On the third week of Donald Trump's criminal hush-money trial, the prosecution called to the stand lawyer Keith Davidson who brokered a hush money deal with porn star Stormy Daniels
Trump is accused of trying to cover up a $130,000 (£104,500) payment to Daniels before he won the 2016 election, which prosecutors say was election interference
Davidson testified he spoke with the National Enquirer's editor about how things could get worse for Trump if Daniels spoke
Davidson also advised Playboy model Karen McDougal on her alleged ''romantic affair'' with Trump and talked to the Enquirer about selling her story
Earlier, Judge Merchan fined Trump a total of $9,000 for breaching a gag order and being in contempt of court
Trump has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records and denies any sexual encounter with Daniels
Brandon Livesay
Reporting from court
The court has just been shown a legal agreement between Keith Davidson and Karen McDougal.
The prosecution asks Davidson to simplify the language in the contract.
“I was to provide legal services to Karen McDougal (for a)… personal interaction she… allegedly had with Donald Trump” he tells the jurors.
Kayla Epstein
Reporting from court
Image source, Getty ImagesTrump seems tired, but is staying engaged through all this questioning.
At one point he appears to write something on a legal pad and pass it between his two attorneys, Emil Bove and Todd Blanche.
He then goes back to looking tired in his chair.
Brandon Livesay
Reporting from court
Davidson is now speaking about Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen.
He says he would talk with Cohen on encrypted apps, but can’t remember which ones specifically.
The prosecution asks about emails and business documents which are on a thumb drive here in the courtroom.
He’s saying yes, these are accurate documents. The prosecution is now adding these into the evidence, so we should see what they say very soon.
They've briefly moved onto Karen McDougal, the former Playboy model.
Davidson says she was a client, and he gave her advice on the “interactions” she had with Donald Trump.
Brandon Livesay
Reporting from court
Davidson starts off his testimony by saying that he knew Dylan Howard professionally.
If you don't remember Howard, he was an editor at the National Enquirer tabloid newspaper which was involved in the “catch-and-kill” scheme to bury stories that could harm Trump’s political campaign.
Davidson says his clients at the time would occasionally end up in tabloid media, so he would talk with Howard “quite often, several times a week”.
Kayla Epstein
Reporting from court
Image source, Getty ImagesThings are really heating up in the courtroom now, after a slew of more technical witnesses.
Keith Davidson is a particularly intriguing figure who has come up in previous testimony. He is the lawyer who represented Stormy Daniels at the time Cohen paid her the hush money.
He also represented Karen McDougal, a Playboy model who also received a large payout to keep quiet about an alleged affair with Trump
The former president denies the allegations, to be clear.
But according to testimony from witnesses like former tabloid publisher David Pecker, and a number of documents we’ve seen so far, Davidson helped facilitate Trump's hush-money payments to both women.
Davidson no longer represents either Daniels or McDougal.
Brandon Livesay
Reporting from court
We've finished with Thompson's testimony, and now we are onto a much more important witness.
Keith Davidson has been called to the stand.
He’s a significant witness for the trial, as he represented Stormy Daniels when she and Cohen negotiated the alleged hush-money payment.
Davidson starts his testimony by telling the court that, as an attorney, he has experience working with non-disclosure agreements and celebrities.
Brandon Livesay
Reporting from court
The court has been watching a video deposition of Donald Trump, which was filmed on 19 October, 2022 at Mar-a-Lago.
The first clip shows Trump talking about his social media account Truth Social.
It then skips to another clip where Trump says he married Melania in 2005. We don’t see the final clip, but get a text transcript.
That final bit of text involves Trump saying he is aware of the notorious Access Hollywood tape.
Kayla Epstein
Reporting from court
Image source, EPAE Jean Carroll after a jury finds that Trump is liable for defaming the writer
Thompson is being asked about a deposition Trump gave in October 2022 for a civil suit brought by the writer E Jean Carroll.
The former magazine columnist who alleged Trump sexually assaulted her in a Manhattan department store dressing room in the 1990s.
Trump denies the allegations.
Carroll brought two successful civil suits against Trump.
In the first trial, which took place last year, a jury found Trump liable for sexual abuse and defamation.
In the second trial, which took place earlier this year, a jury found Trump liable for defaming Carroll, and awarded her $83.3m in damages.
Brandon Livesay
Reporting from court
Image source, ReutersPhillip Thompson has travelled from Texas to give testimony today, after he was subpoenaed as a witness.
His company is involved with recording depositions for various legal matters. He’s going through the technicalities of how that works.
The prosecution asks him about a deposition recording of Donald Trump, talking about E Jean Carroll.
