Trump is back in court today, opening statements have begun, and the media is back to their bizarre reporting about his favorite target, including a report about flatulence. Meanwhile, anti-Jew protests erupt on campus at Columbia University and Yale University, and even the Biden administration is condemning them.
00:02:01.400All right, let's kick it off with Trump, because that's happening right now, though there's plenty to get to on these campuses and beyond.
00:02:08.540And here's the update. They started off the morning ruling on, it's called a Sandoval hearing in New York State.
00:02:16.120It's a special thing in New York where the judge and the lawyers sit down and they go over what the prosecution will be allowed to confront the defendant with if he takes the stand.
00:02:28.140So that the defense knows exactly how bad it's going to get in terms of his past bad acts.
00:02:34.880And they can hash it out, prosecution and defense attorneys, before the prosecutor tries it.
00:02:42.720And basically everything is in except for Trump's cheating on a math test back in the fourth grade.
00:02:48.740So it's basically a total green light for every alleged bad act in Trump's past.
00:02:57.180He can be confronted by the ruling against him in the civil fraud case brought by Letitia James, the $474 million judgment.
00:03:06.960He can be confronted with the findings of his gag order violations in his civil fraud case, not just this case, in the civil fraud case.
00:03:15.880He can be confronted with the, with two federal juries findings that he defamed E. Jean Carroll, not the sexual abuse liability, but the defamation liability.
00:03:30.660Good luck to the Trump team in trying to explain or whatever team's going to be charged with this, what he defamed her about.
00:03:39.920How are they going to get in that he defamed her without getting into the underlying allegation?
00:03:50.880And then she sued him for defamation and won on both.
00:03:53.980So I think this is a little too cute by half.
00:03:57.380It's a way of getting a both end, but trying to seem fair because he excluded sexual abuse finding.
00:04:03.140Trump can also be confronted with his agreement to dissolve the Trump foundation.
00:04:07.320Uh, the judge said he will allow prosecutors to introduce Donald Trump's infamous access Hollywood tape into evidence, not the tape itself, but the transcript so they can get, grab them by the P word in there.
00:04:22.220I mean, so basically Trump can't testify is the first effective ruling of the day because Emily, all he's going to be doing is trying to prove to the jury.
00:04:35.040There's a reason in the law we exclude character evidence as a role because you're not trying somebody on whether they're a good person or a bad person.
00:04:42.840OJ Simpson seemed like a perfectly nice person when he sat there to be tried for nearly beheading his ex-wife and Ron Goldman.
00:04:52.480It was about whether there was proof beyond a reasonable doubt about whether he committed this crime.
00:04:56.960Your character doesn't say whether you did it or didn't.
00:04:59.260Here in New York, we're going to allow a trial in Donald Trump's character.
00:05:03.640And he's been in business so long and has been such a colorful character for long enough that he really can't effectively allow that to happen, which means he can't take the stand.
00:05:13.760Yeah, I mean, I agree with that completely.
00:05:15.160It just also seems like such a great use of everyone's time just going through the annals of Donald Trump's various expressions of his own personal character.
00:05:23.660I think that will serve the public very well at this point.
00:05:26.520He has been so shy to reveal his true self up until now.
00:05:30.060But maybe, maybe finally they will get to the bottom of it here.
00:05:33.260I'm also wondering how real this toothache is, because I would honestly, if I were sitting and listening to this, probably spontaneously have a toothache as well.
00:05:43.140But, you know, I agree with exactly what you're saying here.
00:05:46.280And I think also it's important to remember that this is clearly a tactic.
00:05:50.520Liz Cheney has an op-ed in the New York Times opinion page today talking about how important this trial is.
00:05:56.960And you're starting to see, I think it was Pramila Jayapal said on a Sunday show just yesterday, something to an extent as, you know, we wouldn't have even been here if Donald Trump had just been impeached.
00:06:07.520So what's also on trial, I think, are the tactics of the left here.
00:06:10.720And the more that we're sort of putting Donald Trump's character on trial after, you know, everybody has had years and years and years to listen to a trial of Donald Trump's character, the left is going to lose in that sort of court of public opinion ruling.
