Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Live Event/Special

Jury Selection in Trump Trial. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired April 15, 2024 - 09:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[09:00:00]

SARA SIDNER, CNN ANCHOR: All right, Leslie Ellis, thank you so much.

We are watching the motorcade of Donald Trump arriving right now to the court. You see all of those trucks. This is an unprecedented moment in our history. The first time ever that a former president has faced criminal charges.

The trial begins today. It's happening, you know, just in the next few minutes. A jury selection will begin.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: And you're seeing the cars pull up right there. Obviously, we will watch and see if Donald Trump speaks.

This has been CNN NEWS CENTRAL.

CNN's special coverage of this trial starts now.

JAKE TAPPER, CNN ANCHOR: History unfolding live on CNN. You're looking at live pictures in New York City of Donald Trump's motorcade making its way to the Manhattan courthouse where, in just under an hour, Mr. Trump, seen leaving Trump Tower just minutes ago, will become the first former president in all 247 years of this republic's existence, to ever stand criminal trial.

It happens as another story of major global consequence is playing out continents away. This hour it remains unclear if Israel plans to respond to brazen Iranian aggression with payback now or later. Israel's war cabinet is meeting to decide its next steps.

I'm Jake Tapper and you're watching CNN's special live coverage.

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: And I'm Kaitlan Collins in New York where we are expecting that motorcade to arrive here at the courthouse behind me and the former president is going to be spending the day inside this courtroom as this historic trial gets underway.

TAPPER: (INAUDIBLE) and start the Trump trial in just minutes by beginning to choose the 12 jurors and six alternates who will ultimately decide if Mr. Trump is guilty of any of the 300 - I'm sorry, any of the 34 counts of falsifying business records are real. Who ends up in the box will determine if Trump is convicted of any of those criminal counts connected to the alleged scheme. The jurors identities will remain hidden from the public out of concern for their safety, but their ultimate judgements will not be.

Even before today, Trump has, on social media and in speeches, fired a barrage of lies and smears and threats describing the presiding judge and the district attorney as conspirators in an elaborate nonexistence scheme run by his opponent, Joe Biden, to persecute and punish him. Now, many of those accusations are completely false, of course.

The trial will also likely feature well-known witnesses, Michael Cohen, the former president's fixer, and Stormy Daniels, whom Cohen and Trump allegedly tried to pay into staying quiet in the final stretch of the 2016 election.

We're going to start off our coverage with CNN's Kara Scannell, who is just about to head inside the courthouse for jury selection.

Kara Scannell, walk us through what we're going to see in just a couple minutes.

KARA SCANNELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, Jake, we've already seen a number of potential jurors make their way into the courtroom. More than 500 have been summoned for today alone. And once they are in the courtroom, the courthouse, they will begin this process where they'll get ready to be brought into the courtroom when the judge is ready for them. And that will mean 100 jurors at a time coming into the courtroom where they will be asked if they can sit in judgment of Donald Trump.

The judge has already outlined how this is going to work. He said he's going to ask a broad question at the top, asking if anyone cannot be fair or impartial or for otherwise another reason cannot serve, whether it's a religious reason or the length of the trial, which is expected to go as long as two months. So, the judge said he will set it up that way and ask that question. If anyone raises their hand and says that they can't, they will be dismissed. That can give you a sense that we could move through some portions of this quickly, but other portions will not go as quickly.

Now, Trump's lawyers have already teed up that they want the judge to separate that question into two different ones because they are still trying to get this trial out of New York. They're trying to challenge the venue, saying that Trump cannot get a fair trial in Manhattan.

But once the initial question is asked, then the judge well go into 42 questions that he has already outlined. And the way he described that this will happen is that he will ask the jurors, one at a time, juror number one, because as you said it is anonymous, what - going through these 42 questions, some of the basics of where did they grow up, where do they live, what do they do for a living, where do they get their news. But some very specific to this case and whether they have ever attended a pro-Trump or an anti-Trump rally, whether they've ever worked for Donald Trump either at - when he was a real estate businessman or in his administration, and whether they belong to any fringe groups, whether that is the Proud Boys or Antifa, to try to determine whether these jurors can be fair and impartial. If they can set aside any opinions that they have.

Ultimately, the goal here is to get to 12 jurors and six alternates.

[09:05:02]

How long that takes remains to be seen.

Jake.

TAPPER: All right, Kara Scannell, thank you so much.

Let's go now to Kaitlan Collins, who's also outside the courthouse in Manhattan.

Kaitlan, a big day for Donald Trump and an historic day. Whatever you think of Donald Trump, whatever you think of the case, an historic day for this country.

COLLINS: Yes, Jake, and let me tell you, we have been out in front of this courthouse multiple - on multiple occasions as we finally approach this day, day one of the start of this trial. I know it's probably hard for people to realize, this is actually the first day because Trump's team sought a lot of delays over the last several weeks and months. They were unsuccessful ultimately in getting it delayed any further past today.

