A judge on Monday rejected former president Donald Trump’s request to prevent a number of key witnesses at the heart of his hush-money case from testifying, paving the way for Michael Cohen and Stormy Daniels to take the stand.
In his ruling, Judge Juan Merchan denied Trump’s demand to preclude evidence provided by Cohen, Daniels, and other prosecution witnesses, stating that their testimony would have clear “probative value.”
At the center of the case are allegations that Trump paid former adult actress Stormy Daniels to conceal their alleged sexual encounter during his 2016 presidential campaign.
Much of the case hinges on the testimony of Cohen, Trump’s former personal attorney, who pleaded guilty in 2018 to eight charges, including violating campaign-finance laws. According to statements Cohen made in a plea deal during special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Trump’s alleged collusion with Russia, the former president allegedly asked him to pay off Stormy Daniels “for the principal purpose of influencing the election.”
Cohen allegedly laid out $130,000 on the eve of the 2016 presidential election to pay Daniels — a porn star whose real name is Stephanie Clifford — to keep quiet about an affair she says she had with Trump 17 years ago. Trump then allegedly manipulated the accounting of the reimbursement to look like ongoing legal fees paid in monthly installments in 2017.
Trump argued that Cohen should be disqualified from testifying because he lacks credibility and has a proclivity to commit perjury.
“Michael Cohen is a liar,” the judge quoted Trump as saying. “He recently committed perjury, on the stand and under oath, at a civil trial involving President Trump. If his public statements are any indication, he plans to do so again at this criminal trial.”
However, Trump gave no proof of Cohen’s past perjury, the judge said.
“This Court has been unable to locate any treatise, statute, or holding from courts in this jurisdiction, or others, that supports Defendant’s rationale that a prosecution witness should be kept off the witness stand because his credibility has been previously called into question,” the judge added.
Merchan also dismissed the former president’s objections to using as evidence the so-called Access Hollywood tape, a leaked audio clip of Trump suggesting in 2005 he could grab women by their genitals without consequence because of his fame.
In March 2023, progressive Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg leveled the indictment against Trump, predicated on the payment of hush money to Daniels that allegedly constituted a falsification of business records.
The hush-money trial, originally scheduled to begin on March 25, was postponed by Merchan until at least mid April pending a review of newly delivered documents from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York.