00:07:27.280I'm going to give you guys and the audience just an overview of what's being said in opening statements.
00:07:31.460Just keep in mind, as you listen to this, there's a reason they call them opening statements, and then they call what happens at the end closing arguments.
00:07:39.860You're allowed to argue the evidence in your closing.
00:07:43.280Opening statements are supposed to be just statements of what you will be proving in front of them without tying, you know, fantastic conclusions together and stitching a narrative and so on.
00:07:55.260The opening statements are supposed to be factual and not argument.
00:07:58.840So this is what the prosecution says they are going to be able to prove, Prosecutor Matthew Colangelo.
00:08:05.300He begins by telling the jury that Trump, and just for the listening audience, there's no audio, there's no video.
00:08:10.600So this is the only way we can get through this trial.
00:08:12.640We get updates from the court, and then we have to read them to you.
00:08:14.960That's why I did a dramatic reenactment of the press coverage the other day.
00:08:19.020Begins by telling the jury Trump lied over and over and over again by disguising his business records.
00:08:24.820Trump, Michael Cohen, and David Pecker formed a conspiracy at a meeting early in the campaign to help Trump get elected.
00:08:35.420Colangelo has referred multiple times to this conspiracy between these three men.
00:08:39.260For the record, Trump is not, he is not charged with conspiracy.
00:08:42.920It's just a colorful term to describe.
00:08:45.900They met and reached an agreement about what the National Enquirer and other magazines within the AMI empire would do when it came to Trump.
00:08:55.560The New York Times reports, let's see.
00:08:59.060Okay, they're talking about how the National Enquirer did indeed go on to try to help Trump's campaign in 2016,
00:09:06.580including by embarrassing some of his opponents, like Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio.
00:09:11.100They put up a couple of the headlines, reports of the New York Times, Jonah Bromwich, I see one juror smiling slightly, as Colangelo describes some of those headlines.
00:09:22.580Remember, they accused Ted Cruz of his father of participating in the Kennedy assassination.
00:09:30.940Okay, they say, the prosecution, Pecker, will testify that $150,000 was more than the National Enquirer would typically pay for such a deal,
00:09:41.880and that Pecker had trouble being reimbursed for the money.
00:09:45.820Crucially, Colangelo says Pecker will testify that he spoke to Trump about it.
00:09:50.700Forgive me for not understanding the math on the $150,000.
00:09:55.920I think they paid $30,000 to a doorman at Trump Tower.
00:09:59.240And then there was another, it might have been $150,000 to Karen McDougal, who was the Playboy playmate.
00:10:04.600So, you know, what's that, $330,000 or so all in?
00:10:07.900Now, critically, they say that David Pecker is going to testify he spoke to Trump about this, so he's going to put it first person.
00:10:15.680You know, I can tell you Trump was in on it, because this is all the alleged election interference that they claim Trump was up to.
00:10:23.900Give me a couple of other, give me one more minute to lay this out.
00:10:27.180He says he has an audio recording, the prosecution does, regarding Cohen, Michael Cohen, that Cohen made, between himself and Mr. Trump, discussing the Karen McDougal deal.
00:10:38.180She was the Playboy playmate of the year in 98, with whom Trump allegedly had an extramarital affair.
00:10:43.520The National Enquirer paid her off to write, quote, health columns for the National Enquirer.
00:11:38.740But anyway, they're saying that this pattern of paying off Karen McDougal suggests a pattern of behavior that prosecutors will urge the jurors to take into account.
00:11:47.700Make assumptions about Trump's involvement in the payment to Daniels based on what he did with McDougal.
00:11:53.820He also, the prosecutor, described a communication from Keith Davidson, the lawyer for Karen McDougal, to Dylan Howard.
00:11:59.920This is the guy actually running the National Enquirer under David Pecker, the owner.
00:12:03.920As it became clear that Trump was winning the election.
00:12:07.040This is where Karen McDougal's lawyer says to Dylan Howard, as it became clear what Trump was winning, what have we done?
