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♪♪ all day long michael cohen has testified that he is a liar, admitting he lied to congress, to the government, to the public. he spoke for 8 hours and 12 minutes on the stand over the last 2 days total. with the trial in a lunch break, we go to cross-examination set to start when court resumes. and the big question is whether the jury will believe him hen he says donald trump directed him to pay hush money, to keep stormy daniels quiet. and, quote, it should not affect trump's chances to become president. i -- andrew weissmann, charles

coleman, and paul butler with andrea in washington. we've all been saying this is the star witness. this is the moment we've been waiting for. but the truth, andrew weissmann, is that this is the moment we've been waiting for. the cross-examination. some think that todd blanche, who has the trust of donald trump. how does he approach this? where does he start? >> so, the good news is, that i don't think you have to be particularly skilled to do this cross-examination. there's so much material. things you can go with are, all of the statements that have been made by michael cohen, in support of donald trump, denying all of this going on. in other words, before he cooperated, to say this is all just essentially a witch hunt. two, you can go

vitriol saying he much he wants to see the result here. three, you can go to the fact that he took an oath, just like the oath he took before he testified today, and violated it. and bring that out. fourth, you can go to the fact that he taped his own boss. he taped donald trump without telling him. and so, he is willing to do things behind donald trump's back. in other words, that's going to be a key theme of did he just pay the $130,000. that's in the bank. there's no way to dispute that. but they have to say that all happened without donald trump knowing. you can say, you made a tape recording of him and didn't tell him. you're willing to do things behind his back. those are some of the things that we're going to hear. which one he starts with, i don't know. but there's many, many ways to do this. >> how combative does this get? >> it's going to be a question of cone. i have to say, having been in

the courtroom, the judge is an adult and sets a tone of decorum. when we talk about the cross-examination of stormy daniels, it reads harsher than it was experienced. no one is screaming. no one is yelling in the courtroom. they have to take the decision that what michael cohen is saying is false, to prevail in this case. the jury has to find there's reasonable doubt and it's important that he's not cooperated. i think it will be pointed but i don't expect there to be the kind of thing you might see on tv or someone screaming and yelling and raising their voices. >> do you start from a position of, okay, what we're going to focus on is what i think we didn't do. where i think he didn't close the holes. yes, you can impugn his character. other witnesses have impugned

his character. you can say, he has taken an oath and violated it. is that where we talked about in the last hour, where he didn't connect the dots of donald trump, to bring it to that felony? and that's really where you go after him. >> i think it's and also. the first thing i'm going to do, if i'm doing the cross, i'm going to take him out of this hero mode. i'm going to try and start, from a very 30,000-foot high-up view, you're not the guy you just tried to be in front of the jury. i'm going to take him out of that, as quickly as possible, before i get into the specifics. at some point, it is critically important beyond just trying to impeach his credibility and damage that for the jury. it is critical for them, to

accomplish you weren't able to do things for the prosecution to get them where they needed to do. i'm curious, danny, your thoughts, in terms of the order. andrew brought up points. i think you hit those specifics. for me, i'm starting really wide. and get the jury thinking out of their minds as quickly as possible. >> i agree with andrew there's an embarrassment of riches. so much. for that reason, i actually see michael cohen as being a difficult witness. even though i agree with andrew, but there is so much. we have three lawyers here. lawyers on the other panel. everyone does it differently. everyone prepares in a different way. it changes throughout your career. every new lawyer scripts it out perfectly with bullet points and sub headings and everything else.

everything blows up once you get started. this is a script that for each question, you have someone that's answering it trying to thwart you. when you have this much material, it's the scariest thing for me. how do you organize it? how do you organize the cross-examination of a michael cohen? andrew ticked off five or six different points. but those are pages and pages of points you can make. then, how deep do you go? stormy daniels, did you walk to the hotel or not when you're preparing the cross, that's important. we have to be careful. too into the weeds and the jury is not going to care if she lied about being at the hotel or having dinner. do you expose every inconsistency they had in life?

