Madeline Halpert
Reporting from court

It's an odd scene in the courtroom right now as Donald Trump is watching a social media video of himself on the screen, apologising for the infamous Access Hollywood tape, in which he said he could "grab women" by their genitals.

In the video, Trump says he is "not a perfect person."

"These words don’t reflect who I am,” he says in the video. "I said it, I was wrong, and I apologise."

He goes on to insult former President Bill Clinton, the husband of his 2016 campaign opponent, Hillary Clinton.

The court is hearing several of Trump's social media posts regarding his treatment of women read aloud.

In one, he calls Stormy Daniels "horseface" and claims Daniels "showed up in New York today trying to drum up some publicity for herself". He goes on to deny the affair Daniels has alleged.

Madeline Halpert
Reporting from court

It’s been a relatively slow morning of testimony so far, but the jury seems as engaged as ever.

They’ve listened to about 25 hours of questioning in this case so far, diligently taking notes and studying witnesses and lawyers during their back and forth.

Though we can’t share too much about the identities of the 12 jurors to protect their anonymity, they look like a range of typical New Yorkers who have found themselves in the midst of one of the most high-profile trials in history.

Madeline Halpert
Reporting from court

After a short break, court's resumed and is going over the defence team's objections to evidence prosecutors want to admit.

During the break, Trump stood and looked at reporters in the room, chuckling a bit as he spoke with lawyer Todd Blanche.

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The jury has been dismissed while court takes a short recess, although some legal arguments are still going on.

Kayla Epstein
Reporting from court

Prosecutors look like they're going to use Longstreet to introduce some documents into evidence.

They ask her about her work reviewing social media posts for this case.

She says she reviewed between 5,000-10,000 social media posts, and saved about 1,500, give or take.

Prosecutors are asking her pretty basic questions about how platforms like Twitter, now called X, works, laying the groundwork for what we assume will be bigger questions in a few moments.

Georgia Longstreet is now taking the stand.

She works for the New York County District Attorney's Office as a paralegal.

Prosecutor Rebecca Mangold is set to question her.

Tiffany Wertheimer
BBC News

In most court trials, a list of potential upcoming witnesses is revealed beforehand - at least to both legal teams - so they know who, and often when, people are set to testify.

Not this time though.

While we do have a list of potential witnesses, we never know who is up next. That's because Justice Merchan has said the prosecutors don’t need to reveal who they plan to call up, for the witnesses own safety.

This is not only to protect the witnesses from supporters of Donald Trump, but also from the former president himself, who often takes to his social media platform, Truth Social, to mock and criticise people.

He did this to such an extent that Justice Merchan placed a gag order on Trump, banning him from attacking court staff, potential jurors and witnesses online. A week later, the judge expanded it to also include his own family and that of Manhattan prosecutor Alvin Bragg, after Trump called Merchan’s daughter a "Rabid Trump Hater”.

So for that reason, we don’t know when star witnesses like Stormy Daniels or Michael Cohen will take the stand.

Madeline Halpert
Reporting from court

After some quick back and forth, Daus' time on the stand has come to an end.

We're about to hear who the next witness will be.

Madeline Halpert
Reporting from court

Emil Bove has finished, and prosecutors are back questioning Daus.

They’ll try to clean up some of the concerns Bove tried to raise through his questioning, that the phone could have been mishandled.

The prosecutor starts by asking a very obvious question: “Is it unusual for a phone to be used?”

No, Daus says.

Kayla Epstein
Reporting from court

Image source, Reuters/Jane Rosenberg

Bove continues to ask very technical questions about Cohen's phone and how data can be transferred onto it, trying to cast doubt on the legitimacy of what authorities extracted from the device.

Yesterday, prosecutors used Douglas Daus' testimony to introduce one of their findings from the phone: a recording of a conversation between Cohen and Trump where they appeared to discuss the funding of a catch-and-kill deal with Karen McDougal, a Playboy model who alleged that she had an affair with Trump.

Image source, Reuters

We're two weeks into testimony now in former US President Donald Trump's hush-money trial.

So let's take a moment to zoom out, and look at what the case is all about.

