I have to admit I’m surprised. It’s mid-afternoon in the eastern time zone where I live, as well as up in New York. I had assumed Stormy Daniels would still be on the witness stand undergoing cross examination by Team Trump. Or more accurately Trump lawyer Susan Necheles who was tasked with Daniels’ cross. Trump surely demanding Daniels’ destruction, days of withering fire that would leave her as nothing but a puddle of tears. Things didn’t turn out that way, and in one memorable exchange it was Daniels and not Necheles who fired a kill shot. Maybe that’s why Daniels’ was done much earlier than expected?
In this NBC article the outlines of the cross-examination which began on Tuesday are described. Necheles is by all accounts a first rate lawyer and by a significant margin the most experienced litigator/trial lawyer, at least from a defense perspective (Trump’s lead lawyer Todd Blanch’s trial experience is mostly as a prosecutor) and it was her job to discredit Daniels’ testimony, same as would be the case for any defense lawyer with any prosecution witness. Attack the witness’s testimony. Explore any inconsistencies in statements, even to an extent their character.
Necheles had two problems from the outset. First is having Trump as a client who wanted, and no doubt demanded they go Roy Cohn (Trump’s legal ideal) and Necheles, for all her credentials was only on the team because she’s a woman. And when the time came to cross-examine Daniels (and later Karen McDougal) it was assumed it would go over better with the jury if a woman was attacking. It’s a well-known strategy in rape/sexual assault trials since forever. I wrote yesterday that for Trump it would have been best to simply challenge Daniels’ on some points of inconsistency, maybe attempt a little “you’re a gold-digger” type questioning and get her the hell off the stand.
Again however this is Trump, and as with E. Jean Carroll he wasn’t about to allow some woman to get away sitting on the witness stand and telling the truth, unflattering truth on HIM! So scorched earth it would be, even though Necheles and probably Blanche too likely told Trump they should limit Daniels’ time on the stand. That they could score some points and move on. That as I’ve said was a problem for Necheles but not her only one. As with Carroll Trump was no doubt demanding some major slut-shaming and he didn’t learn a damn thing from getting tuned up by Carroll and her lawyers during his civil trials. Necheles I’m sure warned Trump, even using that as an example that we live in a post #MeToo world. That slut-shaming was as likely if not more so to fail than succeed.
In a strictly legal sense it doesn’t matter if Trump and Daniels had sex back in 2006. Trump was worried after the Access Hollywood tape the story (and McDougal’s) would come out and his campaign would be toast. But as MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin points out it’s the sleazy sensationalism of the story that gives the jury reason to go back in time to October 2016 and how desperate Trump was to keep all this from becoming public. The legal case, the actual crimes are proved in documents but juries like to know motive, the “why did the defendant do it?” and again, that’s why the less time Daniels was on the stand the better it would have been for Trump.
However, jurors are human beings and of course they will wonder about whether the actual sex with Daniels happened. And, post #MeToo or not at least some of them will make a distinction between Playboy Playmate Karen McDougal (Hefner marketed the “girl next door” image for decades) and someone like Daniels who engaged in hard-core sex for the cameras. I’m sure Trump believed slut-shaming would work, and that the jury would be convinced the tryst with Daniels never happened. And if it didn’t happen then she’s just a gold-digger who went looking for a payday. (Actually we’ve learned she was getting inquiries about that 2011 In Touch article)
There’s no getting around the fact that Daniels was a sex worker and that carries a stigma with lots of people. Necheles tried to hone in on that, basically accusing Daniels of being a “whore” and as a porn star running around and f**king or trying to find someone to f**k every waking minute. Daniels could have, during Necheles various ways of asking her about getting paid for sex with all the “you’re nothing but a whore” implications have retorted “are you working for the defendant for free? You’re probably getting paid a lot more than I ever did!” Daniels was more circumspect but pundits say both Tuesday and today she held up fairly well. In fact was a better witness and more damaging to Trump on cross than direct examination.
Again, bearing in mind who her client was Necheles pushed too hard at times and made some mistakes. It was even shown some of her questions to Daniels about statements were based on inaccurate quotes of things Daniels had actually said. There were literally times where Daniels insisted Necheles was trying to get her to admit to things that weren’t entirely true, and even asked to be shown the statements (i.e. tweets) and it turned out Necheles WAS asking not just leading but falsely leading questions. I can’t imagine that did her or Trump any good with the jurors.
