{"id":2227519,"date":"2024-04-22T18:12:02","date_gmt":"2024-04-22T22:12:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/trump-lawyers-unveil-hush-money-strategy-prosecutors-facts-show-nothing-illegal\/"},"modified":"2024-04-22T18:14:19","modified_gmt":"2024-04-22T22:14:19","slug":"trump-lawyers-unveil-hush-money-strategy-prosecutors-facts-show-nothing-illegal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/trump-lawyers-unveil-hush-money-strategy-prosecutors-facts-show-nothing-illegal\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump&#8217;s legal team reveals hush money strategy: Prosecutors find no illegal actions"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">24<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Ftrump-lawyers-unveil-hush-money-strategy-prosecutors-facts-show-nothing-illegal%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2227519&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>Attorneys representing Donald Trump in his <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/the-big-problem-with-the-stormy-daniels-hush-money-case-against-trump\/\" title=\"The Big Problem With The Stormy Daniels Hush Money Case Against Trump\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/fec-drops-its-inquiry-into-trumps-payments-to-stormy-daniels\/\" title=\"FEC Drops Its Inquiry Into Trump\u2019s Payments To Stormy Daniels\">hush money<\/a> case<\/a> in New York unveiled \u200ctheir defense strategy, focusing on challenging the legality of the charges rather \u2064than\u200d the specific allegations.\u2064 Trump&#8217;s \u2062lawyer, Todd Blanche, emphasized Trump&#8217;s unawareness of\u2062 the hush\u200d money details, stating that many aspects of the indictment\u2064 aim to criminalize non-illegal actions. The defense asserts that \u200bthe transactions do not \u2063constitute a crime, emphasizing \u200bthat\u200b even \u2064if the allegations\u200d are true, they don&#8217;t amount to criminal acts.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p><strong>NEW YORK \u2014<\/strong> Attorneys for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/donald-trump\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Donald Trump<\/a> unveiled their defense strategy during opening arguments in his hush money case on Monday, largely choosing to dispute the laws under which prosecutors have charged Trump rather than the allegations themselves.<\/p>\n<p>For the defense\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/news\/2973771\/trump-trial-new-york-prosecutors-and-defense-give-opening-arguments\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"opening statement\">opening statement<\/a>, Trump lawyer Todd Blanche told the jury that Trump was not involved in nor aware of the specifics of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/supreme-court-rejects-trump-bid-to-shield-financial-records\/\" title=\"Supreme Court Rejects Trump Bid To Shield Financial Records\">hush money payments<\/a> because Trump left it up to his former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen to manage. Blanche said his client had \u201cnothing to do with\u201d creating 34 checks, the hush money along with other compensation to Cohen, or the allegedly falsified entries on the ledger.<\/p>\n<p>But he said many elements of the indictment against Trump seek to criminalize actions that are not actually illegal.<\/p>\n<figure><figcaption>Attorneys for former President Donald Trump Todd Blanche, front, and Emil Bove, rear, exit the New York State appellate court, Monday, April 8, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo\/Peter K. Afriyie)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cEntering into a nondisclosure agreement is perfectly legal; companies do that all the time,\u201d Blanche said. \u201cThere\u2019s nothing illegal about that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Prosecutor Matthew Colangelo objected after Blanche said that Stormy Daniels\u2019s allegations that she and Trump had an affair were almost an \u201cattempt to extort President Trump.\u201d Justice Juan Merchan sustained the objection on Blanche\u2019s comment, and the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/2020-trump-campaign-attorney-says-pence-may-ask-state-lawmakers-to-decide-election\/\" title=\"2020 Trump campaign attorney says Pence may ask state lawmakers to decide election\">attorney continued<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>During opening statements for Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg\u2019s office, Colangelo said Cohen used his own money to scrounge up $130,000 in 2016 to pay adult film star Daniels for her silence about an alleged sexual encounter with Trump in 2006. The indictment alleged that marked an act of deceit against voters in the final days of the 2016 campaign.<\/p>\n<p>But at the beginning of his opening arguments, Blanche minimized the 34-count indictment against his client as \u201creally just 34 pieces of paper.