BREAKING NEWS
Paul Auster, Author and Brooklyn Literary Star, Dies at 77With critically lauded works like "The New York Trilogy," the charismatic author and patron saint of Brooklyn, his adopted borough, drew worldwide acclaim.
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Tuesday, April 30, 2024
Paul Auster, author and Brooklyn literary star, dies at 77
Opinion: How Trump’s team paid for silence
This is a special edition of Opinion Today on Donald Trump's hush-money trial, featuring insights from contributors to The Point, Opinion's blog. Today, Jonathan Alter reports from inside the courthouse.
Tuesday afternoon's riveting testimony by Keith Davidson, the frustrated Hollywood lawyer who represented both former Playboy Playmate Karen McDougal and porn star Stormy Daniels, raises an intriguing question: Will the jury buy testimony from a witness who clearly despises Michael Cohen, the man whose narrative of the case he is bolstering? My bet is it will. The prosecution used a devastating chain of texts to pre-corroborate Cohen, whose coming testimony is the most important in the case. All afternoon, the prosecutor, Joshua Steinglass, used Davidson to give jurors a permission slip to simultaneously distrust Cohen and believe him. Davidson first became acquainted with Cohen in 2011 when dirty.com, a website that traffics in dirt about celebrities, posted an item about Donald Trump having a fling with a porn star named Stormy Daniels, and Davidson called Cohen. "Before I could barely get my name out, I was met with a hostile barrage of insults and allegations that went on for quite a while," Davidson testified. "He was just screaming. He believed Stormy Daniels was behind the story." In fact, Davidson got the item taken down. Much of Davidson's testimony involved McDougal, whose hush-money deal was a kind of a dress rehearsal for the alleged crime, which is Trump and Cohen covering up the hush money paid to Stormy Daniels. For a time, American Media Inc., then the owner of The National Enquirer, was in competition with ABC News for McDougal's story, which led to a memorable moment in court. Davidson claimed a group of women he derided in a text as "the estrogen mafia" wanted her to tell her story to ABC News.
"We had it all set. We picked the date, camera crews, makeup," Brian Ross, the ABC News correspondent, told me this afternoon by phone. "Then she called and said, 'My family doesn't want me to do it.'" Ross thinks the real reason this explosive story didn't come out was that ABC News, which doesn't pay for stories, became leverage: "In retrospect, they were using us to get to Trump for the money." After American Media paid off McDougal, David Pecker, the former publisher, backed out of paying hush money to Stormy Daniels. But when Davidson demanded the payment, Cohen began offering a million excuses for why Trump couldn't pay. "I thought he was trying to kick the can down the road until after the election," Davidson testified, which will be an important part of the prosecution's case. When it was clear Trump wouldn't pay, Davidson testified that Cohen said, "Goddammit, I'll just do it myself." It was then that Cohen set up a dummy corporation to send Davidson the money and began trying to get reimbursed by Trump. All of the texts and phone calls between Davidson and Cohen are still one step removed from Trump. But they pre-corroborate what Cohen will say "the boss" told him to do, and that is critical. More on the Trump trial: Forward this newsletter to friends to share ideas and perspectives that will help inform their lives. They can sign up here. Do you have feedback? Email us at opiniontoday@nytimes.com. If you have questions about your Times account, delivery problems or other issues, visit our Help Page or contact The Times.
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