00:12:16.320And then Colangelo says it was election fraud, pure and simple.
00:12:20.680This is their theory, they're covering up an affair, like you have some obligation to let your affair partners come out and humiliate you.
00:12:27.940Okay, so Eliana, if you ever run for office and something bad in your past comes back to haunt you and somebody says, I'm going to tell everybody about how you cheated on some math tests, which we know Eliana Johnson never did.
00:12:41.580You can't do anything to make them go away.
00:12:52.700What do you make of this theory of the case and how it's going so far?
00:12:57.940So I'll stipulate that I am not a lawyer.
00:13:00.880However, I am familiar and I've talked to folks who are familiar with the defense, the Trump side's legal strategy here.
00:13:09.580It's pretty clear to me that the prosecution's goal is to throw the kitchen sink at Trump and make the case that he's a bad, skeezy person.
00:13:17.440Look, we know all of this stuff, and I think the defense is going to try to focus very narrowly on the crime for which Trump is being prosecuted.
00:13:28.340And they're going to argue it is not actually illegal to have an affair with someone and then sign an NDA.
00:13:38.520People sign NDAs in the course of business all the time.
00:13:41.280And the challenge, I think, for the prosecution is going to be to prove that Trump personally ordered whoever the person was in the Trump organization, some junior person.
00:13:58.220And I believe that guy is going to testify to falsify those business records, that he had control over how the record of this transaction was entered when he got a bill from Michael Cohen.
00:14:11.300And that, therefore, Trump personally was responsible for the falsification of that record.
00:14:18.620So it's a lot more complicated, I think, than the prosecution is presenting it, which is Trump's a bad, skeezy guy and does bad, skeezy things and all that stuff is illegal.
00:14:29.040But they're clearly trying to paint a larger picture and obscure what I think is like a pretty minor, flimsy and weak case.
00:14:38.960And there's a reason that Alvin Bragg's predecessor did not bring this case.
00:14:45.300The defense is going to say that they can't tie any of this to Trump, that apparently he's going to argue that Trump repaid Michael Cohen, that one hundred and thirty thousand dollar check that Cohen cut to Stormy, that Trump repaid Michael Cohen for legal expenses or legal retainer, I think is how it was listed in his business records, four hundred and twenty.
00:15:05.220So he's making the argument. Ask yourself, would a frugal businessman like Donald Trump, would a man who pinches pennies like that repay a one hundred and thirty thousand dollar debt to the tune of four hundred and twenty thousand?
00:15:17.360That's what the defense got up to say. And they went on to say this follows.
00:15:21.060President Trump is innocent. President Trump did not commit any crimes.
00:15:24.300He's doing what any of us would do. They say the story you were just told by the prosecution is simply not true.
00:15:31.140He says, let's see, that money that he gave to Michael Cohen was not a payback.
00:15:39.400He was President Trump's personal attorney.
00:15:41.500So they are going to dispute that the monies Trump paid to Cohen were reimbursement for whatever was paid to Stormy.
00:15:49.540And they're going to be relying on Michael Cohen's testimony that there was a deal between Trump and Cohen that Trump would use one hundred and thirty thousand dollars to pay off Stormy and he would do it through Cohen.
00:16:22.800The point is, though, if he paid money to get himself elected and he didn't document it as a campaign expense, it could potentially be a campaign finance violation.
00:16:36.200Emily, it's not in this case, because as former FEC election officials have told us on this show,
00:16:43.960it's not a campaign finance violation unless the only reason one would ever pay it is to advance one's political interests.
00:17:19.760The absolute crux of the case is that it has to be the only reason for the payment.
00:17:25.180And if they had classified it, actually, as a campaign expense, who knows what legal routes the left would have pursued to challenge that, actually.
00:17:32.960So that's another interesting question.
00:17:44.740Let's say you'll concede Donald Trump's argument here.
00:17:47.420If you give him the most charitable version of this, it never happened and he just didn't want Melania to have to deal with the pain, which is certainly legally an argument that he can make because nobody's in his head.