Though it is teeming with people outside the courthouse here. A lot of members of the media here to cover this trial given it is so historic. And I can tell you, for top of mind for Donald Trump right now as he is making quite clear on social media today is how his political fate is going to be shaped by what happens inside that courtroom behind me because, of course, they could ultimately determine what happens come November. They could have a role in looking at the election. And that is something that Donald Trump is thinking about as he is entering that courtroom.

He has just arrived here at 100 Centre Street to begin this trial.

Got CNN's Paula Reid and Kristen Holmes here with me as we are always outside the courthouse.

And, Paula, you know, getting up to this day, Trump's team was trying delay, delay, delay. What is their actual strategy going to be now that this isn't getting delayed, they are going to be inside this courtroom and this is going to be starting?

PAULA REID, CNN SENIOR LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Jury selection is going to be challenging for them and they know it. They believe that they're walking into a process that is inherently skewed against their client because of the makeup of the jury pool. They believe that the system that is designed to weed out bias here is not sufficient. You know, they would argue that, look, we each have ten strikes, right, people that we can try to eliminate, but if it's just a minority of the potential jurors of that pool of 100 who are pro-Trump, it will be easy, right, for the prosecutors to wipe them out, but then you have all these other people who are against their client.

So, what we're going to see is as they go forward they're going to try to preserve every possible issue for appeal. You just heard Kara talking about this issue of people who will be dismissed for cause. Now that could be, you don't speak or understanding English or you have a vacation or you have a bias, you can't be impartial. And the Trump team really wants the judge to separate out these folks who are being dismissed for cause because they want to, later on down the road, be able to show, look, this is how many people we lost because they couldn't possibly be impartial.

And as we go through jury selection and the trial, you're going to see them - some folks say it's a delay strategy, in some cases it is, but he also has legitimate, constitutional rights that they are going to try to assert throughout this process.

COLLINS: Yes, I mean, but when you say that, that means they think that they are likely going to lose this case and they're going to have to appeal it.

REID: I don't think there's a lot of optimism in Trump world that they will win here. I think it is an open question. What you have to do before you can really answer that question is see how this is presented to the jury, right?

This is really, at its heart, it's a paperwork case and you have some witnesses who are question marks. How does Michael Cohen play on the stand? How do they do on cross-examination? It's not a foregone conclusion, but there's not a lot of optimism that they're going to win.

COLLINS: Yes. And Trump was saying last week, you know, jury selection is largely luck. I mean his attorneys are going to be hoping that that's not the case here, that they can find even just that one juror, because if it is a hung jury that is a dream for them here, Kristen.

As Trump was, you know, out in public this week holding rallies, holding his political events, his schedule is about the change drastically. He is going to have to be in here unless he requests a waiver of his appearance, which he hasn't done yet. How - what are you hearing from your sources who are talking to him this weekend about where he's at mentally going into this?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, look, we can here from Donald Trump all we want about him raging against the saying it's unfair. We can hear from his advisors saying to us that they want this to happen because this is actually going to give him a boost with fundraisers or with campaigning.

But when you really get down to the heart of it, one, we don't know if this is going to actually help him, and neither do Trump's advisers. They have no idea how this plays out. We have not gotten to this stage before. Obviously, this is unprecedented. And we are now in a general election.

What happened during a primary is not the same thing that's going to happen in a general election. But too, when it comes to Donald Trump himself, he does not want to be sitting through this trial. We have to remember that this is a deeply embarrassing case for Donald Trump. We are likely to hear salacious details. I mean at the heart of this is an alleged affair with a porn star and then hush money payments to cover up said affairs. That is not something Donald Trump wants on full display for everyone to see, particularly heading into this election.

So, he is angry. He has been ranting. He has been talking to people about how he doesn't understand why they could not get more delays. I think there was a hope, at least from him, that ultimately this wouldn't happen until after the November election. Obviously, we're here today though.

COLLINS: Yes. And of course, Jake, we'll likely hear all of that from Donald Trump. He's not expected to hold any press conferences today, but he often speaks on his way inside the courtroom, his way outside the courtroom.

[09:10:04]

And Kristen makes a good point there, that this really goes to the heart of something that was personally mortifying for him. And, you know, a strain with the former first lady, Melania Trump, as all of this was playing out his first year inside the White House, Jake. Now it will be playing out inside a courtroom.

TAPPER: All right, Kaitlan Collins, thanks so much. We'll come back to you soon.

My panel's here with me.

Jamie Gangel, let me start with you. Again, I just want to reiterate, whatever our viewers or our listeners think about Donald Trump, whatever they think about the merits of this case, and there's certainly criticism of District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who's bringing the case and the legal theory that he's - that he's using, and we'll get to that in a second, Laura. But whatever you think, this is a huge moment in American history.

