'He should be worried': Michael Cohen reveals what Trump should fear most in hush money trial

Now I'm joined by Michael Cohen, Donald Trump's former lawyer and the key witness in the Manhattan case, he is the author of the book Revenge and is the host of the podcasts Mula and Political Beatdown. Also with us is Christy Greenberg, who was in the courtroom. today she is a legal analyst for MSNBC and former deputy director of the Stny Criminal Division, the perfect people to analyze this for all of us Christy. I want to start with you because you were in the courtroom today and you described the judge as a very hot date. explain how the judge got this case back on track today so in january

trump

's legal team requested documents from stny and they produced about 200,000 pages of documents.

Trump's legal team then Goes Bananas says oh, we have to dismiss the case. Discovery violations for prosecutors and postponement of

trial

um well, Donald Trump lost all of those motions decisively today because the law says that the district attorney's office needs to disclose documents that are relevant and within its custody, control and possession and these documents were not relevant, the district attorney's office was When asked how many are relevant, they said less than 300 of those 200,000,

what

the Trump team said, they were confused and couldn't really answer, they said tens of thousands, They really didn't know, at the end of the day, these were bank records that had nothing to do with the case, the special counsel, the office reports had nothing to do with the Michael Cohen case phones that they already had and then the question arose.

Well, all of these sdny documents were those that were under the control of the district attorney's office. your argument Todd whitewashes you who was a prosecutor for nine years at sdny and said no they were not under our control essentially SD Andy was a third party either Trump or the DA's office could have ordered these documents at any time, they knew that and the Trump team made a decision they said: we are going to hold on to this we are going to sit idly we are going to ask at the last minute why they did that it is obvious that they wanted to torpedo the

trial

date So which was a surprising hearing, the judge got very upset at several points and you noted that these were really serious allegations not only against the prosecutors but also against him as an accomplice and he basically said, "We're retraining this, you know, in the clues we had." We are sending a trial date and therefore Donald Trump not only lost here.

I think you really saw yet again another lawyer for Donald Trump lose his credibility in front of the court and the public today. I mean, as Christy just described very articulately, we're at a point where the judge didn't say any more about this, set a trial date, but we've been so focused, Michael, on the kind of delays here and in the time we lose. Fai. Sometimes, focus on

what

this case is really about. You were a key witness here. For people who may have forgotten, tell us what this case is really about and what the jury will hear from you when the time finally comes.

Yeah, those are all questions that I'm pretty sure the Manhattan DA, the prosecutors, would ask. I'd rather not go into the details, so I would definitely like to tell Christie, but if I can say anything about what he just said that is accurate, the Manhattan District Attorney requested these records from the Southern District of New York. over a year ago and what they received from the Southern District of New York they turned over to prosecutors so I understand why Judge Maran acted the way he did in relation to Todd Blanch and it was rightly so so another The question is whether you realize that Todd Blanch and the entire Trump team are so persistent: trying to attack my credibility to try to find a way to impunize my reputation again for the sole purpose of further delaying this trial or canceling it. the entire schedule, which is just an illusion, well you're not going to give us a preview of your testimony, you know what this trial is about, so let me ask you something different, I mean, you said you just alluded to the judge.

Last week he basically rejected Trump's motion seeking to erase his testimony from the upcoming trial. They tried to do that. What

should

Trump

fear

most

about April 15? I mean, this trial date is set. Why

should

you worry? Yes, he should worry about me. should be

worried

about the Manhattan district attorney, the district attorney of the New York prosecutors, should be

worried

about the documentary evidence, should be worried about all the witnesses that are going to come to that trial simply because, like others too they have done it um, appropriately put, this is a very simple case, this is a case based on documentary evidence and corroborating testimony, you know these documents do not lie and they paint a very specific picture which of course does not benefit Donald Trump, yes.

In question, we're looking forward to seeing him in three weeks and talking about it, let me ask you Chrisy because again we have a trial date. Now I want to get into the head of what defense is here. The judge seemed a little skeptical. what they had to offer, but there is a trial date, what do you think his real defense can be in this trial? So some things, they're going to say that these payments, these

hush

money

payments to Stormmy Daniels had nothing to do with the purpose of them having nothing to do with campaign finance violations or affecting the election, they actually do.

He tried to keep his family and Melania from finding out, but it is a difficult defense to make unless Donald Trump testifies. I don't know where the evidence would be for that. They come from, if not from Donald Trump himself, uh, then I really think what you're going to see, as Michael points out, is that they're going to beat Michael on the standard, they're going to do everything they can to uh and they're going to really try. and attack their credibility and the credibility of the witnesses, but I will say that you know that the Manhattan district attorney's office would not have brought this case if they did not feel that not only did they have strong witness testimony, but they felt that the testimony of the witnesses was corroborated by documents here you have copies of signed checks that Donald Trump is signing from the Oval Office you have accounting books there are documents that show these payments and they are clearly payments that the witnesses not only Michael Cohen but several others can explain what The purpose was and just one thing to point out about the seriousness of this is that you know sdny told the court at the sentencing of Michael Cohen for the same offense for these campaign finance violations that they were so serious that they threatened the fairness of the elections and eroded our faith in the electoral process, so if the crime was serious for Michael Cohen, then it is certainly serious for Donald Trump, the person who ordered Michael Cohen to commit the crime for the benefit of Donald Trump, so There is a lot of talk about this not being serious and this being the least serious of the cases, I do not agree, this is electoral interference and I think we are going to see that in a few weeks a case of the two-level justice system will be presented, Well, Michael, I'm sure you've thought about it. a lawyer, you've been in the courtroom, you've thought about all the things that will happen to you, a judge overseeing the terms of your probation recently questioned your integrity, suggesting you committed perjury because you denied under oath that you committed tax evasion After you pleaded guilty in 2018, what are you going to say if Trump's lawyers bring this up at trial to try to discredit you?

Yes, once again, this gets back to the essence of my testimony. Look, I don't think Judge Ferman described it accurately. My lawyer, Da Perry, put it best when he said that he believed and now I'm going to paraphrase because he said it much more articulately than I'm going to say. That Judge Ferman missed the boat on the whole decision. In fact, what he should have been looking at is not only the fact that the Department of Corrections Probation Office endorsed the termination of supervised release that he chose not to, but more importantly, that there was even more here the judge and Goron. of everyone in the case the New York attorney general did not find Donald Trump credible he did not find Don Jr Eric Ivanka Jeff mccan Alan weiselberg his witness did not find any of them credible but the only person who did and did everything possible to say it Michael Cohen told the truth that is page 43 of the 92 page decision I think Ferman missed the boat here by a mile Hello everyone MSNBC has a new and improved app, you will receive real-time alerts and Analysis live blogs in-depth essays featured videos and the best coverage of the 2024 election download the new MSNBC app here's how to do it tap the App Store on your phone press search in the bottom right corner type MSNBC click the MSNBC app , click get or cloud icon and enjoy it