00:17:59.380And unless they have documentation proving otherwise, that this was only the specific reason that this happened was just for one thing, the campaign only.
00:18:08.600Now, that may be the case, but can they actually prove that it was the only, only reason?
00:18:15.740And it feels silly to even bring the questions about Michael Cohen as a witness into this because it's the case.
00:18:22.980I mean, you have to go through so many layers of ridiculousness just to get to how the jury is going to look at Michael Cohen.
00:18:28.160But that is another legitimate question.
00:18:30.160It's one that the Trump defense is obviously going to raise over and over again, the credibility of his testimony.
00:18:36.120If he is what this is all hinging on, if he's the one who can say that was the only reason for the payment, does it matter to the jury?
00:18:43.640If it's coming from Michael Cohen, I don't know.
00:18:46.520But yeah, this case is just weak all around.
00:18:48.740We've known it for a year and it's just going to become increasingly clear as the process goes on.
00:18:52.560That's so true because the normal way we get into arguments about campaign finance violations is when somebody tries to use campaign money to go buy themselves a suit for a presidential debate instead of their own money because they're cheapskates.
00:19:10.200And then they get in trouble because that suit is not something that would only ever be purchased for a debate.
00:19:21.100It's something that people purchase all the time for various reasons.
00:19:25.240And the way it was explained to us by this former FEC guy was even if the person can say, yeah, but I never wear suits.
00:19:34.060I literally only bought it for this debate.
00:20:33.060It seems that Blanche, the Times goes on, Todd Blanche will not be allowed to accuse Cohen of perjury directly, but he will say that Cohen lied under oath.
00:20:42.400The legal distinction may matter to some jurors, but the concept is likely more important as the defense team continues its efforts to undermine Cohen.
00:20:49.560The jury's not going to care one bit, whether he lied under oath or whether he lied in a way that it amounted to a legal definition of perjury.
00:21:28.420Offering a motive for Cohen's testimony against Trump.
00:21:31.240And he equates the catch and kill scheme involves involving the National Enquirer alleged by prosecutors to ordinary editorial decisions made by newspapers.
00:21:41.200I mean, you're the editor in chief of a news publication, Eliana.
00:21:45.420You don't do catch and kill, but I don't think he's wrong.
00:22:52.040So Trump had an arrangement with this guy.
00:22:54.340But was it was there a legal issue with that?
00:22:57.480And is that what this case is actually about?
00:23:00.620I don't totally understand how they how that relates to me.
00:23:06.580I guess my focus and what I've tried to wrap my head around is the NDA Trump struck with Stormy, how it was billed and represented within the Trump organization and whether that was a legitimate or not campaign expense.
00:23:23.380And our friend, Andy McCarthy, is the one who has really helped me understand this by talking to him and listening to his podcast, where he distinguished between, as you were talking about, a campaign expense is polling, is something like that that literally would not have existed but for the campaign, an advertising there.
00:23:46.820Or, as Emily said, there are lots of plausible reasons one could have signed an NDA with Stormy and paid her $130,000 to keep her mouth shut.
00:24:08.680They have to show that the entry in the Trump organization's docket of this agreement, the payment to Cohen as legal fees, was intended to cover up this campaign finance crime.
00:24:44.580Manhattan had a, you know, like not a not a friendly jury pool to Trump.
00:24:50.480And the real challenge of this of this is like getting the jurors to look at this with fresh eyes and to view Trump to view this on the merits.
00:24:59.800OK, so to that point, we ran this soundbite last week and I encourage everybody to go back and listen to the whole episode.
00:27:33.840It doesn't make it a campaign expense, even though my purpose was to do it to influence the election.
00:27:39.440Or suppose I'm an individual and I have a messy divorce in my background and I decide I'm going to run for office and I say to my lawyer, can we seal those records?
00:27:48.500And I pay my lawyer to try to seal those divorce records, even though I'm doing it for the purpose of influencing a campaign.
00:27:55.440Because those are things you might do for non-election related purposes, as is paying off a lover whom you allegedly had had an affair with while your wife was pregnant.