Trump has been charged with business fraud over hush-money payments to ex-porn actress Stormy Daniels.

Daniels claims she and Trump had sex, and that she accepted $130,000 (£104,500) from his former lawyer before the 2016 election in exchange for her silence about the encounter.

Prosecutors allege Trump had his personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, make the payments, and then they claim Trump fraudulently recorded the transaction in his company’s books as legal expenses when in fact he was paying Cohen back for the hush-money payments.

Paying hush-money is not illegal, but the prosecution says how the payment was recorded amounts to election fraud.

Since the allegations surfaced in 2018, the former president has denied any sexual involvement with Daniels.

He's facing 34 counts of fraud under campaign finance laws, and has pleaded not guilty to all of them.

Madeline Halpert
Reporting from court

After those housekeeping issues, the witness, Doug Daus, is back on the stand and the jurors have taken their seats once again.

Emil Bove is questioning him about Michael Cohen's cell phones, and trying to create doubts about the chain of custody of the phone, which authorities have scoured for evidence.

Kayla Epstein
Reporting from court

Trump's lawyer Todd Blanche is once again arguing about how the Access Hollywood tape can be used in this case.

It's come up again and again, and Blanche wants to clarify the limits on how prosecutors can use it.

The infamous 2005 recording captured Trump and an entertainment host having a lewd conversation about women, and the Washington Post published a bombshell story about the tape before the 2016 election.

Justice Merchan issued a pre-trial decision that limited how prosecutors could use the tape. He said they could not play it for the jury, because it would be too prejudicial. But references to the tape were allowed, and transcripts from the recording might be admissible.

Image source, Getty Images

All US presidents, once they have left office, are still carefully guarded for their own safety, and assigned a Secret Service detail for the rest of their life.

This photo from this morning of New York police officers waiting for Trump's motorcade, shows just part of the massive security operation in place to move him through Manhattan every morning for this trial.

Madeline Halpert
Reporting from court

We're starting off court with Justice Merchan clarifying that Trump has a right to testify in his trial.

Yesterday, Trump claimed his gag order prevented him from doing so, but Justice Merchan says this is not true.

“You have an absolute right to testify at trial if that’s what you decide to do after consultation with your attorneys," he says.

We still don't know whether Donald Trump will take the stand in the case.

Madeline Halpert
Reporting from court

The prosecutors are here and Donald Trump has just walked into the courtroom wearing a blue suit and tie. He is followed by his lawyers and staff who are carrying a heavy box of files.

Madeline Halpert
Reporting from court

As we wait for things to get started in court, a reminder that today is Donald Trump’s last day to pay a $9,000 (£7,150) fine for violating his gag order nine times.

The gag order prevents Trump from making public comments about people related to the case, including witnesses, court staff and their family members.

Since the order was imposed, Trump has made a number of comments about his former lawyer Michael Cohen - a witness - as well as jurors in the case.

Justice Merchan has warned Trump that further violations could lead to jail time.

The judge held a hearing in court yesterday about whether Trump breached the order several more times (before the jail warning was issued).

We’re still waiting for a ruling on that. Prosecutors are only asking for a fine at this point.

The former president's motorcade left Trump Tower in New York City a short time ago, and he's now arrived at the Manhattan Criminal Court.

Madeline Halpert
Reporting from court

Good morning from Manhattan Criminal Court and the end of Donald Trump’s third week of trial.

Yesterday, we heard testimony from Keith Davidson, Stormy Daniels' former lawyer, who testified about the details behind her $130,000 hush money payment.

At the end of the day, we started to hear from Doug Daus, a forensic analyst with the District Attorney's office who was in charge of extracting data from the phone of Michael Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer.

Though his answers were rather technical, we heard an important recording from the phone in which Cohen could be heard telling Trump: "I need to open up a company for the transfer of all of that info regarding our friend, David.”

Cohen was presumably referencing David Pecker, a former tabloid publisher who helped to bury a story of a model’s alleged affair with Donald Trump. The recording suggests Trump was aware of at least one of the hush-money arrangements.

We’ll pick up with more testimony from Daus shortly.