Testimony by former National Enquirer editor David Pecker on Thursday at Donald Trump’s secret trial in New York included references to adult film actress Stormy Daniels and agreements to rescind embarrassing stories about Trump ahead of the 2016 presidential election.
Before Pecker began, prosecutors asked the court to convict Trump of contempt of silence, bringing up more statements he had made over the past two days.
On Thursday morning, the Supreme Court also heard arguments on Trump’s claim that he is immune from criminal prosecution for attempting to overturn the 2020 election.
On the witness stand Thursday, Pecker said he spoke with Trump and his aides about paying to hush up a former Playboy model’s story about a year-long affair with Trump. He also said he heard about a story involving Daniels.
Pecker told jurors that the cover-up efforts he helped in were aimed at protecting the then-candidate’s 2016 campaign and his family.
On his second day of testimony, Pecker said he didn’t believe Trump and attorney Michael Cohen, his intermediary at the time, were trying to keep the stories of two women, Karen McDougal and Daniels, out of the news for his wife Melania Trump. , Ivanka’s daughter, or any other relative.
“It was essentially about what the impact would be on the campaign and the election,” Pecker said.
Pecker said he had a verbal exchange with the president-elect at Trump Tower in January 2017, shortly before Trump’s inauguration. In that session, Pecker said Trump thanked him for paying McDougal for his silence and for contributing to other Trump cover-ups.
Neither Trump nor Cohen mentioned Trump’s marriage in conversations that dragged on for months about how to care for McDougal and later Daniels, the witness said.
“His family never spoke and in the verbal exchange I had directly with M. Trump, his family didn’t speak, so I assumed that the [main] fear of the campaign,” Pecker testified.
The crux of the indictment against Trump is that he falsified records to cover up that Cohen paid Daniels $130,000 in 2016 to silence her about an alleged sexual relationship that she said had occurred a decade earlier.
Although the National Enquirer paid McDougal $150,000 for the rights to his story about his relationship with Donald Trump, the Wall Street Journal reported on November 4, 2016 that the Enquirer paid to remove the story, 4 days before the presidential election. The Enquirer responded with its own article stating that it doesn’t pay for articles it doesn’t publish.
“Was that the truth?” asked prosecutor Joshua Steinglass and former investigator David Pecker.
“No,” Pecker replied.
“Who is this story?” Steinglass asked.
“I did. . . I searched for my business, I searched for myself, and I searched for Donald Trump,” Pecker responded.
Pecker said he also spoke with Trump by phone on Nov. 5, 2016, and told him that no one from the Enquirer had leaked the story.
“I don’t know if Donald Trump called me on the phone,” Pecker said. “I was very agitated. It couldn’t have happened. The call ended very abruptly. He didn’t say goodbye.
Pecker testified that he first learned of Daniels’ alleged date with Trump a few days after the “Access Hollywood” tape in which Trump bragged about grabbing women by the genitals.
Pecker said he was having dinner with his wife on a Saturday night in early October 2016 when he received an “urgent call” from Dylan Howard, his company’s former chief content officer.
According to Pecker, Howard said he won a call from two of his more sensible appeals indicating that Daniels was looking to sell a story alleging a sex date with Trump.
One of the sources, Keith Davidson, the Playboy model’s lawyer who won a secret payment earlier, told him they could get him the story for $120,000 “if we make a resolution now,” Pecker said.
Prosecutors presented an exchange of texts between Pecker and Howard dated Oct. 9, 2016, two days after the Washington Post’s “Access Hollywood” article.
One text read: “The woman needs $120,000, she has donations from Mail, and GMA needs her to reach out and do a lie detector test. I know there have been denials in the past, but this story is true. Now I can close your post to end the discussions in the media and then we can compare the next steps.
According to the conversation, Pecker said he knew the woman Stormy Daniels. Pecker said he couldn’t afford the $120,000.
“I said, ‘I don’t need the National Enquirer to be related to a porn star,'” Pecker testified. “For our largest store and distributor, Walmart, this would be very negative for the magazine and the American media. “
He told Howard to Michael Cohen, Trump’s lawyer at the time.