00:28:24.000Like someone's actually going to have to take a look at these legal standards, which are black and white and easy to understand relatively.
00:28:30.760And wrestle with this reality at some point, like it's it's one of the reasons why the case never should have been brought, frankly.
00:28:38.400And Brad Smith writes such a good point there about also the potential ramifications for precedent down the road if you do this, because to your point, Megan,
00:28:46.100say Donald Trump had classified these payments as campaign expenses, what would have happened then?
00:28:52.200And what happens if this ruling comes down and says that it was improperly not classified?
00:28:58.180What happens to those purchases people make that are intended to influence an election but are not exclusively election related?
00:29:06.600And I suspect that there's going to be an argument made that Stormy Daniels herself wouldn't have needed to be paid off if Donald Trump hadn't run for president.
00:29:16.660Therefore, this is all just about the campaign.
00:29:19.240But that is also not a good argument because it brings it back to, oh, well, you would never have needed a suit if you hadn't decided to run for president.
00:29:28.200No, not at all, but that I mean, we can be really cynical and look at the jury and say, you know, it comes down on this area that voted 85 percent for Joe Biden over Donald Trump being able to assemble an impartial jury there.
00:29:42.980I'm pretty cynical about that, honestly, but I know some people on the left are frustrated with Bragg for even bringing this case because they look at the other ones down the road and say, listen, we're talking about a potential hush money payoff to a porn star for Donald Trump, a man who was like actually planting stories about himself in the tabloids for years.
00:30:03.700This is known to the American public long before he decided to run for president.
00:30:07.760Meanwhile, they're trying to focus on January 6th cases, on documents cases.
00:30:12.160I mean, it just it does look extremely silly next to all of that.
00:30:15.860The media coverage continues to be a joke.
00:30:20.700Brian Stelter just tweeted out a source close to Trump tells at Dana Bash CNN that he what he confessed?
00:32:06.860And I'm hearing from credible sources who know what's going on in the courtroom.
00:32:12.160And what I'm hearing is, is that, take it for what it's worth, but that Donald Trump is actually farting in the courtroom and that it's very stinky around him.
00:32:22.540It's a putrid odor in the courtroom and that Trump's lawyers are like repulsed by the scent and the smell.
00:32:30.200I'm hearing it from actual credible people that as he's kind of falling asleep, he is actually passing gas and that his lawyers are really struggling with the smell.
00:32:42.920I think you'll actually start to hear more of that.
00:32:47.780I mean, they're hot on the trail of the flatulence.
00:33:50.260I mean, it's just, of course, though, if they can, if they can find a credible way by their low standards to get this into print, they will.
00:34:34.540And the candidate in the general election that's hurt is the one that's in the headlines.
00:34:41.240And the fact that Trump has these legal cases against him and is sitting in a courtroom, it gives the media a very easy excuse to keep Trump in the headlines every single day.
00:34:53.220And this is the sort of news that we're going to hear about him.
00:34:57.520And this is the real reason I think a lot of these trials are damaging for him.
00:35:01.620It keeps him at the center of the news when the headlines we should really be seeing are Trump out campaigning and prosecuting the case against Biden.
00:35:09.760And instead we're hearing about, you know, his odors from the courtroom.
00:35:13.880Not to mention Biden fails to say anything about the rampant antisemitism on college campuses coast to coast.
00:49:15.660I'm a 2006 graduate and the Beacon also had a reporter up there covering the events as they transpired on Friday and Saturday, where just much like at Columbia, the students were camped out in tents on a university plaza.
00:49:33.080And it is noteworthy that these events took place at a World War II memorial to Yale students who served in the wars and tore down an American flag and cheered as it was brought to the ground at that memorial.
00:50:16.560And to see it, to hear it yelled when an American flag falls on one of our most prestigious or at least used to be university campuses, Eliana, brings up something very like vile.
00:50:42.520These people are calling for the death of Jews.
00:50:45.260They're tearing down American flags on American university colleges.
00:50:49.580And we're just sitting back saying, you Jews, go ahead, Eliana.