But slut-shaming and the implication “you’re a lying whore” was what what Trump wanted and Necheles kept pressing. Too far. Necheles might have realized somewhere along the way not just Trump but the entire defense team had underestimated Daniels and in one memorable exchange that I think will be the takeaway for both the public (those who closely follow this trial) and more importantly the jury. Referring to Daniels overall work in the sex industry (in addition to exotic dancer and porn performer Daniels also wrote and directed films and managed projects) this took place:
Necheles asked her about the number of porn films she’s written and directed, and said, “You have a lot of experience making phony stories about sex.”
“Wow. That’s not how I would put it,” Daniels replied. “The sex in the films is very much real, just like what happened to me in that room” with Trump. She added, “If that story was untrue, I would’ve written it to be a lot better.”
As I’ve said Necheles is a good and experienced trial lawyer and apparently didn’t visibly rock back on her heels, but she HAD to be thinking along the lines of: Oh sh*t! I don’t care what Trump wants. This woman is killing us and I need to get this over with. And sure enough Daniels’ testimony wound up ending (the prosecution did some re-direct and the defense didn’t re-cross) and Daniel’s left the courtroom. With Trump still there trying not to explode. I don’t know what pressure Necheles was under from Trump but as MSNBC legal pundit Harry Littman noted she committed a cardinal mistake – asking questions where she didn’t know what the witness’s answer would be. I’m sure if Trump had his way Daniels would be coming back to court in the morning for a third day of grilling. It must have been an interesting lunch break, where Necheles and Todd Blanche too pressed upon Trump the need to cut their losses and get Daniels the hell off the stand.
The case will continue to move forward. As I said the legal pundits note that whether or not Daniels and Trump had sex doesn’t matter. The crime is the cover up of any story it had happened. But as I’ve already said the “why” Trump was so frantic to buy Daniels’ (and McDougal’s) silence matters. Smacking jurors upside the head with the tawdry tales in the context of Oct. 2016 does in fact matter.
As then former President John Adams stated in the movie Amistad the lawyer that tells the best story has the best chance of winning. Daniels’ story might not be a pretty one but it’s memorable. It also gives the jury the answer as to why Trump would go to the lengths he did to cover up the story. In this trial Team Trump assumed they could discredit Daniels as a liar and by extension the entire prosecution case. It looks like instead they bolstered Daniels’ credibility and the prosecution’s case. Because they underestimated Daniels.
I hope someday Daniels can find herself living a quiet life on a farm and with her horses. Not that she’s a hero. I’ll always wonder “what if” as in if she’d spoken up in Oct. 2016. I get that she was probably scared (that parking lot threat in 2011 was on her mind) and she figured that signing an NDA and keeping her mouth shut would keep her out of the Trump/MAGA crosshairs. At least she did wind up telling her story. And this week in a manner and situation that will be devastating to Trump.
It will be interesting to see how things play out when it’s Karen McDougal’s turn.
Men always underestimate strong, confident women. Especially men like Trump. Funny how it always seems to work out badly for them, when strength and confidence ‘trump’ weakness and cowardice.
If Stormy is a slut and whore…what words describe Melania’s arrangement with this rapist pig? Be best whore and slut!
I’ve said it multiple times before and it applies to trophy wives in general. It’s not specific to Melania although she’d by far the best known example of the breed. When one looks at the levels of “the world’s oldest profession” down on the bottom are crack hos and just above them streetwalkers. You get to better levels up to even escorts with high end services with slick webesites or guys/gals with their onw slickly produced ones. People that get thousands of dollars per hour. Then there’s something called sugar babies which apparently has its own niche on the web – a place for women adversising a willingness to be “kept women” – a nice apartment/condo and nice clothes and perhaps some other goodies for being available on short notice to be arm candy or a roll in the sheets.
Trophy wives are multi million dollar versions of sugar babies. At the very top end of the scale. But still they are paid to be arm candy and hostess, screw hubby now and then and usually have a kid or two so he can nudge his buddies in a “look, my little swimmers can still get it done” way.
You did leave out groupie who bangs rock star or rich athlete and gets pregnant to live off the child support. Somewhat like sugar baby but without the maintenance.
Well, she was a better negotiator. She held out for the Mrs. degree and I can guarantee she had a damned fine lawyer who was hard nosed about the original prenup, which has been renegotiated several times since (I bet when he ran for president the first time and again got the nomination and when the news about Stormy and MacDougall broke).
To the average evangelical hypocrite, he made an honest woman of her and she birthed his child, which makes her better than Stormy (I hope Stormy got tested for STIs,because he refused to.use a condom).