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A ghost is haunting Donald Trump's criminal trial in a New York state court. hollywood access tape measure. The tape itself is not included in the charges against Trump, who allege he falsified business records to conceal payments he made to adult film star Stormy Daniels in exchange for her silence about her past sexual activities. But according to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, the tapes are “centrally relevant” to explaining Trump's motivation for orchestrating the payment to Daniels. Still, jurors won't hear Trump bragging about grabbing women by the genitals. Judge Juan Merchan's ruling allows prosecutors to present evidence of Trump's infamous remarks, but they cannot play the audio itself.
People of New York v. Donald TrumpThis may be the only one of the four indictments indicted by President Trump before the 2024 presidential election, which begins today. In many ways, it's an odd fit for such a leading role. But its very shabby feel hollywood access The tape is a reminder of Trump's contempt for women, a major controversy of his 2016 presidential campaign and one of the main sources of his appeal as he runs for re-election.
As for Trump's legal problems: people vs trump It's always been a strange case. It does not directly address Trump's attempts to illegally seize power in 2020, such as the cases against him in federal court and Fulton County, Georgia. It's not as legally straightforward as the charges brought by Special Counsel Jack Smith for allegedly hiding classified documents at Mar-a-Lago after Trump's presidency ended. When District Attorney Alvin Bragg became the first prosecutor to announce criminal charges against Donald Trump in March 2023, commentators' reactions included more than a little doubt. Will this case really proceed first?
The New York case was not only the first to be prosecuted, but also the first to go to trial, as delays had delayed other prosecutions. Partly because of its newfound political significance, there has been a bit of a rebranding in recent months, with both Bragg's office and the press appearing to be more inclined to take the case seriously. It is no longer simply a “hush case” as many commentators initially described it. Bragg now regularly describes the incident as an “election interference incident,” reasoning that Trump's plan to pay Daniels was aimed at depriving the public of relevant information about the candidates before they could vote.
How confident you are about this reconstruction will depend in part on how convincing you find the legal theory behind the case, which elevates a misdemeanor charge of falsifying business records to a felony by linking it to Trump's intent to violate state and federal laws. Election laws – but not prosecuted for other violations. (Bragg also claims intent to commit tax fraud.) At this point, a federal judge and Judge Merchan gave Bragg's approach to the charges as a matter of law. Nonetheless, with the underlying campaign finance issues not being prosecuted, it would at least be difficult to present this case as focused on election interference, especially when the “election interference” in question was inherently much less significant than what occurred in World War II. There's something a little odd about this. Before January 6th.
That said, the incident speaks to Trump's willingness to play dirty tricks during the 2016 campaign and the last-minute chaos in the weeks before Election Day. This place hollywood access The tape comes in. after washington post Bragg released the tape in October 2016 and claimed that “the defendant and his campaign staff were deeply concerned that the tape would harm his viability as a candidate and undermine his standing, particularly among female voters.” . her silence. In a similar vein, Bragg sought to present her material on allegations of sexual assault and harassment against President Trump. hollywood access tape measure. Judge Merchan has not yet made a decision on this second request.
At this point, hollywood access The tapes and subsequent reporting on Trump's treatment of women have understandably faded somewhat into the background amidst all the other scandals. But reading the district attorney's office's court filings is like being transported back into the dizzying chaos of the final weeks before the 2016 election.
This was a bruising time for many American women, who not only shrugged at Trump's disregard for their full humanity, but were bestowed the highest office in the country. This anger erupted at the massive Women's March on Washington following President Trump's inauguration in January 2017, resulting in a surge in women's political participation and organizing. This appears to have contributed to the sudden explosion of the #MeToo movement in late 2017. But Trump's impunity and lack of consideration have continued to lead to conflict. Most hurtful came in the fall of 2018, when the Republican-led Senate confirmed Brett's confirmation. Kavanaugh appeared before the Supreme Court despite being accused of attempted sexual assault.
The Stormy Daniels story spans this period. wall street journal The payments to Daniels were first reported in January 2018, and Trump's fixer Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to federal charges related to his role in the hush-money scheme in August of that year. (Why the Justice Department did not indict Trump and left it to the district attorney's office is one of the remaining oddities in the case.) 60 minutes In an interview about her meeting with Trump in 2006, Daniels insisted, “This is not ‘Me Too.’ I was not a victim.” Still, the episode highlights that Trump's relationship with women is fundamentally centered on expressing her own power and authority, and Daniels' own account of their evening together is unsettling. said 60 minutes She said she did not want to sleep with him and did so in part because he offered to give her space. cub. In October of that year, the then-president posted a tweet calling Daniels “horseface.”
This dynamic emerged during the jury selection process. Several candidates participated in the Women's March. One female prospective juror posted tweets accusing Trump of being 'racist' and 'sexist', about which Judge Merchande questioned her while Trump watched from a few steps away. Another said she doesn't follow politics closely, but “obviously I know about President Trump,” she added. “I am a woman.” (None of these candidates ultimately made it to the jury.) Meanwhile, outside the courtroom, new york times/A Siena poll conducted earlier this month found a striking difference between how men and women view the severity of hush-money allegations. Women were twice as likely as men to consider the incident 'very serious', while men were twice as likely to consider it 'not serious at all'.
understanding people vs trump In this context, this is not an exercise in revisiting the chaos of the 2016 election and Trump's first term. This speaks directly to what Trump is proposing as a 2024 presidential candidate. As in 2020, the campaign against Joe Biden is less conducive to the misogynistic attacks that prompted Trump to run against Hillary Clinton in 2016. But this time, Trump's campaign centered in part on his promise to force Americans to conform to a very limited view of gender and sexuality. As Spencer Kornhaber wrote: Atlantic Ocean, Trump's proposal would “effectively end the existence of transgender people in the government's view.” The candidate has also promised to promote “positive education about the nuclear family” and “the roles of mothers and fathers,” fueling resentment among many of his right-wing supporters toward young, single women who are the Democratic voting bloc. If Trump's relationship with Daniels, and his treatment of women more generally, expresses his understanding that his treatment of women is sharply divided between the men who rule the world and the women he rules, then his 2024 presidential campaign will be guided by government policy. It is a promise to implement that vision.
In that respect, the New York trial set the question nicely. hollywood access In the 2016 tape, does this guy really want to be president? Of course, the answer for many people was yes. The revelations about Trump's meeting with Stormy Daniels, which the campaign desperately kept quiet about, may not have affected his electoral chances. What difference will these facts explained to voters during the trial make this time?