00:50:53.540Shredfield, perfectly comfortable going to class and crossing their little picket line as the mob swarms in front of you, tearing down a flag, our flag, to say, no, try it.
00:51:13.260And it's noteworthy that administrators issued warnings on Saturday, but did nothing.
00:51:22.820And at late Saturday evening, a young Jewish student, a young woman, was sent to the hospital when one of these protesters poked her in the eye with a Palestinian flag.
00:51:35.020And this morning, the police were called in to start arresting people.
00:51:40.760It must be Yale University's president, Peter Salovey, announced a year ago that this would be his last year.
00:51:54.920However, he must be watching what is taking place on the Columbia University campus and thought, I've got to start clearing this out.
00:52:03.700But if these guys don't know already that their response to this is not to issue warnings and stand by as people start to get hurt, as private property, private university property is desecrated, rules are broken, university entrances and exits are blocked from students.
00:52:23.480I listened to a recording that we were not authorized to share, that a student took of her call to the Yale University Police Department, where the police officers told her, we are concerned.
00:52:36.340We have not been authorized by the university to do anything yet.
00:53:45.320And it's certainly not okay on a college campus.
00:53:46.740Because I don't like when, and no, you weren't doing this, but when people try to reduce this kind of behavior to free speech, it's bullshit.
00:53:56.120So we need to be really clear on acceptable behaviors.
00:53:59.400And all you need to do is picture a bunch of whites doing this to a black student about 40 years ago and ask yourself whether you defend it.
00:54:10.840A reporter got kind of trolled on Twitter over the weekend.
00:54:13.640I want to say she was from the New York Times or the Washington Post for saying she was there.
00:54:17.440And what she saw at Columbia was, you know, a lot of, you know, a lot of that crazy stuff was happening.
01:22:25.480You can come into our bathrooms on any school campus, on college campuses, on K through 12.
01:22:31.240It's just fine because we're going to be completely safe because there are absolutely no sickos who are going to take advantage of this bastardization of Title IX.
01:22:44.660I take you already to the University of Tampa and Young America's Foundation, which happened to catch one of these fakers coming out of the women's restroom.
01:31:02.860This was at the Pembroke Middle School in North Wales, PA.
01:31:06.300Megan, I actually think that the two things we've talked about are connected, one of which is the treatment of Jewish students on college campuses, and the second is this reaction to men and trans folks using women's bathrooms.
01:31:22.260And it's like what we see of the result of having these hierarchies of oppressions, and a lot of these anti-Semitism committees on campuses have said what we're seeing on campuses is this double standard where when Jews say, hey, this is discrimination, we're not comfortable with this, this is a problem, they're not believed or they're told we're privileged, and we're going to discount what you say.
01:31:47.820You're the only group not allowed to say we're being discriminated against.
01:31:51.340And it's the same thing that we're seeing with this bathroom issue where when women are saying it, and look, I remember visiting colleges with my parents, and in fact, like, I had mixed-sex bathrooms in college.
01:35:24.040And I could not possibly agree with Eliana more that this is exactly connected to what we talked about on college campuses.
01:35:29.820They don't want to own the logical conclusion of their own oppressor-oppressed dichotomy, which is that now men who identify as women, they are taking the priority.
01:35:43.540They get priority over actual women because they say they feel like women, because somehow they've rewritten Title IX, not by Congress, but by executive fiat, to include men.
01:35:54.820I mean, it should be a massive scandal that the media is covering like crazy, that parents are outraged about, and parents are outraged.
01:36:02.120But you're barely even hearing anything about it from the Republican Party.
01:36:05.320And the Republican Party, you know, opposed it during the Obama years, but should have been going full-court press then, too.
01:36:11.360Thanks to the policies of this administration, never mind their corporate enablers like Planet Fitness and so on,
01:36:17.020you or your kid could be minding your own business in the locker room, getting ready for a workout or post-shower, toweling off,
01:36:24.820and that lunatic can come in wearing his diaper, claiming he's a woman, but packing a gun.