or do you pick and choose? all the while, you have to improv right out of documents or notes you prepared. things can go sideways with every question. every question, no matter how skillfully crafted, that witness is looking to zing you on it. you not only look bad but you might get thrown off the rhythm and script. when you prepare a script, you can't be too rigid, you have to improv right out of it. >> there's concerns of taking the root of, do you point out the fact he didn't close the deal? that's speaking to him as a truth teller. if he is going to lie and say anything, the hard part of going with, you didn't say this and didn't say that, at closing, they're going to be saying in summation, this guy is willing to say anything. why isn't he filling in those gaps? it's a hard thing. and the government is going to say that. they're going to say, you can't

pick and choose. you know, you're saying he's a total liar. but he didn't actually say everything the state needs him to say. you have to be really careful. that's an inconsistent argument. that cross is operating two purposes. >> that's why people would hire you and not me. also that i don't have a law license. andrea? >> just very quickly, we've got some news. the prosecutor has told judge merchan this morning, michael cohen is the last witness. after the redirect -- the cross-examination and the redirect, the prosecution is apparently going to be resting and saying, as they had, most likely, depending how long the cross-examination goes, this week is it for them. we know tomorrow is not a trial day. and friday is not, as well. this week, it is -- their son

barron's high school graduation. barron trump's high school graduation. do you go big or small? how do you start the cross-examination after the lunch break? >> you treat him with the test. you want the jury to know, he is a lying, convicted criminal, who should not be believed. but i would go after him on some of the substance. he's been saying, vaguely, that trump directed the hush money payments. and that trump knew about and in some sense directed the falsification of the business records. where is donald trump's -- where are his fingerprints? i thought the interview with lanny davis, michael cohen's lawyer, was effective. it seemed like he was walking back the guilty plea. and i don't think the jury would favor that towards him. lanny pivoted. it's not michael cohen on trial. if you look at a lot of this,

you could get that impression. so, michael cohen is a person who directed or was responsible for getting -- karen mcdougal and the door man, them getting paid for hush money. he worked with stormy daniels' lawyer, michael cohen did, to get her paid. what about donald trump? and his relationship to the false business records. what do we have on that? we have most revealingly, trump's handwritten notes on one of the drafts. we have michael cohen's testimony, that trump directed the payments to be made this way. then, we got common sense. would michael cohen have taken out a mortgage on his home, that donald trump wasn't going to reimburse him? the question is, will that be enough for the jury? >> indeed. and chris hayes has come out of the courtroom -- out of the courthouse. talk to us, chris, about what

you're watching. you were in the overflow room? in the courtroom? what were you seeing? >> i was in the courtroom -- i was in the courtroom. i was seated right -- i was in the courtroom, seated right behind this weird phalanx entourage. >> behind the speaker. >> yes. we hind those folks. it was fascinating. i thought cohen maintained, from my accounts of what i read, he was succinct. he sounded earnest. he was in a register and tone that we don't normally associate with michael cohen. there is a number of striking moments. one of them was the back and forth about the attempts by a lawyer named bob costello to get michael cohen under a retainer to essentially keep him in the family when all of this is

starting to fall apart after the fbi has raided michael cohen. there's a number of points that e-mails from mr. costello are read into evidence, that have a very, you know, mob movie feel to them. kind of combination of flattery and menace in equal measures. you're loved. you have friends in high places. sleep well tonight. trying to set up a back channel that michael cohen can communicate to rudy giuliani, who is representing the president as his client. all that part, i was watching the jury during that portion. it was quite colorful. none of it felt like the kinds of machinations of the way he could be implicated. it seemed like an intent and pressureful campaign that brought to bear on michael cohen to keep him from, quote, flipping. and enter into evidence are tweets by the president of the united states. talking about flipping, expressing disappointment when he has. i thought that was a highlight.

