I’ll say right upfront this is speculation. Opinion. With a bit of snark thrown in. But when you’re done reading this (I promise it will be short) you too will think I’m on to something. By now anyone who’s heard anything about Trump’s criminal trial in Manhattan knows he chose NOT to testify in his own defense. Legal pundits/experts and talking heads mostly felt like there wasn’t a chance in hell he’d do so. Yet almost to a person they, like all of us qualified that opinion if just a tiny bit. Still, the prevailing wisdom was that just this once Trump would follow the advice of his lawyers.
Let’s talk briefly about those lawyers. By all accounts Todd Blanche, Susan Necheles and Emil Bove are very good lawyers. Blanche made his reputation mostly as a quite successful federal prosecutor. However his experience on the defense side is rather limited and not so accomplished. And he went into this trial inexperienced. This was actually only his second trial as a defense lawyer. Still, he’d prosecuted enough cases that he was capable of swimming in the deep end of the pool. Necheles and Bove were both much more experienced and could back Blanche up. So if not the best of the best Trump had a very good defense team. Yet most legal pundits felt they didn’t perform up to their potential.
Why that is doesn’t require much analysis. Like any defendant Trump had the final say on defense strategy and even tactics. MOST defendants, especially when they have good lawyers let those lawyers handle things. Not Donald Trump. He wanted a team of Roy Cohn clones who would attack, attack and attack with every slash and burn tactic they could come up with. That wound up costing Cohn dearly but Cohn was a mentor to a young Trump and the stories he told have shaped Trump’s approach to legal problems his entire life.
Trump wanted, demanded his lawyers fight every bit of evidence that was introduced just on principle. To rip witnesses, especially Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen to shreds. Trump wanted their blood on the floor and the walls. This type of stuff usually doesn’t play well with juries, at least not anymore but Trump was paying the bills and his lawyers in the end did what he wanted despite their misgivings. Those lawyers had to be thinking (often) of Rick Wilson of Lincoln Project fame saying everything Trump touches dies. By signing up to represent them their hard earned legal reputations have been severely wounded. Perhaps mortally. If they failed to convince Trump not to take the stand every pundit in the country, but more importantly their fellow lawyers and worse potential big money clients would think them guilty of legal malpractice.
Now, it’s not like they didn’t have plenty of ammo to bring to “this is why you shouldn’t take the stand” conversations with Trump. Plus, I still believe Trump was rightly scared to testify although he’d never admit it. Hell, in the dead of night when he’s alone with his thoughts he HATES himself over such fears. On the other hand he’s got his precious “brand” to maintain and NOT testifying was bound to damage it. Trump’s not smart but he’s savvy and he knows his MAGAs so he was faced with an impossible choice. And that’s why against reason and sound legal advice until the defense rested we couldn’t be sure Trump wouldn’t overrule his lawyers and take the stand.
It’s not hard to imagine them them ritually slashing their wrists while he waddled his fat orange ass up there. Any chance of rehabilitating their legal reputations would be over the moment Trump sat down after being sworn. However they had ONE “Trump Card” they could play. It’s why they were there representing Trump in the first place. I wrote an article recently pointing out that the whole payoff got bungled into committing financial crimes in the first place because for a while there Trump thought he could get away with stringing Daniels along. Until AFTER the election. And then refusing to pay her. At that point what would it matter? It wasn’t like he was ever worried about Melania because he had a prenup that would get enforced regardless of any personal embarrassment to her.
You see where I’m going? Trump is famously a cheap bastard. He’s spent his life screwing people he’s owed money to out of actually paying them. That includes not just contractors, but banks. And lawyers! Figured it out yet? Trump has shelled out a literal fortune in legal fees. All that money raised that he wanted to keep for himself but instead has had to pay out to lawyers. Good ones have learned to collect a hefty upfront retainer. Trump HATES that. However, most of them are young enough they’ve got years of potential practice and collection of big money from well-off clients ahead of them. Having their reputation ruined for what would be splashed all over the news both now and for years to come as “legal malpractice” might make those lawyers consider the unthinkable.
Tell Trump they’ll refund their fees if he didn’t testify! Basically, but him off to save their careers. I know. That sounds crazy. But think about it for a bit before dismissing the idea. I can easily imagine between the three of them Trump’s legal team had a good four or five million to hand back to (or forego) Trump. You think Trump wouldn’t jump at a deal like that?
So that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. Trump’s lawyers didn’t convince him not to testify with logic and/or reason. They convinced him with money. Poor Irony. In a trial about Trump committing crimes to pay off a porn star for her silence, HE could have wound up being paid for HIS silence. At least from the witness stand.
Add in he’s a coward to his shriveled black lump of coal he calls his heart. He NEVER fights his own battles…he just shoots off his cakehole and demands OTHERS to sacrifice in his evil name. Same as all the other nazi dictators.
Not saying you’re wrong Denis-we don’t know and may never know the why/why not on this one. There is however another explanation: his lawyers played on his narcissism which, as we all know, is boundless. They may have started on this when they said they’d represent him in court, maybe later. Were I so unfortunate as to represent this colossal ass I would not let a day go by when I would tell him how foolish the prosecutors would make him look on the stand. I would stress just how easy it would be to do so probably adding an such bull-hockey as “even the most brilliant defendant would be embarrassed by xxxx, yyyy, zzzz gotcha’ questions”. One thing I think trump avoids even more than he avoids paying his bills is anything that would show him in a light other than what his own mind shows him. Getting on the stand would have shown just how big a liar and idiot he actually is and would have shown it to the world. I believe trump’s attorneys were at least smart enough to come up with examples that would have made trump think twice before testifying in his own defense–think twice and back the hell out.
We may never know but that reason is as likely, or more so, than the “we won’t take your money” thing. Sure, lawyers do pro bono work but I cannot give a single example of them doing so for someone who, while not an actual billionaire, is an actual millionaire (still needs fact-checking. lol). Money might not be important to these attorneys but looking stupid for free is not attractive to anyone I know.
As I said at the outset it’s speculation. Snarky? To a degree. However even if not likely it’s a theory that fits the facts. Granted returning a retainer or part of one is a VERY unlawyerly thing to do. Still, each of these lawyers are well off financially and have built good reputations, at least prior to this case. Given their performance those reputations have been damaged, even if many who know them believe they were stuck carrying out orders from Trump instead of doing things their way. But allowing Trump to take the stand would have finished them professionally.
All have at least a decade of full-time legal practice ahead of them and intend to build a successful financial status into a wealthy one. Sometimes you have to take a step back to be able to move sideways so you can move forward again. What’s one or even two million bucks against the lost legal fees they’d have earned with trashed reputations had Trump taken the stand? Yes, they could have salvaged things a bit by filing a motion to withdraw but the judge would have been legally well justified in rejecting it. It might have provided a bit of legal/reputational “cover” but not as much as they would have wanted.
However, with Trump not taking the stand they are getting some credit for having convinced him to sit there and keep his fat mouth shut. Being known as “the lawyers who got Trump to listen to their advice” (even if they had to pay him for his silence which is something that we’ll never know) will help them when enough months have passed to scrub off the Trump stink. If convicted a new lawyer(s) will handle his appeal.
It’s equally possible that they eventually got him to understand that if he tells even ONE lie while under cross-examination and the prosecution nails him on it, he’s looking at an additional charge of perjury – and that WILL involve jail time.