The New York trial of Donald Trump, the first US president to face criminal charges, is rapidly approaching its end.
On Monday, Michael Cohen, once Trump’s political fixer and the prosecution’s key witness against him, returns to the stand to face more questions from a defense attorney and then another round of questioning from a prosecutor.
On Thursday, the final day of the trial, Cohen admitted that he had been a serial liar in years past, telling a 12-member jury that he sometimes told lies to help Trump and other times to protect his family. .
Under a series of withering questions, Trump’s defense attorney, Todd Blanche, sought to portray Cohen as someone who cannot be believed, who is essentially dishonest, deceitful and shady.
The case centers on a $130,000 payment Cohen made to porn star Stormy Daniels just before Trump’s successful run for president in 2016 to conceal her claim that she had a one-night stand with Trump a decade earlier. , to hide information from voters. when they headed to the polls eight years ago.
Evidence at trial shows that Trump repaid Cohen in 2017 after becoming president, and Trump was accused of falsifying his business records to claim that the repayment to Cohen was for his legal work.
Cohen testified for prosecutors that the refund was for money he paid Daniels to maintain her silence, not for legal work, and that Trump approved the plan twice, including once at his Trump Tower in New York and a second time in the Oval Office of the White House after he became president.
Trump has denied Daniels’ claim that he had a relationship with her and all criminal charges.
Cohen is the last of 19 prosecution witnesses against Trump, who served a single term as chief executive of the United States from 2017 to 2021 and is now the presumptive 2024 Republican presidential nominee in the November election against President Joe Biden, the Democrat who defeated him in 2020. .
When the prosecution’s case ends, Trump’s defense team will almost certainly ask New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchán to dismiss the 34-count indictment against Trump, a request that is rarely granted. in American criminal trials.
If Merchan indeed refuses to dismiss the case against Trump, his defense could call his own witnesses on his behalf, but he has given no certain indication that he will do so. Trump has said he wants to testify in his own defense, but defendants are not required to do so and American legal analysts say it is unlikely because defendants often hurt themselves by testifying from him rather than help.
If Trump were to testify, Merchan has already ruled that prosecutors will be able to question him about two civil cases he lost in recent months and he was ordered to pay hundreds of millions of dollars in damages. One involved business fraud at his real estate conglomerate Trump Organization and the other his defamation of a New York writer who had won a sexual assault decision against him.
Assuming Trump does not take the stand and his defense attorneys present only one, two or none, Merchan has told lawyers in the case that closing arguments could begin on May 28, after next Monday’s Memorial Day holiday. Fallen in the United States.
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