and the most interesting part of the day, in some ways, and probably the most important, was the last hour was essentially a prebuttal of the cross, in which, susan hoffinger went through all of the different times michael cohen has lied. his legal troubles, the fact he's been disbarred. the fact he objected to the pleas that he entered, that he said he doesn't really kind of agree he should have pled guilty to those things. they tried to parse that. i thought it was relatively successful, given a bad set of facts. that is going to be interesting. that is going to be an attempt that says, this is a guy that made mistakes or lied. he's lied in different direction s faced legal trouble. on the core of his interactions with trump, he is telling the truth and reformed in a sense and what he has told is corroborated. >> it's interesting. robert costello, so close to giuliani. that's like what was happening with some of the january 6th

witnesses. this is spelled out in court, in testimony. they're trying to keep him on the reservation. on the family. don't go off and flip. and then, publicly, saying it. but that last hour, it is fascinating to read it. all those admissions are really going to be the way the cross-examination probably starts. you know, you lied. you cheated. you did -- you know, everything you tried now, just now to take back your plea, your guilty plea. who is the authentic michael cohen? that's the way they would probably take it, right, chris? >> yeah. yes. and in some senses there's an interesting -- one of the narrative themes throughout this whole thing, right, is the similarities between cohen and how cohen operated and trumped. and the fact that trump liked him. when trump stiffed his law firm for the first time, they brought michael cohen to get the check.

there's a fractal nature that you got this minitrump figure. the justice department was weapon siized against me. and there's some merit in some ways to the allegations that michael cohen has leveled with bill barr's level of injustice. and there is a sort of -- this sense, in which, this kind of cutting corners, not telling the full truth, feeling like you're only under siege and persecuted. there's some resonances and echos between how donald trump performs that and a lot of some of the personality traits. particularly those that are zoomed in on cross and were touched in the prebuttal. >> there's a little news from our reporters in court, during the morning side bar. merchan said that michael cohen will be the final witness. during that meeting, blanche said he could not commit to calling any witnesses.

he says the defense has one expert witness who couldn't be available until monday. but his testimony is contingent on a decision about how the instructions to the jury will be written. he said he did not know whether donald trump would testify and that the defense has decided not to call allen garten. danny, will you put that into plain language for me? >> look at this by example -- ending sooner than expected, we can infer, where the prosecution said they had two witnesses and now, only one, that this is a last-minute or end-of-game decision, a judgment call, as to the final witness. and look, i've been saying this all along, the prosecution moving as quickly as they have, has thrown off the defense. they're planning for whatever witness they plan to call. he's not available. >> they have one witness? >> they're not committing to that. the defense case is almost always much, much shorter than the prosecution's case.

i frequently call zero witnesses and rely on the burden of proof and say they haven't proven it. >> you can make the argument to the jury, they didn't make the case. i didn't need to have witnesses. it's not incumbent on me, it's incumbent on the prosecution. do jurors look at that and say, you didn't have a defense? >> they are going to be instructed against that. it is the state's burden of proof to prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt. and i believe, danny, wouldn't you then, as a defense team, take on a burden, by presenting something, in some ways, it changes that dynamic. people start to think, the state's case, versus your case. particularly, if the defendant testifies. it becomes a swearing contest, in this case, i think that would end very, very badly for the defense. i would be shocked if donald trump actually testifies.

i think we're going to get a statement from him that says about how the case is so weak i didn't need to. something like that. pretty typical. >> yeah. maybe not. chris hayes, give us your take on what we heard from todd blanche who didn't know whether or not donald trump would testify. >> i think it would be malpractice. i wouldn't put malpractice past them. we know what happens in the attorney/client relationship between donald trump and his lawyers. this trial has it as its central focus. i mean, it's not the first one. look at rudy giuliani. look at two other lawyers who are facing -- jeffrey clark or john eastman, the people that respected the president in some capacity, are facing sanctions,

disbarment, criminal prosecution. i wouldn't put it past him. there's enough reptilian sense of protection, with the lizard brain. >> chris hayes, we're relying on this updated document. how does it look in there, how are his kids reacting? what's the jury looking like? give us some sense. >> his eyes have been closed most of the morning. i can't say what's happening behind the lids. his eyes have been closed. the jury has been paying careful attention. the prosecution has done a good job of moving things quickly and using these exhibits that allow a place for visual focus.

