Taking the stand on Thursday for now the third day this week, former National Enquirer publisher David Pecker’s testimony provided to form a roadmap for the prosecution’s case against former President Donald Trump.
From detailing business invoice practices to establishing how deeply involved Trump was from beginning to end, lawyers for the District Attorney’s office had Pecker walk the jury through much of the events that occurred leading up to and after the payments to Stormy Daniels to keep quiet about an affair she allegedly to have had with the real estate mogul.
Sprinkled in the testimony were juicy celebrity gossip tidbits and revelations about Trump’s repeated inquiries about a Playboy model who also claimed to have had an affair with him.
And after hours of dishing new details, the defense on Thursday tried to paint Pecker as suffering from memory lapses and operating for his own motives.
Here is what you missed on Day 7 of Trump’s hush money trial:
Pecker lays out the series of events
At the heart of the prosecution’s case is the accusation that former Trump lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen paid Daniels to keep quiet about the affair she alleged occurred.
Pecker didn’t make those payments. But he did make payments, he says, to other people who were shopping salacious stories about Trump. And, he told the jury, he was communicating with Cohen about the payments to Daniels, including asking Trump to pay back Cohen at the lawyer’s request.
Much of Pecker’s testimony focused on his dealings with Karen McDougal, a Playboy model who said she had a year-long relationship with Trump.
Pecker testified that he paid McDougal $150,000 — for both the rights to her story that he never intended to publish and for her to author pieces for his publications. He did so with assurances from Cohen, he testified, that Trump would pay him back, at least for the $125,000 he estimated the rights to her story was worth.
Pecker was concerned over the legality of deals with Trump
Pecker testified about new public evidence that demonstrated he was concerned about the potential legal liability of paying for stories tied to a political candidate. That’s what prompted him and a lawyer to decide not to seek repayment from Trump for the McDougal payment.
He admitted that his company lied to the Wall Street Journal about the agreement with McDougal.
“I wanted to protect my company, I wanted to protect myself, and I wanted to protect Donald Trump,” Pecker said.
Pecker said Trump tried to buy boxes of old research on him that National Enquirer kept
Pecker testified that Trump was fixated on obtaining old boxes of materials and files that the National Enquirer had in its possession. Cohen called “constantly” in September 2016 to request that they be sent to his office, Pecker said, as they were trying to negotiate how the presidential hopeful would pay for McDougal’s story.
At a September 2016 meeting at Trump Tower, Cohen continued to press Pecker about boxes of National Enquirer materials that Pecker brought to New York from Florida.
Cohen told Pecker that Trump was nervous about the records and the McDougal story remaining in National Enquirer control and that if he “got hit by a bus or the company was sold, he did not want someone else to potentially publish those stories.”
‘I am not a bank’
In detailing how the payments to McDougal were made, Pecker told the jury that he went to lengths to make sure the rest of the newsroom didn’t find out.
Pecker planned to use a company run by a former executive at his company, Investment Advisory Services, Inc., to pay a shell corporation that Cohen had established, “Resolution Consultants.”
“I don’t want to have a check from the Trump Organization going through AMI,” Pecker testified. He said Cohen advised making a flat-fee payment for “advisory services.”
“Because I believe that payment would raise a lot of issues and communicate something to the editors which I did not want to happen,” he explained.
Pecker also testified to being tired of making payments. He said that Cohen was “very agitated” as the negotiations dragged on with McDougal, and wanted Pecker to pay.
By the time it got to paying Daniels, Pecker said he put his foot down.
“We already paid $30,000 to the doorman. We paid $150,000 to Karen McDougal and I am not a bank,” Pecker testified. “We are not paying out any further disbursements or monies.”
Trump asked for updates on McDougal
Pecker said Trump was “very upset” about a video of Trump on Radar Online, a website that Pecker’s company had acquired, that described Trump as “being a Playboy man.”
The post predated AMI’s acquisition of Radar, and he instructed editor-in-chief Dylan Howard to take it down. It included an audio clip of Trump.
Repeatedly, including after Trump took office, he or his bodyguard asked Pecker how McDougal was doing, referring to her as “our girl.”
Pecker testifies that he told Trump that McDougal “is writing her articles. She’s quiet. She’s fine,” during a private meeting in January 2017. Trump thanked him “for handling the McDougal situation and the doorman situation.”
Defense worked to sow doubt about Pecker’s memory, motive, and prosecutors’ tactics
Trump lawyer Emil Bove conducted cross-examination — attempting at first suggesting that Pecker’s memories of the events had been refreshed by the District Attorney’s office.
“It’s hard to remember exactly what happened almost ten years ago, right?” Bove asked.
“Yes,” Pecker replied.
Bove sought to show that Pecker did not tell investigators from the FBI that Hope Hicks had been in an August 2015 meeting at Trump Tower — a detail he then testified to do during the trial.
Testifying under cross-examination, Pecker said he learned from prosecutors about the phrase “catch and kill,” which has been used to describe his purchasing McDougal’s story with no intent to publish it.
Bove also got Pecker to testify about several other gossip-laden stories of celebrities and politicians he helped kill.
Pecker testified how he helped kill a “Planet Hollywood restaurant story” to aid Ron Perelman, one of his biggest advertisers through Revlon. And he struck an agreement with Arnold Schwarzenegger to not write negative stories about him when he ran for governor of California — in exchange for Schwarzenegger’s blessing on a “giant acquisition.”
Pecker testified to how Endeavor CEO Ari Emanuel enlisted his help to suppress potentially negative stories about his brother Rahm Emanual, who had just ended a stint as the White House chief of staff and was angling for a run for Chicago mayor, and actor Mark Wahlberg. “What Mr. Emanuel wanted was for help with an affair Rahm Emanuel had, right?” “Yes,” Pecker said. Rahm Emanual is now the ambassador to Japan.
Pecker explained how he sought to use compromising photographs of Tiger Woods as leverage with the golf star — getting him to pose for the cover of one of his other magazines.
Jurors attention appeared to ebb and flow
During Pecker’s testimony about Daniels, who surged to infamy during Trump’s presidency, jurors began taking notes.
But the panel of New Yorkers who are set to judge Trump in the case appeared less interested in Pecker’s account of the bookkeeping for payment to McDougal, whose name is less well known.
Merchan did not rule whether Trump violated the gag order
The prosecution charged that Trump had made four new violations in the last three days — including during an early morning stop outside a J.P. Morgan building under construction when he Trump issued a warning to Pecker and others, saying I have a platform and I will use it.”
“Be nice,” he said.
But Merchan still has not ruled whether Trump violated the order in instances that were previously debated when prosecutors argued Trump “seems to be angling” for incarceration by repeatedly and knowingly breaching it.