A key day in Donald Trump's hush money trial on Tuesday with Michael Cohen facing cross-examination from defense lawyers for the first time. Trump's lawyers attempting to use Cohen's own words against him and to portray him as a man bent on revenge against his former boss. Cohen being asked, on your first podcast mea culpa you referred to President Trump as a boorish cartoon misogynist didn't you? Cohen, it sounds like something I would say. And later, you recall the first one in 2020 as a Cheeto dusted cartoon villain. Cohen, that also sounds like something I said. And finally, you think you might have said, quote, I truly effing hope this man ends up in prison. Is that exact? Cohen, it sounds like my language on mea culpa. That, of course, is one of his podcasts. In direct examination earlier in the day, Cohen told the court about a conversation with Trump after the FBI seized Cohen's phone records and records in a search warrant, his phones and his records. Cohen testifying that Trump told him, quote, don't worry. I am the president of the United States. There is nothing here. Everything is going to be okay. Stay tough. You are going to be okay. Joining me now is trial attorney. Let's start with the conclusion of the direct examination, because it did seem to have some of these critical details about the ultimate break that Michael Cohen had with Trump and the subsequent fire that he came in for from the former president. What do you make of that sort of last admission there that was made and how it may impact whether or not there's ultimately a conviction? Well, when we look at this, we have to think when he was on the witness stand, he was very compelling. Michael Cohen, he answered yes or no questions and was direct. to the point, and he reached a point in his life that basically he said he made a decision to pick his family over Trump, which was a very compelling story. I mean, American people love a comeback story, someone that, you know, did wrong, that now is gonna do something right. And on the cross-examination, the defense counsel came in very, very hot, very, very hostile. His first question out of the box was talking about defense counsel and how Michael Cohen portrayed him on TikTok. The judge pulled him over and said, why are you making this about yourself? Why aren't you making this about Cohen? Which was potentially an error. And there was no aha moment during the cross-examination. There was no moment of, oh, I got you on this. So ultimately, it was a win for the prosecution. Interesting. I mean, yeah, we can put that up, actually. So this was Todd Blanche, the president's defense attorney, saying to Cohen, you went on TikTok and called. Blanche, a crying little, S-H-I-D, didn't you? Cohen, sounds like something I would say. So, basically, you're arguing this was something that made it look like this was about the lawyers and not actually about Donald Trump. Michael Cohen has so much baggage. I mean, he has more baggage than you can fill in a department store, so why not start with all of his lies? He's lied. He's lied to Congress. He's lied to the American people. And start with that. Start strong and help do that. But also, the point that you made about the attorney generals, that is very, very compelling testimony. So, here we have, allegedly, the President of the United States basically saying, don't worry about anything. Be loyal to me, and you're going to get out of free jail card, which goes to the fact that, potentially, of the whole kind of conspiracy, the intent to hide this, and the fact that, listen, be loyal and we'll keep this under wraps. So, one other figure that's coming into orbit, the Trump orbit at this point, and we heard about this in Cohen's direct examination yesterday, is Rudy Giuliani. And there's an intermediary figure who is kind of going back and forth between Michael Cohen and Rudy Giuliani, and Cohen kind of details how he didn't really trust this guy. He thought everything he was telling him was going straight to Rudy Giuliani. And this was how Rudy Giuliani was talking about Michael Cohen during this time period in an interview on Fox back then. Watch this. You're at war with Michael Cohen now? I don't know. I don't think we're at war with him. He's destroyed himself, Chris, as a witness. I prosecuted, you know, 5,000 cases. I'd never prosecuted a case on this guy's testimony. He's contradicted so many times that, I mean, you begin your cross-examination by saying which set of lies are you going to tell us today, Michael? Let's go through them now. This is before Cohen pleads guilty, which is, of course, the breaking point between Cohen and Trump, who is out there, you know, urging Trump, urging Michael Cohen to stay strong and to not flip. How do you think the jury is going to take all of this in? Well, the jury is going to listen to all the facts and evidence and make a determination on that. But we have to remember, the state was very smart when they laid out this case. They started at the very beginning, starting with the story of the catch and kill and all these stories, and used documents to help substantiate the case. They knew that Michael Cohen has some serious credibility issues. He's lied to Congress. He's lied before. So they needed documentation to prove that. And I think they did a very good job of doing that. All right.