but the most striking thing to me, was the rows in front of me. when you have ramaswamy and other congressmen, eric and laura trump. the individual that works in the staff to compile to make things to make the defendant feel good about himself. i was watching herself at work, as she was copying and pasting to be printed at lunch. hear i'm sitting and watching, here are all these people who have allowed -- not his family members. and not even the staff who work for him. but the people, like vikram swami, who are playing the michael cohen role. there's michael cohen there, a diminished man. people encountered him -- you remember what michael cohen was like in 2017 and 2018, full of bluster. full of confidence. full of intimidation. and now, he's up there, looking

gaunt, looking defeated, on the witness stand. and you're watching the next it ration of people auditioning to be the next version of that guy up on the stand, or the next version of mike pence, the former vice president, who sure as heck is not in the excuse me to support the man he served in the white house after they sicked a mob after him chanting, hang mike pence. you have a set of people that have no connection that are looking at the ghost of christmas future, the man on the stand, that was this figure that thought he could generate, revenue, fame and fortune and power for himself by proximity with donald trump. and ended up on the wrong side of the bargain. and you wonder if anyone in those rows is going to end up in the same position. >> as you were, is i. when he had the office in 30 rock, after donald trump was elected, not at nbc news, but at the squire law firm upstairs. i remember visited him up there.

he was special counsel to the president. the phone calls he was getting and the deals he had made because of the access he had because he was the lawyer to the president of the united states. a man who was high on a hill. and you're right to talk about how fall he has fallen since then. the michael cohen you see today is not the michael cohen you saw a few years ago. the michael cohen that flicked against donald trump is a diminished man. the motivations behind that. he talks about wanting to do right by the american public and right by the american family, is neither here or there. by this case, it's what he experienced and what donald trump asked him to do and whether the jury believes it. >> that's right. how credible that story is.

and how corroborated it is. i have to say, that corroboration, to come back to the e-mails and why the constant use of exhibits and texts, which is not norval to michael cohen's directive. it's part of trial practice. in this case, it's effective. because of michael cohen's history. because of the fact he is talk under oath is a set of lies. there's documented lies he told. when he says something and we see it in paper. say something, and see it in paper. bob costello, was being sketchy. you felt like it was being pressured. you see the e-mail and you say, that's a sketchy e-mail. you talk about setting up the back channel. is he saying back channel? some paraphrasing way? and it says, i would be happy to set up a back channel. that's right on the money. they kept doing that time and time again, in a way i think does bolster the credibility of

the story he's telling on these main points. >> chris hayes, thank you so much. for more from chris, tune into "all in with chris hayes" tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on msnbc. let's bring in lisa ruben and "new york times" investigative reporter suzanne craig also at the courthouse. they've been in the overflow room today. lisa, what is your take on the decision, first of all, for the prosecution, to rest after michael cohen, after his cross-examination and the redirect. and for the defense to say, they may have one witness, an expert witness that is not ready for monday, that they may not have any witnesses. >> let's start with the second first. their witness list, as it had been shared with the prosecution and is available in the public filing was also three people long. and it consisted of, that expert, donald trump, and allen garten. and in some respects, the only surprise is that allen garten

will not be testifying. we expected that donald trump would be a game-time call. that happened in side bar. nobody in the courtroom or the overflow room heard it. the question to blanche's, do we know if he is going to be testifying was no. and blanche was a solid wall there, no. he gave no indication of when he would know, how he would know, just for right now, he doesn't know. i'm not really that surprised to hear that the defense believes that if it puts on a case, it will likely only consist of the expert witness, with a big question mark hovering around donald trump's head. in terms of the prosecution decision to end with cohen, if they called a second witness, it was always my expectation, that person was going to be custodial witness or records witness at the most. and today, in today's transcript, at the side bar, that's what they said. they called an additional witness, it would have been somebody from a book publishing

company to authenticate and read excerpts from another trump book. that's not going to happen. they decided they don't need it. and based on the experts we have seen, about trump's modus operandi, i would agree with them. it's additive but not necessary. and cumulatively, they probably don't need it. i want to tell you something, though, about michael cohen. i was really struck today between how high-flying michael cohen was in 2017 and 2018, despite not getting the job he wanted in the white house. he testified that he was making $4 million a year after leaving president trump's employ. he was holding himself as the personal attorney for the president when he was doing ten hours of legal work for trump, the trump organization or members of the trump family directively. he was making his money off of is trump's name and having that

