The former tabloid publisher David Pecker’s testimony in Donald Trump’s criminal trial on Friday presented a granular look into a hush-money scheme which prosecutors allege was meant to sway the 2016 election in the real estate mogul’s favor.
But when Trump’s longtime assistant, Rhona Graff, was called to the witness stand, her testimony humanized the trial, reminding the courtroom that at its core, these proceedings center on an adult film actor named Stormy Daniels – as well as a man who is either flawed or fraudulent.
A key moment in prosecutor Susan Hoffinger’s questioning of Graff revealed that Trump’s contacts contained an entry for Karen McDougal, along with that of someone else named “Stormy”.
Hoffinger asked if she saw Daniels at Trump Tower on one occasion.
“I have a vague recollection of seeing her in the reception area on the 26th floor,” she said. To the best of her knowledge, this was sometime before the 2016 presidential election which Trump won.
“When you saw her at Trump Tower, did you know she was an adult film actress?” Hoffinger asked.
“Yes, I did,” Graff replied.
During her cross-examination of Graff, defense attorney Susan Necheles worked hard to downplay Daniels’s presence at Trump Tower. Necheles cast Trump as a man who was so busy that he maybe wasn’t paying enough attention to business records, the alleged falsification of which prompted the prosecution against the former president.
“I vaguely recall hearing … that she was one of the people [who] may be an interesting contestant on the show,” Graff said when asked whether Daniels was being considered for a slot on Trump’s television program The Apprentice. “I can’t recall a specific instance where I heard it, it was part of the office chatter.”
Necheles asked, “You understood that she was there to discuss being cast for The Apprentice, correct?”
Graff replied: “I assumed that.”
Necheles then had Graff describe how Trump would occasionally sign checks while he was preoccupied or multitasking. That line of inquiry seemed aimed at establishing that Trump was simply distracted when he signed checks now under prosecutors’ scrutiny.
With Pecker, defense attorney Emil Bove’s questions on cross prompted him to in effect say that coverage beneficial to Trump was business as usual, as the ex-president’s legal team tries to chip away at the prosecution’s claim that there was an illicit conspiracy to sway the 2016 race.
Pecker was instrumental in coordinating three hush-money payments that were made during the 2016 election campaign to quash negative stories about Trump.
In cross-examination on his fourth day of testimony, Pecker was grilled by Bove about whether he benefited from running positive stories about Trump and negative stories about other politicians even before the alleged catch-and-kill scheme.
Pecker testified that the Enquirer ran negative stories about the Clintons as part of the effort to help the Trump campaign, agreed in a meeting on August 2015.
Asked if there were negative articles before the meeting, Pecker said: “That’s correct” and agreed that it was because it made good business sense for the National Enquirer to run articles about the Clintons long before he did so on Trump’s behalf.
Bove’s questioning also seemed to try driving wedges into the notion that Trump’s 2006 affair with Karen McDougal, a former Playboy model, was any real threat to Trump’s reputation – apparently suggesting that if she didn’t constitute an actual problem, then giving her money wasn’t meant to influence the election.
He admitted that Trump did not pay him any money directly related to McDougal, and that when he first heard about the story he understood that she did not want to publish it. He said he told Trump the same thing when Trump called his office. He also told jurors he understood that McDougal wanted to rekindle her work in magazines.
Pecker has testified that American Media Inc (AMI), the publisher of the National Enquirer, paid $30,000 to a former Trump Tower doorman who claimed Trump had a child out of wedlock. Another $150,000 was paid to McDougal.
It is the third payment, however, worth $130,000 and paid by Michael Cohen to Stormy Daniels in October 2016, that is at the heart of the case. Prosecutors have charged Trump with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records over: they say Trump illegally marked reimbursements to Cohen for the hush money as payment for Cohen’s legal services.
Through yes-or-no questions, which Pecker largely confirmed, Bove on Thursday afternoon had already begun outlining the defense’s argument – namely, that AMI has had a long relationship with Trump, one that began well before the election. Buying stories and not publishing them was also standard for the tabloid.
Bove also questioned Pecker’s memory, saying that he listed two different time periods for when he first met Trump about his campaign.
“These things happened a long time ago – even when you’re doing your best, and I’m sure you are – it’s hard to remember what people said almost 10 years ago,” Bove said.
Earlier in the week, Pecker detailed how he operated as the “eyes and ears” for Trump’s campaign starting in 2015, right after Trump announced his candidacy. He promised Trump and Cohen that he would inform them of any people trying to sell negative stories about Trump.
While Pecker seemed eager to help Trump pay off the doorman, he started becoming wary of the hush payments as AMI was working on an agreement with McDougal. The former Playboy model was requesting $150,000 in payment for her story.
Pecker said Cohen told him: “I’m your friend, the boss will take care of it.”
Pecker was also nervous about potential campaign finance contribution violations, alluding to previous troubles the National Enquirer had when helping the former California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger bury stories.
Though AMI would ultimately facilitate payments to McDougal, Pecker would decline to reimburse Stormy Daniels directly.
“I said I don’t want the National Enquirer to be associated with a porn star,” Pecker said. “This would be very damaging for the magazine, very damaging for American Media.”
Even though the Wall Street Journal would ultimately publish McDougal’s story, and the National Enquirer’s involvement in killing it, four days before the election in November 2016, Trump won the presidency. He would go on to thank Pecker on multiple occasions following his victory.
At the end of their questioning, prosecutors asked Pecker if he had any ill feelings toward Trump.
“On the contrary,” he said. “I felt that Donald Trump was my mentor. He helped me throughout my career.”
Bove also tried to make distance between Pecker and the Daniels payoff, again in an effort to undermine an alleged conspiracy.
Pecker confirmed that he had had a phone call from the then editor-in-chief of the National Enquirer, Dylan Howard, shortly before election day 2016, where he learned about Daniels’s account.
“You told Mr Howard that you wanted no involvement with the story, is that correct?” Pecker agreed.
“You did not consider Stormy Daniels’s story to be part of any agreement you had in August 2015?” Bove grilled. “You wanted nothing to do with it.”
“That’s right,” Pecker answered.
On redirect, prosecutor Joshua Steinglass repeatedly tried to counter Bove’s narrative by eliciting testimony from Pecker indicating that his handling of payoffs was normal tabloid business.
Steinglass asked whether a woman’s story about an affair with a married candidate would do well.
“That would have been kind of like National Enquirer gold?”
Pecker said yes.
But, Steinglass continued: “At the time you had entered into that agreement [with McDougal], you had zero intention of publishing that story?”
Steinglass pressed: “Despite the fact that publishing it would help your bottom line, you killed it to help the candidate, Donald Trump?”
“Uh, yes,” Pecker said.
After court adjourns Friday, it is scheduled to resume Tuesday.
