Trump’s hush-money trial at a glance: gag order hearing and Pecker testimony

Trump sat for the second day of witness testimony in court in Manhattan on Tuesday in his criminal trial. The former president spoke to the media outside the courtroom, where he rallied against pro-Palestinian protests happening in various US college campuses.

Judge Juan Merchan held off on deciding whether Trump should be fined $10,000 for attacking expected trial witnesses in direct violation of a gag order designed to protect trial participants from being the target of Trump’s abuse.

Merchan subjected Trump to a gag order before the trial began, covering prosecutors (but not the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg), witnesses, court employees, jurors and their families. Before the trial, Merchan then extended the gag order to cover his own family and Bragg’s family, after Trump posted about Merchan’s daughter, who worked for a company that helped Democratic candidates with digital campaigns.

Trump remains free to criticize Merchan himself, though doing so would be unlikely to win any favors, who will decide Trump’s sentence should the jury find him guilty.

The judge reserved ruling from the bench on Tuesday, but he appeared deeply unconvinced by arguments from Trump’s lead lawyer Todd Blanche that a series of social media posts were just responses to political attacks on Trump and therefore permitted. “Mr Blanche, you’re losing all credibility,” Merchan said.

David Pecker, Trump’s longtime ally and former publisher of the National Enquirer, was on the stand again as a prosecution witness following a brief appearance on Monday following opening statements.

Pecker told the court about being invited to a meeting with Trump and his then lawyer, Michael Cohen, in New York in 2015 after Trump had just declared his candidacy for president and was seeking a friendly and powerful media insider. “I said what I would do is I would run or publish positive stories about Mr Trump and I would publish negative stories about his opponents, and I said that I would also be the eyes and ears,” Pecker told jurors.

Pecker said he had a “great relationship” with Trump over the years and considered him a “friend”, describing the former president as “very detail-oriented … almost micromanaging”.

Pecker discussed the first of three “catch and kill” schemes, involving negative stories for Donald Trump that prosecutors allege he suppressed to help Trump’s campaign. The first involved a former Trump Tower doorman, Dino Sajudin, who alleged that Trump fathered illegitimate children. Pecker testified that he negotiated to pay $30,000 for the story, and that Cohen told him that “the boss”, referring to Trump, was “very pleased”.

Pecker also began to discuss Karen McDougal, a Playboy model who alleged that she had an affair with Trump. McDougal is expected to take the witness stand during this trial.

The court adjourned early at 2pm ET for the Passover holiday. The trial is not being held on Wednesday and is set to resume on Thursday.