fancy office, visiting with all of his knickknacks and items from the trump life. that's what people people were paying $4 million for. the contrast between that michael cohen and the other michael cohen at the end of examination is a different man. he had sell off his taxing medallions, because a convicted felon can't hold them. and had to rid himself of the real estate he collected over the years, including holding buildings because his legal fees have been so great, he couldn't have afforded it. while michael cohen is not pleading poverty now, the life he enjoys is a far cry from the lavish lifestyle he had in that office at 30 rock after donald trump became president. i was really struck by just how the mighty have fallen, really. >> i think -- we all may know from interactions from michael

cohen, from working in the business that we work in, we understand how different the michael cohen today is from the person who was in the sere of donald trump. chris hayes calling him gaunt. ultimately, the surprise for a lot of people that did not believe that the prosecution would end with michael cohen, was based on the fact he is a problematic witness. do you think that the michael cohen that you've watched on the stand is, if rehabilitated, may not be the right word. but presented in a way that ultimately what the prosecutors decided was, he did come across as credible. he came across has someone who admitted all of his failings, including the fact he lied under oath before. but he brought together the pieces of a believable prosecution. who is the michael cohen you saw, sue? >> i think it's a new game this

afternoon. it's going to be hard to tell how he does. the words that were in my ear. i lied, i lied. yes, ma'am, yes, ma'am. the government spent a long time trying to bullet-proof him. he did well in answering the questions. it was rehearsed. he was very reserved in court. i felt he was subdued. i don't know where that goes this afternoon. the good thing for michael cohen and for the government, is we head into the final days of this, looks like now. is that a lot of what michael cohen said has been corroborated. he brought some new, important evidence in. a lot of it we heard from other witnesses. i felt like we heard pieces from david pecker that came into michael cohen. we heard pieces of hope hicks that came into michael cohen. and michael cohen was able to corroborate the conversations

and the records. and the other thing that michael cohen did this morning, is he went through some of the false documents, the 34 false documents that the jury is going to have to consider whether or not they were falsified. he went through the entry of those documents, one by one. it was tedious. but we got through them. he didn't say that donald trump entered them. he didn't say that. that doesn't have to happen. all that has to happen is donald trump caused them to be entered. and the government has left that impression, whether or not they can get that through to the jury, we'll see. but i think that was also important for michael cohen, this morning. this afternoon, and tomorrow, it's just going to be a whole new game, how he holds up. and what impression the jury is left with. >> we're going to get that first glimpse of it, in a few minutes. they come back from the lunch break in the 2:00 hour. sue craig, and lisa rubin.

let's get to lawrence o'donnell. he's been in the court overflow room. you've been there, it feels like, every day. what struck you today about michael cohen on the stand? >> michael cohen delivered what the prosecution need him to deliver. including the phrase false business record. he was asked early in his testimony this morning when going through the invoices for his services, that he did not provide, whether those were false records. he said they were. and more importantly, the records created by the trump organization, paying him. he said were false business records, including the check stubs that came along with each one of those signed checks, signed by donald trump. he stressed in his testimony, as the d.a. brought out, that the creation of the false business records was a trump organization

idea. that's to say, michael cohen just expected to get one of these $35,000 checks every month. he wasn't getting them. he was told, send us an invoice. send us an invoice, so we can put in for the payment. so, michael cohen's sending of the invoice is what generates the false business records. and it wasn't michael cohen's idea to send those invoices and generate any of those false business records. but he was taken through that very carefully, establishing the exact elements of the crime requires to be filled. towards the end of the testimony, why did you pay stormy daniels? it was to help the campaign. if donald trump was not a kand candidate, he would not have paid stormy daniels. and the actual last words of his testimony, before we went --

before the defense -- sorry, the prosecution, completed the direct testimony, was the ultimate question to michael cohen -- do you have any regrets? and he said, i do. he said, i regret doing things i should not have. he said, i violated my moral compass. and i suffered the con consequenc consequences for that. and so did my family. and those were the last words that the jury heard from michael cohen, before this recess break for lunch. after which, you're going to see -- we're going to see something completely different than what we've seen so far. that will be the cross-examination. >> lawrence, do you think that the litany of lies he told, is still going to be the residing impression before -- it's a little difficult to say how this will be handled.