JAMIE GANGEL, CNN SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT: No question. It is historic, as we've been saying. He wanted to delay. He didn't want any trials before.

But now that he is here, we are going to see Donald Trump go into his classic playbook. He will campaign from the courthouse steps. He will call it a witch hunt. We know there is a gag order, but I don't think, at the end of the day, it's going to be much of a gag order because the judge isn't going to want to slow this case down.

TAPPER: Explain the gag order part of it, if you would, for a second.

GANGEL: So, he's - the lawyers may be able to do this more effectively than I can, but there are things he is not supposed to say, but every weekend we hear him on at rallies attacking the judge. It's a - he's a Trump (INAUDIBLE) attacking the judge's family.

The reality is that - does the judge want to call him out on that and slow the trial down, or will he just keep going. One other thing to remember from the E. Jean Carroll case, Donald

Trump can be pretty intimidating when he's in a courtroom, the way he looks at jurors. And I think it will be something we need to watch and hear from our reporters in the courtroom what his demeanor is as we go through this jury selection.

TAPPER: So, Laura Coates, as one of the lawyers at the table, explain what these 34 felony counts are. And if you would also, explain why some people find this - the legal theory under which Alvin Bragg, the district attorney, is bringing these to be suspect.

LAURA COATES, CNN ANCHOR AND CHIEF LEGAL ANALYST: Well, you know, one of the reasons, and she's mentioned, that we're going to have to look at this through a different lens, and we don't have eyes into the courtroom, right? We don't have actual cameras in the courtroom. So, we're going to have to glean is through the presentation of evidence, what the jurors actually find.

But the prosecution is going to be really key here. There are 34 counts of falsifying business records. They've got to meet the burden of proving this is an intentional act by Donald Trump. This is important because it says it actually has to have the intent to defraud, an intend to commit another crime and trying to cause a false entry of a record. What was that false entry, that Michael Cohen paid money to Stormy Daniels and said it was for one thing and then actually it was for quite a different matter, a falsification of a business record, trying to get reimbursement.

But the idea of what was the other underlying crime is the sub - is the issue people have with Alvin Bragg's case here. What was the other crime he was intending of committing? How can you prove it? And, of course, this dates back to 2015 when the original (INAUDIBLE) had with David Pecker at AMI, who was supposed to be the eyes and ears of the Trump campaign, you're talking about really nine years later having this case be brought.

So, there are a number of issues people find with them. By the end of the day, he has a burden of proof, and he feels he can meet it.

TAPPER: Fascinating stuff.

And, Karen, let me - let me talk about the jury selection, because that's what today is, the first day of jury selection. There are 100 potential jurors supposed to show up to the courthouse today. We heard Kara Scannell describing some of the questions. I mean there are typical - there are typical questions. You know, where do you live? What neighborhood in you are? Who is your employer? And then ones that I've never seen on a jury questionnaire before, and I've covered a few of these, have you, a relative or a close friend ever worked for or volunteered for a Trump presidential campaign? Are you a member of the (INAUDIBLE) Boys or Antifa? Do you have any strong feelings about how Mr. Trump is being treated in this case?

This is going to be a real challenge to find 12 jurors, six alternates, that both sides say, OK, we think that they can be fair. KAREN FRIEDMAN AGNIFILO, CNN LEGAL ANALYST: That's correct, it is

going to be a challenge. But that's what jury selection is designed to do. It's designed to weed out the people who can't be fair and impartial and look at just the evidence that's presented. People who have biases

. I mean everybody comes to court with opinions, feelings. Somebody would have voted in the presidential election for one person or another. It's not a matter of, who do you prefer, or what you political leanings are. It's, can you put that aside and judge the evidence from a fair and impartial basis, not taken any of the speeches that are being made or opinions that are being set out there, just all the - all the stuff in the background, only what is presented to them in court.

[09:15:03]

And it happens every single day in - across this country, right? Otherwise, there would never be an acquittal in a case if jurors couldn't be fair and impartial. Nobody's pro-murderer or pro-sexual assault, yet they can still go to a trial and acquit someone if the prosecutor has not met their burden. And that's what jury selection its designed to do is to find the people who can be fair and impartial in this particular case.

TAPPER: Elie Honig, let's go back to what Jamie was talking about when it comes to the gag order. What exactly is the instruction? What exactly is the concern? And has Mr. Trump been abiding by the gag order?

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: So, now he's not going to abide by the gag order and we're going to have an important moment soon to see whether the DA or the judge does anything about it.

So, the gag order is not nearly as broad or burdensome as Donald Trump has been complaining about. All the gag order says is he's not allowed to comment publicly about witnesses, jurors, court staff, prosecutors staff, or their families. He is allowed to complain, vociferously, about the case itself, about Judge Merchan, about the DA Alvin Bragg.

