Alina Habba was overheard on the phone with her client, Donald Trump, on Wednesday as she was walking through the courthouse. According to MSNBC's Lisa Rubin, Habba said: “'Hi, sir, I am in the elevator in the courtroom.' Pause. 'I will knock them dead.'”...well, not mouth, necessarily.
And that’s where Amer [NYAG's office] was headed. He was going to show that especially once Eric perceived that he was at sufficient risk that he had to plead the Fifth hundreds of times in fall 2020, his lack of recollections as to how they handled later statements of financial condition (and related valuation changes) was not credible. 6/
That’s likely where we would have ended the day but for vociferous objections from Cliff Robert & then Chris Kise, who, in supposedly trying to shut down that line of questions sideswiped the judge’s principal law clerk. 7/
Predictably, that enraged the usually droll Engoron, and we were off to the races about a potential expansion of the gag order, the legitimacy of the notes the judge and his clerk exchange, and whether Kise’s First Amendment rights trump (no pun intended) the clerk’s right to safety. 8/ Lawyers joke if the law’s not on your side, argue the facts. If the facts aren’t on your side, argue the law. And if you’ve got neither, pound the table and yell. That’s what happened today with the added factor that Trump’s team timed their outrage to strip the AG’s team of a last, devastating word today.
Don’t buy it. As Amer himself said with a grin, today was a great day for the AG’s team, even if Don Jr.’s joviality and Eric’s stinginess disguised that at times. More on why later…. FIN.All due respect to Lisa Rubin, what’s there to buy? Nobody whose vote might be swayed is paying such close attention to this trial. If you are paying attention, you know the judge has the last word, and Trump is still screeching that the case is over because Cohen didn’t say what Trump thought he said (and this isn’t a movie trial. There is no “star witness” on whom the four weeks of testimony depend. Well, except maybe Jr., Eric, and Trump himself.)
And, she left out the best parts:
Kise then absurdly claimed that he has a "First Amendment right" to criticize the judge's clerk. (Lawyers do not have a right to say whatever they want during a trial). Kise then said that he couldn't possibly be a misogynist since he was "happily married" and had a 17 year old daughter.Please tell a judge you have a constitutional right to speak your mind in court, see how that works as a defense to contempt.
Kise knows this, he’s not a goddamned idiot. Habba, on the other hand:
Alina Habba then chimed in to claim that the reason why they were attacking the clerk was because it appeared to them that the judge was just doing whatever his clerk told him to do. That didn't seem to make things better.I hope Trump liked that, because I think it cost him about $250 million .
Every lawyer who has ever hung up a shingle knows that the very last thing you ever want to do is upset or attack a judicial assistant or court clerk. Team Trump simply doesn't understand the most basic things you need to do to win an argument with persuasion in a court of law. Any court of law.
Or they simply don't care.
They’ve lost; they know it (well, Kise does). This is all just performance now for an audience of one. Hope he thinks he’s getting his money’s worth.
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