they have so much material to work with here. the lies and the attempt to walk back from the guilty plea. >> you can't have a trump witness from the trump side of this story, that hasn't told lies to get donald trump to this place. this whole case is about a lie. it's the lies, the initial lice, about -- he had no idea who stormy daniels was. what the jury has gone through with michael cohen on the witness stand, the eflation of those lies. the way the lies moved over time and how they were abandoned. there was a point that donald trump said, okay. you paid off stormy daniels and say it was your idea. it's impossible for a witness like michael cohen to come in

and provide useful information without actually having lied his way to get to a point where he's in a decision with donald trump, that he can be in the room with donald trump, allen weisselberg, planning the lie of how he will be reimbursed. michael cohen has a mountain of lies. but the way the d.a. brought out the story of the lies and how they changed over times. and the big decisions that michael cohen made after the fbi raided his home and the hotel room and he was temporarily staying in and his office. and how his meeting with his family about what to do next turned him away from the life of

lying for donald trump. that's the story that the jury has of now. getting up there, cross-examination and thinking you can score points that michael cohen lied, you can have get away from there. you have to pick individual lies and use that lie as the lever that separates the jury from accepting the rest of michael cohen's testimony. >> arguably, by doing that, getting under michael cohen's skin, is there anything you have seen in his testimony? and this is friendly questioning. he's going to face a different situation with todd blanche. but any emotions and impatience? anything that would say to you tiredness, that would say to

you, that could be an opening for todd blanche and a problem for michael cohen and the prosecution? >> absolutely not. we've all seen those emotions in michael cohen, in the other appearances he's done. in his podcast that he talked about today. and on television. we've seen that. we've seen that wild, undisciplined side of michael cohen. we say, we've seen a different michael cohen on the witness stand. that's true of a person that's taken the witness stand and taken an oath. it changes everyone. no one sits on a witness stand and sounds like they sound at home or sounds like they might on tv or other settings. the witness stand is a unique setting. it's a surgery room. everyone is completely different

in that spot. and michael cohen has been the best version of michael cohen. we've seen the worst of him. >> lawrence, thank you for coming on. for lawrence's version of what's going on in the courtroom, starting at 8:00 p.m. and tune in "the last word" at 10:00 p.m., all on msnbc. joining us now, former federal prosecutor and former fdny criminal division deputy chief, christy greenberg. he's been in the overflow all morning. she worked in the fdny with trump's lawyer, todd blanche, we're saying will be conducting the cross-examination of michael cohen. let me ask you bluntly, is he the right person to do this cross-examination for a trial? that whatever happens will make history? and what approach, knowing him, do you expect him to take with

michael cohen? >> well, i think because his client is going to demand it, and the case demands it, he will have a hard-hitting cross-examination that's going to come at michael cohen in an aggressive way. one of the things he will focus on, is defending my old office, fdny. michael cohen says on the stand, they coerced him to plead guilty. if he didn't plead guilty, they would charge his wife. that's not a thing that generally happens. i don't have any personal knowledge of what they did in that case. he also said, these two crimes that i pled guilty to, the tax fraud and the bank fraud, the things i did not do with donald trump, i have a problem with those. even though he pled guilty, he is saying he didn't actually do it because he was coerced by the

bad prosecutors. i expect todd blanche to focus on that because that is an area where michael cohen is still, to this day, not accepting responsibility and not telling the truth. it doesn't fit into his narrative, which is very clean, that everything i did that was illegal, i did at the direction of and for the benefit of donald trump. i think todd blanche will have fodder there. if you have the jury believe he's not telling the truth about anything as he sits on the stand, that causes them to question anything else as to the charged conduct here. >> kristy, is it because he really does deeply believe that he was treated unfairly on the tax charge. to probe it now, after he's testified about how angry he was about it, that's really a way of getting him to be himself and to