Assistant District Attorney Joshua Steinglass asked Pecker why he didn’t pay for the story. Pecker countered that his company had already paid $30,000 to a former Trump Tower doorman who was looking for a story about a Trump case, which was later found to be false, as well as $150,000 to Karen McDougal, the former Playboy model who said she had a sexual relationship with Trump.
Howard showed up to call Cohen and “advise” him on how to handle the situation, according to Pecker.
Steinglass asked why Pecker thought it would be an idea to turn the matter over to Cohen.
“I think it could be very damaging,” Pecker said. It will be withdrawn from the market. If someone wanted to buy it, I think Michael Cohen and Donald Trump would buy it. “
Jurors heard Pecker refer to the widely viewed “Access Hollywood” tape in which Trump told host Billy Bush in 2005 that he could freely release a woman’s genitals because of her celebrity. However, New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan, who is overseeing the case. , has already ruled that releasing the video would be too damaging. So, while prosecutors can look at it, they can’t show the video itself.
In his morning testimony, Pecker said he had struck a deal with Cohen under which a shell company created through Cohen would pay for the rights to Karen McDougal’s story. Pecker created an invoice for his own fake company, Investor Advisory Services, which billed Cohen’s shell company. , Resolution Consultants, for the charge of the rights to McDougal’s life story.
But in late September 2016, after discussing the deal with American Media Inc. ‘s general counsel, Pecker said he had replaced his brain and was not selling the rights to Cohen.
“I called Michael Cohen,” Pecker testified, “and told him that the agreement, the assignment agreement, was not being respected. I’m not going to go any further. This is a bad concept and I need you to break the agreement. “He was very angry, very upset, essentially yelling at me. Pecker said Cohen told him, “‘The boss is going to get really angry. . . I can’t, I’m your friend, I don’t understand why you’re so worried. Pecker said he was very worried, without saying why, and dropped the case.
Prosecutor Steinglass asked, “Has the U. S. media ever been reimbursed for the money spent to obtain the rights to Karen McDougal’s life story?
“No, we did,” Pecker replied.
Pecker recounted a past in which he bought a lewd story and killed it: a story about Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Pecker said that in 2002 he was preparing to buy bodybuilding-focused magazines that had featured Schwarzenegger extensively over the years. He met with Schwarzenegger, who pointed out that he had had to sue publications like the Enquirer for their previous negative articles about “I intend to run for governor and I would like them not to tell negative stories about me, neither now nor in the future,” Pecker told Schwarzenegger. He said Schwarzenegger also needs an editor and spokesperson for bodybuilding magazines.
And shortly after she announced on Jay Leno’s show that she was running for governor, after she made that announcement, several women called the National Enquirer to tell stories they had to sell about other relationships or contacts and about the sexual harassment they suffered. I thought Arnold Schwarzenegger had done it.
“And the agreement I had with Arnold that I would call him and tell him all the stories that were going around. And I ended up buying them, getting them for a while. When he became governor, one of the stories that he had I acquired, I’m not going to publish, and the user who took that story, since we didn’t publish it, reported it to the Los Angeles Times and the L. A. Times. He published a very embarrassing story. Most of the press got in touch. Arnold when he spoke about this story and his comment: “Ask my friend David Pecker. It’s very embarrassing for me and for the company. “
Pecker said Schwarzenegger’s experience influenced the contract he signed with McDougal in 2016.
Trump attended the first of the testimonies Thursday morning with little visual reaction. He let out a big yawn in the middle of a brief pause in David Pecker’s testimony about Stormy Daniels.
Before the trial, Trump greeted the structure’s staff and union members at the site of JPMorgan Chase’s new headquarters in midtown Manhattan. He also spoke briefly to reporters in the hallway outside the trial, saying he would hold a rally at Madison Square Garden. to honor police and firefighters or perhaps teachers.
The trial was not televised. The Washington Post has reporters in the courtroom and in the media room posting live updates.
Trump faces 34 counts of falsifying business records similar to attorney Michael Cohen’s reimbursement for a secret payment to Daniels, who alleged she had a sexual relationship with Trump years before he ran for president. Trump pleaded guilty.