courtroom, you know, getting up and walking around it in opportune times and things like that this judge, I think, is not having it. I think he's told that. I think Judge Mershon has told Trump, you know, a few times you know to sit still or you know behave properly. So he's putting limits on it. So, yes, I think that's a big deal.
Speaker 2:
Now I have to say I mean I've seen jurors fall asleep in cases. I've even seen judges doze off at certain points. So I mean the days can get long, although I don't think these days are particularly long in this trial, I mean and they've only had two nominally full days so far, I believe, or maybe today was the third one. But you know anybody can, can doze off. But if you're the defendant and it's all about you and you're purporting to direct your legal team and you're barking out orders and yet you're falling asleep, obviously it adds another layer of absurdity to the whole proceedings. And that's what we've got with Trump. It's a clown show.
Speaker 1:
A clown show, my exact words that I was going to use. It's a clown show, like I've never seen anything like it. And look again the fact that we're even trying to talk about this as though it's completely normal. It's still beyond absurd to me, even that degree of normalizing it, because I want to scream about how ridiculous this is. But that would be inappropriate. So earlier today, the prosecution called Keith Davidson as a witness. Were you familiar with this testimony from earlier today?
Speaker 2:
I followed along with that. I was. That was interesting to me because, you know, really Keith Davidson had I mean, that wasn't entirely kosher, so to speak his representation of Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal, because he seemed to be somewhat conflicted. He is he really representing them and I think he was, but I don't know if he explained to his clients in the technically proper way that you know, did he have some other conflicts because of his close relationships with? You know the counterparties, you know the AMI and Pecker and Dylan Howard, and is he really trying to get the best deal for them? Um, I think those are things, legitimately, that um probably made him not the best attorney for them. Although I don't think he was horrible, he did get them some, um, some compensation, but it seems like, given the stakes, he could have gotten a lot more. But, um, but, but, but you know. But he's a legitimate attorney and he was trying to to work out transactions here and I think his testimony comes across so far. You know, we'll have to see how it ends up and and get the full cross examination obviously to really fully assess it, but so far I think he also comes across as credible and it just adds another layer of corroboration and another layer of strength to the case, because he's really emphasizing also the stakes here.
Speaker 2:
They knew that this was all about winning the election or not. Obviously, right after the Access Hollywood tapes he really drew the line there. When that Access Hollywood story broke. That was a game changer. Trump didn't care about suppressing all this stuff before that, which is deadly for Trump legally also, because one of his defenses that he's sort of proffered is that, well, obviously this is embarrassing. You know personally, and so you know these women are not that I'm saying, it's true what they're saying. But you know my family, my wife, I don't want them, you know, being subjected to these kinds of stories. So sure, who wouldn't want to bury that? But actually Trump is a different cat, right, he couldn't have cared less.
Speaker 1:
And his family, right, well, wouldn't he just cut a check from the Trump organization from the account that his family doesn't have any eyes on. Wouldn't that just be the simplest way to go about that?
Speaker 2:
Absolutely. It would have been the simplest way and if he had done that it wouldn't really have violated any laws. It wouldn't have violated campaign finance laws. But at every opportunity he chose to make it much more complicated to track it. And I mean he's basically both Davidson and Pecker and I'm sure other witnesses will say he had no interest in paying. I mean, he's kind of a cheapskate with that sort of stuff. He had no interest in hushing this story when it came to his family.
Speaker 2:
It was only when the electoral consequences became evident, after that whole Access Hollywood recording dropped, that he radically changed his tune because it was for the election, election.
Speaker 2:
So it's absurd to think now, given what we've heard, that this was not about the election but really just about his sensitivity to other people's feelings. You know, all of the witness testimony, all of the texts and communications that have gone back and forth so far have shown that he had not a care in the world on the personal side, about this. You know he probably didn't think there was anything wrong with it. I mean, I think he felt totally entitled to engage in this type of behavior and that seems to be more what the evidence is showing. But he did not want voters to be aware of it and to put that into a context where they might think this Access Hollywood tape was credible. And also remember Davidson was saying you know, we all thought the election was over. I mean, there's communications he sent out at the time. You know those wave the white flag type of statements. He's not going to win.