maybe show his temper on the stand. >> there's a mound of evidence he committed tax fraud. he committed tax fraud over five years. and to the tune of over $4 million. they had testimony from people that were his accountants who prepared his taxes. and people who he was reporting to. they had a solid tax fraud case. he made a plea at the time saying he evaded taxes. he went after, in multiple interviews and said, i never evaded paying my taxes. and today, he said, i never disputed the underline facts that i evaded the taxes. i didn't like the fact that they coerced me. his story has changed multiple times. i expect you see todd blanche hammer that home because it is a vulnerable for him. and casts doubt on him more

broadly. >> if the prosecution rests their case after michael cohen -- it's expected they will. have they proven the case? the defense doesn't have to call anybody. they can say the prosecution has not met the burden. kristy, have they proven their case there's a faliication of records and it was to hide an underlying crime, in this case, a state violation of federal election code? >> i think they have done a good job of telling that story. the falsification of business records piece, all donald trump has to have done is caused others to do it. he doesn't have to be the one in the general ledger making the changes to the entries in the system. they didn't need to prove that. he needs to have caused others to do it by arranging this whole reimbursement system and having

a general idea of how they were going to effectuate it. that came out yesterday when michael cohen testified to the meetings he had with allen weisselberg and donald trump, subsequent meetings he had with donald trump where he talked about this is for reimbursement. this is not for future legal fees. as a point, today it came out in the testimony, about, you know, the payments and the invoices, where michael cohen didn't remember the amount he was supposed to be paid each month. if these were for legal fees, you would expect a retainer, you would expect detailed time sheets where the lawyer says here is the work i am doing. none of that exists in this case. and donald trump scrutinizes his bills. if nothing else, that's been clear. they've proven their case on that piece. as for the fact this was for campaign purposes, this has been proven very, very clearly. >> kristy, there's two lawyers on the jury. do you think it's crystal clear

to the lawyers on the jury? >> that's always a problem. i can say as a prosecutor, i never wanted to put lawyers on the jury because i was always worried they weren't necessarily follow the judge's instruction and they would take what they know about the law and what they may be -- their outside knowledge and bring that into a case. i think it's really hard to separate, just following the instructions from what you may know outside. it's a real risk. you have to figure those two lawyers are people who are going to be leaders on the jury because they have a general sense of how these proceedings go, particularly one of them is a litigator. that's a concern. they will be the ones to poke holes and to scrutinize and ask questions and bring outside knowledge. that's a wild card for here, for sure. >> kristy greenberg, it's hard

to overstate the stakes of what's to come. that's the cross-examination of michael cohen, personal and political stakes. for donald trump. turns out the co-chair of the rnc, who is also his daughter-in-law, among those who have been in court this morning. we'll talk to the former head of rnc, michael steele, when our coverage continues after this short break. we actually have reinvented ocean voyages, designing all-inclusive experiences for the thinking person. viking - voted world's best by both travel + leisure and condé nast traveler. learn more at viking.com. uhhh. katie! i knew i'd find you here. i know, it's wild.

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to a criminal trial for a former president and the respective republican nominee. the all be certain republican nominee. how remarkable is that and you see vivek and these candidates for vice president showing up today. >> it's not remarkable. it's as expected. it is furthering the fealty and loyalty to the nominee of the party who's sitting in court because of his criminal

activity. i was listening to the incredibly smart lawyers onset and i was struck by the thought everyone is fixating on michael cohen being a liar and getting tripped up on being a liar. well, the individuals you saw in the shot coming into the courtroom are lying as well. they're liars. because they know that what donald trump is saying about the elections about our country, about our politics, is all a lie. so, you know, this idea that we are, you know, you know, surprised that you know, michael cohen said these things. michael cohen didn't lie for michael cohen. he lied for donald trump. just as these useful idiots are doing the same thing. state of our national politics. >> and just saying there was also testimony that came out about his ego, his greed, how he

was, you know, trying to get that job before donald trump, he was in the aura. so kent, all you need is one. you're an attorney. one juror saying he was really in it for himself and this is about him and not about donald trump. >> sure. that's the goal that the defense is going to you know, play out in its cross-examination to play to that one juror who looks at this and says well, you know, he was doing this all for himself or donald trump didn't know x, y, and z, even though all the evidence shows that donald trump has always had his finger on the pulse of everything that happens in this orbit, especially if it involves money. but all you need is that one. and just as we've seen in our national politics, all you need is that one political actor to fall. and the dominos then fall after that.