Trump was involved in a civil defamation case against Carroll, which he lost earlier this year.
He had previously been found liable after she accused him of sexual assault.
Phillip Thompson is now called to the stand.
Thompson works for Esquire Depositions Solutions, a company that provides remote and in-person court reporting services.
Brandon Livesay
Reporting from court
Another video is now showing: It’s Trump at a campaign event in Gettysburg ahead of the general election in 2016.
“The events never happened,” Trump tells the audience, while standing in front a Trump-Pence banner.
And that’s it for Dr Browning. His testimony is over.
He was brought in purely to say the videos were from C-Span archives.
Brandon Livesay
Reporting from court
Image source, Getty ImagesTrump at the Greensboro, North Carolina, campaign rally in October 2016
In the first video that the court is shown, Donald Trump speaking at a campaign event in October 2016.
He says in the video he “has no idea who these women are”, presumably speaking of Stormy Daniels and others who have alleged affairs.
"Whoever she is… her stories are fiction," Trump tells his audience.
Trump is standing in front of a giant American flag as he talks.
The jury are watching the video on their personal television screens, and the audio of Trump echoes throughout the cavernous court room.
You can find a clip of the video here, external.
Brandon Livesay
Reporting from court
We’re hearing from Dr Robert Browning, who runs the archives at C-SPAN.
He is being asked by the prosecution about videos of Donald Trump that were requested by the Manhattan District Attorney’s office.
The prosecution is listing a series of C-SPAN videos involving Trump at campaign events and media conferences.
These have just been submitted into evidence, and we are about to watch one of the clips.
Just a reminder that C-SPAN is a public affairs network that televises events and moments related to the US government.
The next witness is Dr Robert Browning.
He is a professor of politics at Purdue University, the director of the C-SPAN Archives and the faculty director of the Center for C-SPAN.
C-SPAN is a public affairs network in the US that televises proceedings of the United States federal government, particularly Congress.
Image source, ReutersDonald Trump has just returned to the courtroom after a short break. The judge is already here, but the jury has not yet been seated.
Stick with us, we should be hearing from the next witness soon.
Kayla Epstein
Reporting from court
This is a very busy recess.
Earlier today, Judge Merchan found Trump in contempt over 9 gag order violations and fined him $1,000 (£779) for each one.
Now, prosecutors gave notice that they might want to ask Trump about these violations if the former president takes the stand during the trial.
Trump has indicated he wants to testify, but has not yet confirmed he will do so.
Kayla Epstein
Reporting from court
The defence's questioning of Gary Farro gave us two things.
First, it showed that their key argument remains that Michael Cohen - the star witness for the prosecution - is unreliable and a difficult man with whom to work.
Second, they seemed committed to making it clear that no one found anything amiss with the hush-money transactions in 2016.
In his cross examination, Blanche got Farro to talk about why the red flags that are now evident in hindsight didn’t come up when Cohen was making these transactions in 2016.
Farro told prosecutors that the bank add layers of scrutiny to certain transactions, but he didn't see anything particuarly unusual about Cohen creating an LLC for a real estate account. In fact, it was fairly typical of Cohen's business practices.
Cohen’s account didn’t have any of the extra monitoring that one associated with a “politically exposed person” would have, either, Farro said.
And as for those rapid-fire transactions in October 2016 that we now know was a payout to Stormy Daniels? None of these transactions raised red flags to you at the time? Blanche asked.
Farro testified they had not.
Brandon Livesay
Reporting from court
Blanche has paused his cross examination to speak with his legal team and Donald Trump.
He crouches down and they whisper for about 20 seconds.
Shortly after, Blanche announces he is done.
And just like that, we are done with the third witness. Gary Farro is excused. The court is now taking a morning recess.
Brandon Livesay
Reporting from court
Are you familiar with the term PEP (politically exposed person), Todd Blanche asks the witness.
Gary Farro affrims that he does and explains that it means someone who has either held office, is in office, or is related to someone in office.
He tells the court this can put banks at risk, so they need to be careful with people who may be a PEP.
Blanche is bringing this up because around the time Farro worked with Michael Cohen, Cohen was the personal lawyer for Donald Trump.
Brandon Livesay
Reporting from court
We’re now hearing about when Gary Farro first met Michael Cohen in person.
They met at Trump Tower, a short walk from a branch of the bank where Gary Farro worked. He says ‘90% of the time, it was urgent’ whenever he was dealing with Cohen.
Farro says the relationship with Cohen stopped when the matters we are hearing about today were published in the media.
He says that ended their professional relationship, at some point in 2017.