Speaker 1:
Now, after this tape, but Trump made this miraculous comeback. I have this one text message right here from Keith Davidson to Dylan Howard, I think the editor at the National Enquirer Right. But Trump made this miraculous comeback, have we done? And then Howard replied to Davidson oh my God, Like, is that not like? No, regardless of what that says about Trump's intent here, clearly Howard and Davidson were well aware that their actions had an impact on the election, if not totally responsible for his victory.
Speaker 2:
And they were like in shock. I think that they had kind of pulled it off. And that was one moment of humanity where they wondered you know, are we responsible for what can happen here? And I think the answer to that is yeah, they are responsible, among others, but they, you know. All the harm that caused, I think, can somewhat be traced to them as well as other individuals. And that was a rare moment of honesty and self-reflection between them where they recognized the significance of it. But Trump recognized it too, because all of a sudden he's willing to pay out. He's putting pressure on Michael Cohen. Now we're getting the story of that sort of secondhand through Davidson and Pecker and these other text messages. But we can see that this corroborates very strongly that Trump understood the importance of getting all this out. And Pecker, by the way, he testified that even after Trump was president, when he met Trump in the White House, trump was throwing a dinner in his honor. And what did they talk about? They were talking about this.
Speaker 2:
They were talking about How's my girl yeah, yeah, I mean he doesn't want to be briefed on the presidential daily briefing Right. I mean he famously couldn't sit through that for even 30 minutes. They had to dumb it down about all the crises in the world. That for even 30 minutes they had to dumb it down about all the crises in the world. You know he didn't have the mind for that, but boy can he spend a lot of time when it's about him being in power, whether it's plotting the insurrection or seeing whether Stormy Daniels or Karen McDougal is going to say something that might affect his ability to stay in power. He's all over that, you know. So it's very revealing.
Speaker 1:
And a total side note here. But what do you think is like? What is your take on him looping in Hope Hicks and Sarah Sanders into basically a plot to cover up an affair to affect the election? Like what do you like? This is the point at which we're. It's the wire and we're like are you taking notes on a criminal conspiracy? What are we doing? Like, whose decision was that?
Speaker 2:
Where's the wire. But you know what? He's rewriting the wire because you know he just doesn't. He thinks all these people are going to go along with him and he, you know, in the case of Sarah Huckabee Sanders and Hope Iggs, he was largely correct. You know. In fact, I think James Comey was in one of these meetings, right?
Speaker 1:
The FBI director.
Speaker 2:
I think he was in a meeting with Becker. I mean, any other person is going to be thinking, you know you don't want these people involved, but he thinks they're all going to be with the program of covering this up. And he wasn't necessarily wrong on that. You know, I think even Comey was still trying to get his bearings as to what was going on. But I think in Trump's mind these people were all in on the criminal conspiracy. You know they're with him and that's why he gets furious when people break with him. You know he saves his harshest rhetoric for those people. It is really type of a mafia mentality which many people have commented on.
Speaker 1:
For sure. And you talk about the fact that he expects these people to engage in conspiracies to cover up his crimes and just takes that for granted. Have you even considered how, just what a random event it is like, how random it is that the origin story for this investigation itself actually spun off from the Mueller investigation? Like this would never have happened if Robert Mueller's team had never gotten access to some of the records from the Trump organization and been able to look at these payments and be like, huh, that seems suspicious, let's, let's spin that off to the Southern District of New York. And then there was also the opportunity for the Southern District to continue. Is such a late stage is because, well, he basically called and killed the investigation, right, he was like, hey, manhattan DA's office, don't worry about this, sdny has got it. And then he's telling SDNY, hey, ixnay on that investigation. Like just a weird tale that we've ended up in this place like this.