that's the same here in this case where that one juror could be sitting there scratching their head, going, yeah, i think, i think this is more about michael cohen than it is donald trump. and that's typically how things play out in trump's orbit. so it's, it's going to take some work, obviously. it's certainly a real high probability in terms of how the defense approaches this. >> i think every one of the people we've shown in that picture, at least the key people, the members of congress, have put out tweets suggesting that they're going to continue throughout the day to update their followers on exactly what their observations are, but even before it happened, the speaker of the house made it clear what his observations are. let me play a little clip, michael. >> they are doing this intentionally to keep him here and keep him off of the campaign trail. i think everybody can see that for what it is.

i'm an attorney. a former litigator myself. i am disgusted by what is happening here. the judicial system in our country has been weaponized against president trump. the system is using all its tools to punish one president and provide cover for another. >> where have we heard that word before? weaponize. in all but one of the battleground states, donald trump continues to lead. we're looking at the latest group of people, they're all in. they believe that donald trump is going to be re-elected president and they are with him. and they all expect it in return. ramaswami. are you kidding me? these are unserious people. and yes, the polls are showing

in may when there has not been any real political engagement by either candidate head to head which won't begin until the conventions, then yeah, donald trump is a point ahead or two points ahead here or even five points ahead. but it's may. and you've still got to run the gauntlet of a campaign. whether you're in court or you're sitting in the oval office. so that, that is the reality that we have to be faced with and voters are discounting some of this noise right now. whether it's around the trump trials or biden's efforts, you know, to bring peace in the middle east. so there's a lot at stake but it doesn't really get the kind of momentum that translates into where the electorate is going to land until we get into the summer.

there are things democrats need to do politically and it looks like they're starting to do that in terms of their messaging and countermessaging, but this is why you see this array of political actors behind donald trump instead of his family. where's his wife? where's his child? where, you've got eric, okay. his daughter-in-law. but i would think as a juror, i'd like to see your wife. where's your wife? you're talking about having a relationship with a porn star. where's your wife on that? so, there are other narratives that we're not talking about because we're kind of fixated on that side of the equation in terms of you know, trying to get some reaction about trump. but i think there's a very powerful story line that's probably not lost on this jury that this man has no family around him, but he's got a lot of political actors who want something, just like guess who. michael cohen. >> why do you think voters are talking about that?

large numbers of voters to make the polls different. this is a criminal trial. the very first criminal trial of a president is happening right now. you're talking about polls in may. yeah, we're a lot of months out from the election, but donald trump's winning in these polls. he's beating him in five out of six battleground states all while this prosecution is painting a picture of him having sex with a porn star then lying about it, getting his lawyer to cover it up for him so that he wasn't going to affect the outcome of this election or he was going to affect it positively by keeping that story under wraps. i mean, and you talk about the family being there and all the ways this should disqualify donald trump to be the president again. and yet his polls don't show that. why is that, michael? >> i think there are a lot of reasons for that. i think it's largely the way the media's covered this from the beginning, to be quite honest about it. the way you just encapsulated it

is the way it is, but that's not how it's been portrayed largely to the public. the scenario with that fact pattern has not been put in front of the voters the way you just described it, to be very honest about it, number one. because the way you described it, that's less. >> sean: that's less the narrative we see from the speaker of the house. >> you talk about media. media, what is media? is it people on cable news? this network? tiktok? >> everybody. >> there's just people are getting information from all different sources right now. they can go where they want to get the information. >> they do. >> they want. so i just want you to define your terms. >> there's an inconsistent message across the board. not putting the finger on whether it's tv, radio, social media. it's everybody that's telling the story, number one. number two, the political side