Live coverage: Trump still says he wants to testify as prosecution could rest its case

Donald Trump’s trial for 34 counts of falsifying business records to hide his encounter with adult film star Stormy Daniels in advance of the 2016 election resumes Monday with the prosecution expected to rest its case.  

The cross-examination of former Trump attorney Michael Cohen is expected to conclude in the first hours of Monday morning. Prosecutors have already indicated that their re-direct of Cohen is expected to last less than an hour and that Cohen will be the final prosecution witness. So the case could go to the defense before the court breaks for lunch.

What happens next is still unclear. Trump is still claiming that he wants to testify; however, The Washington Post reports that there is no indication Trump’s legal team is preparing for him to take the stand, and there are almost infinite reasons why this would be a bad idea for his case. Trump could be questioned directly about events involving Daniels, as well as multiple previous misdeeds—from money-laundering at his casinos to his self-enriching charity and his recent fraud trial. The odds of Trump appearing are very long. 

During Cohen’s cross-examination, Trump defense attorney Todd Blanche was maddeningly recursive and disjointed in his questioning. Blanche began and dropped lines of questioning before they seemed to go anywhere. 

On Thursday, Blanche questioned Cohen over a possible inconsistency between his claim that a phone call with bodyguard Keith Schiller was about the payment to Daniels when texts on the same evening suggested that Cohen talked to Schiller about his irritation with a 14-year-old prankster. Opinions varied over whether Blanche came off as forceful or just shrill, but that moment generated the most heat of the trial and may have damaged to Cohen’s credibility. 

The defense team talked about two possible rebuttal witnesses on Thursday: Bradley Smith, a finance law expert, and Bob Costello, a former attorney for Cohen. However, the defense wants Smith to talk about whether the law on falsifying business records is applicable in this case, and Judge Juan Merchan won’t let them do that. They want Costello to testify about his interactions with Cohen when he was serving as Cohen’s attorney. That also seems unlikely.

So the benefit of calling these witnesses, rather than just facing the jury and saying that prosecutors have failed to prove their case, may be minimal.

The judge has reportedly said that while testimony could wrap up this week, closing arguments won’t happen until next week after the Memorial Day holiday.