Speaker 2:
Well, it's a disturbing tale because, you know, and SDNY, out of all of the US attorneys offices around the United States, they kind of held themselves out as being the most independent. They called themselves it's not the Southern District of New York, it's the Sovereign District of New York. Nobody tells us what to do and people were sort of repeating that line, which was false. Barr was having his, you know, minions and the deputies, and Rosenstein's deputies, and calling and putting pressure on it, even after Cohen had been prosecuted and convicted and sentenced to jail. Well, you know.
Speaker 2:
So what kind of a message is that? Here, the exact same conduct which benefits Trump has resulted in the lower person being prosecuted and going to jail, but but the prosecutorial authorities in this case the Southern District of New York, nominally being obviously part of the Department of Justice deciding no, the Southern District of New York not only being obviously part of the Department of Justice, deciding no, not to go through with it. It's a terrible look and they have never really wanted to admit that, that that happened, but clearly that it did. And now instead actually other people, on their behalf, I think, have tried to scapegoat Michael Cohen, saying he wasn't credible. So how could they go forward. But Alvin Bragg in the district attorney's office has put the lie to that.
Speaker 1:
Let's bring this back full circle. So you know, cohen does obviously have these credibility issues, but one of the things we found out during the course of Packer's testimony is that he signed a non-prosecution agreement with the manhattan da's office in 2019. So if the southern district of new york really wanted to pursue these charges, all they had to do was work their way up the chain to david pecker, their star witness, right there. Why, I don't understand. Why is it they didn't take next steps on that? Do any due diligence? I mean, obviously you know Bill Barr, unreliable narrator here, with his take on on how that proceeded. Obviously he had a hand in making sure this didn't go any further, but and we even had the instance of them, you know, erasing numerous instances of mentions of individual one and Cohen's indictment Like it seems like the fix was in from the get go once Barr was.
Speaker 2:
That's right. I mean, that was the intervention on Trump's behalf by high ranking officials at the Department of Justice, which was inappropriate because it wasn't based on policy or equity or anything like that. It was just to serve Trump's personal needs. And that might have made it more difficult for the district attorney's office to go forward. If they didn't know what the US attorney's office was doing, if they thought they were going forward, they didn't want to duplicate it. So I think that made it harder. I think that was part of the issue. There was that not only was there not cooperation from the federal side of it for the district attorney's office, but they might have felt that there was some interference there and that delayed it. I mean, eventually they probably realized yeah, this isn't happening at the federal level. Should we go forward at the federal level? Should we go forward?
Speaker 2:
And there was a whole tortuous history there where it looked like it wouldn't go forward for a while, but then they kept at it and it, you know, looks like now they've got a really strong case.
Speaker 2:
But and then the coup de grace, so to speak, of absurdity or what I don't know, is that the trial was almost derailed. It was certainly continued for about a month when it turned out that the US attorney's office there in the Southern District had been subpoenaed right, you know, lawfully subpoenaed and hadn't complied with it in a timely way. And then at the last minute they dumped all kinds of documents on the case and that caused the delay. So they really were a negative influence here and we haven't gotten to the bottom of that. A lot of what Barr did and caused to be done in the department has just been swept under the rug. I mean, people don't want to, you know, internally investigate that, it seems. But it's important for straightening things out, going forward and for accountability and for writing a correct history here to try to understand what happened there. So there's still a lot of questions with all of that.
Speaker 1:
Right, I'm not a fan of news outlets having Bill Barr on in any fashion whatsoever, but I do have an example of the shell game that was being played at DOJ, similar to what was going on with Manhattan. You know, manhattan's office in the Southern District of New York, specifically Rod Rosenstein, during the Mueller investigation, basically telling the FBI hey, you know, mueller's team will handle the counterintelligence aspect of the Russia investigation. And then telling Mueller's team hey, we're going to spin off the counterintelligence aspect of the investigation to the FBI, like, what kind of like? It seems as though once they come up with the strategy that works, once they try to employ it over and over. Same thing with this catch and kill scheme, I would imagine. But one last thing before.