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The indictment alleges that Trump caused the Trump Organization and his personal trust to record\u00a0$420,000 in\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/romney-proposes-350-monthly-payments-to-families-with-kids-under-six\/\" title=\"Romney Proposes 0 Monthly Payments To Families With Kids Under Six\">payments made<\/a> to Cohen in 2017 as retainer fees rather than as reimbursements for the $130,000 that Cohen paid to Daniels before the 2016 election. Blanche posited that Trump was ignorant of the money Cohen had given to Daniels and that the $420,000 was what Trump believed he owed Cohen for his work as his lawyer.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPresident Trump did not pay Mr. Cohen back $130,000. President Trump paid Michael Cohen $420,000,\u201d Blanche said, asking the jury if a \u201cfrugal businessman\u201d such as Trump would repay a $130,000 debt \u201cto the tune of $420,000.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNone of this was a crime,\u201d Blanche added.<\/p>\n<p>Attorney Philip Holloway told the <em>Washington Examiner <\/em>that what the defense is attempting to explain to the jury is that \u201ceven if all the factual allegations are true, they don\u2019t amount to a crime.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Even \u201cif these transactions occur, it doesn\u2019t necessarily mean that anything is a crime,\u201d Holloway said of Blanche\u2019s strategy.<\/p>\n<p>William Trachman, an attorney who served in the Office of Civil Rights under the Trump administration, noted that the argument laid out by Blanche covered elements that typically \u201cgo into a motion to dismiss, where they say, \u2018take all the allegations together, and they don\u2019t actually add up to anything illegal.&#8217;\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t know how effective it\u2019ll be with the jury, when the prosecutors themselves are saying, \u2018here are the laws,&#8217;\u201d Trachman said, adding, \u201cthey\u2019re going to, of course, have their burden to establish the elements of all the laws.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After the court proceedings wrapped up for the day, Trump exited the court and spoke to the media in the hallway.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m the leading candidate \u2026 and this is what they\u2019re trying to take me off the trail for. Checks being paid to a lawyer,\u201d he told the press gathered outside the courtroom. \u201cIt\u2019s a case as to bookkeeping, which is a very minor thing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Blanche\u2019s statements on Monday showcased how Trump\u2019s defense will largely seek to convince jurors that the former president is on the right side of the law, and lay out the argument that prosecutors are the ones seeking to bend the rules by taking misdemeanor counts for falsifying records and elevating them to Class E felonies by asserting Trump did it in the furtherance of a separate crime.<\/p>\n<p>An attorney for the former president, Will Scharf, signaled this defense on Sunday in an interview with <em>Fox and Friends Weekend<\/em>, saying, \u201cWe believe the facts are absolutely on our side, that they are absolutely exonerative.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The trial will resume on Tuesday at 9:30 a.m., with Merchan first hearing prosecutors\u2019 motion to hold Trump in contempt for several alleged violations of his gag order in the case. <\/p>\n<p>Testimony by David Pecker, a media mogul who prosecutors say was a \u201cco-conspirator\u201d to the hush money scheme, will continue at around 11 a.m. local time.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the hush money case, Trump&#8217;s attorneys contested the laws the prosecutors used to charge him, shifting focus from the allegations. Trump&#8217;s lawyer, Todd Blanche, clarified to the jury that Trump had no involvement, presenting a strategic defense during the trial&#8217;s opening arguments<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2633,"featured_media":2227520,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/wex-s3.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/AP24113611300069-1024x683.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[538],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2227519","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-washington-examiner"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/wex-s3.s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/AP24113611300069-1024x683.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2227519","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2633"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2227519"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2227519\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2227520"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2227519"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2227519"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2227519"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}