Secrets, Lies and Payoffs Laid Bare in Week 1 of Trump Trial Testimony
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Donald Trump fought mightily before and after he was elected president to keep secret the embarrassing details of his private life, but often failed despite having a fat checkbook and a well-connected tabloid editor in his pocket, according to the first week of evidence at his trial. Over four days of testimony this week, former National Enquirer executive David Pecker told the jury just how deeply involved Trump’s team was in using the supermarket tabloid to fuel his 2016 presidential campaign. Prosecutors tried to show that Trump was acutely aware of the machinations being made on his behalf by the tabloid executive and Michael Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer and fixer. After Pecker’s testimony concluded Friday, jurors heard from Trump’s longtime assistant and Cohen’s former banker.
Evidence shows Cohen paid $130,000 in hush money to adult-film actress Stormy Daniels shortly before the 2016 election to buy her silence about an alleged sexual encounter she had with Trump years earlier. For years, Pecker told the jury, he and his friend Trump — then a reality TV star — had a mutually beneficial relationship that involved information-sharing in the celebrity world. When Trump decided to run for president, that relationship kicked into overdrive, as the supermarket gossip sheet published glowing stories about the brash tycoon, and ran many other stories pummeling his political rivals. Yet the first week of trial testimony showed the arrangement was far from foolproof. Just four days before the 2016 election, the Wall Street Journal revealed that the Enquirer had secretly paid a Playboy model, Karen McDougal, for the rights to her story about an affair with Trump. The Enquirer then refused to publish the story, a practice known as “catch and kill.”
After the Journal wrote about the arrangement, Trump called Pecker, furious. “How could this happen? I thought you had this under control,” Trump said, according to Pecker. “He was very agitated.” At the time, Pecker’s company publicly denied buying McDougal’s story to keep her quiet. After being granted immunity from prosecution, however, he testified that was precisely what he’d done. Cohen promised him he would be reimbursed for paying McDougal, Pecker said, but his lawyers warned him later that such compensation was potentially a crime — and said he may have already broken campaign finance law by paying McDougal. And so, Pecker testified, he balked at paying again when a lawyer for Daniels came forward to sell her story of a sexual tryst with Trump.
“I am not purchasing this story. I am not going to be involved with a porn star, and I am not a bank,” Pecker said he told Cohen. Trump ultimately instructed Cohen to pay Daniels $130,000 for her silence, according to evidence from this case. Prosecutors alleged that these payments were categorized as a legal fee, rather than a campaign expense, to keep them from public disclosure forms. Trump’s defense team has argued that most of what the prosecutors are showing the jury is not criminal conduct, saying that if any crime was committed, it was by Cohen, not Trump. But evidence they elicited from Pecker shows Trump was still trying to keep those secrets after he won the election.
The speed of light from Earth to the Moon in real time (c = 3×10^8 m/s) -
@Spintendo Once more you've lost the plot.
MANY public figures - whether politicians, sports, wealthy people - pay for negative stories to be suppressed.
Ask Biden, Obama, Clintons.
Even if the stories are untrue, it's legal....except those who got paid, might then be guilty of blackmail or extortion - but the law can rarely be bothered to go after them.
What yall libs are doing to Trump is selective prosecution... and not just a little selective, but crazy selective. Countless Dems "should" now be prosecuted - if we want consistency.
Next, you'll prosecute breathing. "Oh no! Trump breathed! That helped him win - election interference!"
Go fuck yourselves, lib corrupt retards.
The plot point is:
--> Biden Regime jails its opponent. USA can no longer preach "democracy" to anybody. <--
USA legitimacy gone - burned up, by corrupt libs.
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You keep forgetting that it's only bad when a conservative does it.
Liberals can wear blackface and be defended. Joy Behar, Ted Danson, Justin Trudeau (several times), and countless others. Have a conservative ask why wearing blackface is bad and the world turns into a shitstorm.
Paying hush money to some whore you banged is bad if you are Trump, but paying hush money to your rape victims is fine if you are a liberal.
If liberals didn't have double standards, they'd have no standards at all.
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@raphjd
Wearing blackface: not illegal
Paying hush money: not illegal
"Creative" accounting: illegalAny other questions?
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I didn't say wearing blackface is illegal.
What I did say is that you people have double standards when it comes to it.
Liberals wear blackface and you people defend them.
A conservative asks why it's wrong, citing liberals who have done it and protected by fellow liberals, and you people lose your fucking tiny minds.