Speaker 2:
I let you go. And that's a great point. We never got to the bottom of that and the press hasn't gotten to the bottom of it. So these are big things that need to be gotten to the bottom of. You know what's going on with that? We've never gotten a straight answer on that.
Speaker 1:
No, I haven't forgotten. I think about it regularly. But yeah, one last thing before I let you go. Trump has made it publicly known that he's willing to testify. Obviously, we can't rely on anything Trump states publicly, because clearly he's a known liar. But let's say you were Trump's legal counsel. What would you advise him to do in regards of testifying? In this case, to insist on testifying, like how would you coach him to kind of respond to the evidence that's been put forth so far?
Speaker 2:
Obviously, we have no idea what else is coming, but as far as what you're currently aware of, it's a great question because Trump probably is, you know, the world's worst witness, I mean, certainly one of the more difficult ones, you can imagine. I did have somebody very, very similar to him in a big trial, obviously not of this magnitude in terms of publicity and involving a former president, but someone with a very similar personality, and it's a difficult call because you can't really run through their testimony with them. They won't cooperate. You don't know what they're going to say. Trump obviously being a known habitual liar, I think he understands enough that he doesn't really want to testify, even though he might find it in his interest to claim that he will. But for a normal witness in a case like this, or a normal defendant in a case like this, your client, if you're representing that person, that's the biggest part of your case, because if that client can make the case, if he's credible or if he's believable to the jury, he can get right up there and talk to them directly and the jury is always going to have, you know, an inquisitiveness about what the defendant is going to say yes, they're going to get instructed by the judge that if the defendant doesn't testify, you know, don't pay any attention to that, you don't draw anything negative for that. That's absolutely his right to do so.
Speaker 2:
The defense will try to say you know he doesn't need to testify, the case is so weak. What's the point? There's nothing to be added here. But the jury is still going to wonder boy. I wish he had gotten up there and testified. So you always want the client to testify, but I don't think Trump is fixable. So it's a really tough question. I don't think you can make him testify in a credible way which doesn't make it worse. And here's the real issue, because you could say look, he's probably going to go down in flames anyway. So maybe his testimony doesn't make it worse. Maybe he speaks to you know one sort of outlier, you know irrational juror who is just going to sympathize with him against all the evidence. But here's the risk, even with all that, is that when it comes to sentencing, the judge takes into consideration whether the testimony of the defendant was truthful or not. That is appropriate and even required factor in sentencing.
Speaker 1:
So it was typically difficult to get a conviction on something like perjury. But if it's in the course of your own trial, when it's time for sentencing the judge is going to look at that like oh hey, you told a bunch of fibs on there, buddy, let's tack on some extra time.
Speaker 2:
And that may be the difference between him going to jail or him not going to jail. So these, these are big issues, but I don't think Trump will testify, because I think he doesn't want to testify. Recall, though, that he did testify for about five minutes in front of Judge N'Goran, but there was no jury there, so they gave him wide latitude to be ridiculous.
Speaker 1:
Yes, that was actually. I think Judge N'Goran actually did him a disservice there by letting him and his lawyers just run wild with their approach in that case, because they that did not prepare them for this endeavor in Merchan's court. But I do appreciate you for joining us. Thank you so much for your input. Tell everyone where they can find you on the. Well, I guess it's no longer known as Twitter, but X, formerly Twitter.
Speaker 2:
Well, I guess it's no longer known as Twitter, but X, formerly Twitter, at Eric Lissan, at E-R-I-C-L-I-S-A-N-N. And hopefully we can do this again or I'll get another. I should expand into podcasting or YouTube type things, so stay tuned for that. But but right now, x, twitter, twitter, and I appreciate all your engagement there.