The New York City trial of former President Donald Trump has ended its second week in a heap of confusion.
The question is the same now as when the charges were announced years after the alleged "criminal" bookkeeping acts occurred: Dude, where's the case?
This week, the prosecutors, a former Biden Department of Justice 7th floor suit, who came to attempt to true-up DA Alvin Bragg's campaign threat to Get Trump, announced that the NEW lynchpin of the case is—aha!—not only the federal election law but a state election law as amorphous as your brother's promise to be a good boy on prom night.
This newly invoked state law alleging Trump conspired to "promote or prevent the election of a person to a public office" will supposedly bridge the local law and federal law to magic up a felony to hit Trump with before the election.
Testimony from the prosecution's first witness this week was former publisher of the National Enquirer David Pecker. Pecker, notwithstanding that awkward name, had a less titillating story to tell about the famous man in the crucible than one might be expected to learn in a trial—in which the entire premise was that Trump paid to kill stories that hurt his reputation so he could steal the 2016 election. You might be thinking at this point, didn't Hillary Clinton win New York in the 2016 election?
Correctamundo, mon cherie.
Indeed, the case makes as much sense as that last sentence. Furthermore, as a fun aside, Hillary Clinton charged the Russia collusion expenditures, including the Steele dossier, as campaign expenses. Donald Trump's "catch and kill" deal with his friend at the Enquirer was not listed as a campaign expense. Prosecutors, shaking balled fists in the air, think, Trump, why couldn't you have written this off as a campaign expense instead of a lawyer expense?! Then we'd really have you!
Alas, Pecker testified that Michael Cohen paid him to kill the steamy Stormy Daniels story, not Donald Trump. And Politico reported that Pecker believed, contrary to his previous statements, that he thought he might be breaking federal elections law by a "hush money payment to former Playboy Playmate Karen McDougal, who alleged she had an affair with Trump."
Why would Pecker have any idea that doing what he'd been doing on behalf of Donald Trump, former Obama apparatchik Rahm Emanuel, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Mark Wahlberg, and other stars for decades all of a sudden would break federal elections law? Because Matthew Colangelo and Alvin Bragg wanted him to repeat that incantation to a gullible jury to magic up a federal felony. This case was so egregious that specialists in federal election crimes said there was no case.
Related: Spoiler Alert: Prosecutors' Tortuous Trump Case Is 'Confusing' to Nearly Everyone
And, why would it matter if Pecker had a thought, fleeting or otherwise, that this wasn't a good move? Now, I'm no attorney, and the fact that the feds/state/DA are strong-arming this guy notwithstanding, Pecker believing he was breaking the law by taking Michael Cohen's money is actually not proof that a Federal Elections Commission violation happened. Democrats should re-read that last sentence.
We understand, however, that the DA and Matthew Colangelo are claiming a conspiracy happened. But using rhetorical zip-ties to allege a conspiracy doesn't mean a conspiracy actually happened. This is especially true since Pecker changed his story only after the full weight of three levels of the judiciary pressed him.
The trial resumes on Tuesday.
Look, let's be honest, the jury will desperately wish to Get Trump. This is Manhattan. They're With Her, for goodness sake. But after the prosecution finished its case-in-chief, the defense could say, your honor, the defense rests and not put on a defense. Trump would never do that because he wants to set the record straight, but he could.
This case is a legal game of Jenga. The Biden-connected prosecutors are desperately hoping that defense attorneys don't pull out one of those blocks lest the entire foundation of this case collapse, which it should.
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