I'm sure Biden, Clinton, and the rest used creative accounting to hide the hush money to their rape victims. Of course, you people don't care because Orange Man Bad.
AGAIN, for the weak-minded liberals.
IF LIBERALS DIDN'T HAVE DOUBLE STANDARDS, THEY'D HAVE NO STANDARDS AT ALL.
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@raphjd said in Secrets, Lies and Payoffs Laid Bare in Week 1 of Trump Trial Testimony:
I'm sure Biden, Clinton, and the rest used creative accounting to hide the hush money to their rape victims
Indeed if you list it openly as "Hush money for Joe's rape victim Tara"......
....or openly as "Hush money for Bill's rape victims Juanita, Paula, Leslie & Kathleen whom I Hillary savage in public"....
.... or openly as "Extortion money paid to Stormy & Michael so they won't frame me Donald with fake story of their own affair".........
It defeats entire point.
Real crime: 600,000 Ukrainians killed. So Biden can stay covered up. That's election interference.
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@raphjd said in Secrets, Lies and Payoffs Laid Bare in Week 1 of Trump Trial Testimony:
Liberals wear blackface and you people defend them.
Really? I thought we were all about cancel culture? But you are right about right-wingers being too stupid to know why it's wrong.
Anyway, this post is about Trump's legal woes. What are you hoping to achieve by your reflection? Not all of us watch Fox. lol
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You are only about cancel culture when conservatives do it.
You losers don't cancel your own unless they go against the liberal dogma.
You bitches turn a blind eye when your own rape women, but get screechy when Orange Man didn't rape someone. Before you open your clapper, remember what the jury said.
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@raphjd The judge ruled that the rape allegation was "substantially true" but couldn't be proven, so the jury settled for sexual assault. That should be Trump's campaign slogan: "It was only sexual assault....not rape!" Along with his being legally barred from ever operating a charity or a university again because of fraud, he is a real role model for generations to come...lol.
And as you are such a fan of anecdotal evidence, remember what happened to John Edwards and Al Franken? Liberals gave them the boot because, unlike Republicans, we do have standards. That's why I think so many Evangelical Christians are so attracted to the GOP; it's the perfect fit for hypocrites.
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LOL, before you bitch about Trump, you need to look deeply into your beloved DNC.
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@raphjd Since you are unable to prove anything I said was wrong, I guess that means you concede.
Thanks for playing
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Nope! Only in your TDS world. Here is what really happened:
![1709710327299-jury-found-against-e-jean-carroll-resized[1].jpg](/assets/uploads/files/1714402351985-1709710327299-jury-found-against-e-jean-carroll-resized-1.jpg)
Since you are a simpleton, I'll spell it out for you.
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NY lib JURY looked at rape allegation
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and found it way lacking
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JURY said NO - see above - NO
That's what happened.
The rest they cooked up after saying, Oh he must be guilty of something - since we all have TDS like @jaroonn
I know you're allergic to facts - but really, try better.
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Maybe you should look at your "victim" and her motives.
I wouldn't stick Biden's dick in her.
BTW, when are you going to look at your own party?! Yeah, that's what I thought and said.
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@raphjd said in Secrets, Lies and Payoffs Laid Bare in Week 1 of Trump Trial Testimony:
Maybe you should look at your "victim" and her motives.
I wouldn't stick Biden's dick in her.That's your come back? Misogynism. Expected.
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Wait, it's misogyny to call a woman ugly? You truly are a simp.
Now stop the SEXISM OF LOW EXPECATIONS and demand that your girlfriends get out there and fight for their country.
And get out on their front lines and die for your beloved actual nazis.
Yeah, that's exactly what I thought.
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@raphjd You didn't call her ugly. You implied she was unrapable. You inability to see the misogyny in that explains everthing.
So I guess this means you are enlisting in the Israeli Army, so you can kill all the devil Muslims?
That's what I thought.....
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Your inability to see your MISOGYNY OF LOW EXPECTATIONS is glaring.
Clearly, you are a femi-simp who promotes pussy privilege, while crying that their country is being invaded. Tell those bitches to grab a gun and defend their fucking country of nazis. Unless, that is, you "secretly" support Putin/Russia and hope they win.
It's not my war, but I support Israel over those who voted a terrorist org as their ruling party, then cheered on 7 Oct.
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@raphjd Your logical gymnastics is mind-blowing. No wonder you always think you are right.
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LOL, ok.
I guess English professors don't need to have coherent logic, which explains your bullshit.
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@raphjd And I guess you are an example of why the Tories have been such a success