And just over the weekend, Donald Trump has been publicly posting attacks on Michael Cohen, known witness, Stormy Daniels, known witness. He called them, quote, "sleaze bags," his word. He commented earlier about Mark Pomerantz, a potential witness. And so, is the DA - I want to see in the next few minutes, first thing out of the DA's mouth should be, judge, he violated the gag order. If you tolerate this, it's like raising a child. If the child breaks a rule and you let it go, you've lost them.

And so one of the challenges for Judge Merchan here is going to be enforcing discipline in this court. We're going to see an important moment on that soon.

TAPPER: All right, very interesting. You're looking live inside the Manhattan courthouse where we are just minutes away from the start of Mr. Trump's historic first criminal trial. Coming up next we're joined by an expert in jury selection voir dire it's called, to take a look at how exactly today will play out and what kind of juror each side is hoping to find.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:21:35]

TAPPER: Welcome back to our coverage of this historic day. You're looking live inside the New York courthouse where Donald Trump is about to make history.

Welcome back to CNN's special coverage. I'm Jake Tapper.

The former president is entering the building. He just entered it moments ago. That's where jury selection is set to start in less than an hour. What's called voir dire. Donald Trump will officially become the first former president in the history of these United States to face a criminal trial.

I want to go to CNN's Laura Coates and Elie Honig. They're at the magic wall. They're going to walk us through what the jury selection process will look like.

COATS: So important being here right now. Let's walk through for the audience's sake how we actually got here. Remind the audience about this hush money trial and where we are now.

HONIG: Yes, Laura, so our story begins way back in 2016, two presidential cycles ago, when in the weeks leading up to the presidential election, Stormy Daniels, the adult film actress, alleged that ten years before that, in 2006, she had had a sexual affair with Donald Trump. Donald Trump's team then entered into what's sometimes called a hush money agreement with Stormy Daniels, where they paid her and she remained silent.

Now, it's important to understand how that agreement worked. First of all, Michael Cohen, then Donald Trump's attorney and fixer, and a key player, a key witness in this trial, he paid Stormy Daniels $130,000. Now, the second half of that transaction is really important because after the election Donald Trump and his businesses, they then reimbursed Michael Cohen for that $130,000 plus several hundred thousand dollars more. And it's really important because this gets to the actual criminal charges to understand how Donald Trump reimbursed Michael Cohen.

Donald Trump issued a series of 11 checks to Michael Cohen for about $35,000 each. Some of them, not all of them, but some of them signed by Donald Trump himself. There's that distinctive Donald Trump signature. And so that's really what lies at the heart of this. The payment of hush money is not a crime, it's the way they structured the reimbursements.

COATES: And the reason they gave for actually doing it, right?

HONIG: Exactly.

COATES: This is where they have the 34 counts of the falsification of business records. And specifically that's where we're going next to the charges -

HONIG: Yes.

COATES: Because how the money was paid and why it was paid is going to be crucial to the actual prosecution.

HONIG: Exactly. The key here is that they tried to characterize these payments, not as hush money payment -

COATES: Right.

HONIG: But as legal fees to the attorney.

Now, the actual charges. The actual charges under New York state law, first of all, are falsifying business records. Not paying hush money -

COATES: Right.

HONIG: But falsifying those records to say legal fees, rather than, I don't know, hush money payments or however they would truthfully be logged, in order to further another crime. And the alleged other crime here is a violation of campaign finance law because the prosecutor's argument is these payments were intended to silence Stormy Daniels to protect Donald Trump at the election, therefore they were actually campaign expenditures way in excess of the amount that you're allowed.

COATES: But on that point, many -

HONIG: Yes.

COATES: Many - let's go back to it for a second. People take issue with this idea, the idea of why you would do so.

HONIG: Yes.

COATES: Is it really another crime. Is it for a personal or a private matter, or was it for actually the campaign's benefit. Obviously, he has denied any allegations of an affair.

HONIG: Right.

COATES: He has said that he is not engaging in this behavior. And so it's a personal matter for him and his wife.

HONIG: Crucial issue that will be debated at trial. The prosecutors will say this was that campaign. Trump's team will say to avoid personal and family embarrassment.

Now, Trump is looking at 34 counts. How'd they get to 34? Those 11 checks are each their own count. Plus, they added counts for each invoice and each ledger entry. It all amounts to 34 counts. But it all relates to the hush money scheme and the falsification. If proven, these are what we call class e felonies in New York.

[09:25:02]

That is the lowest of five classes, a through e, under New York law. And if guilty, Donald Trump will face a maximum of four years in prison. Now, most first-time offenders in New York who are convicted of class e felony do not get prison time, they get probation and fines, but some do get prison time. It is unlikely but possible if Trump gets convicted.

COATES: But don't - but don't multiply four times 34 at all, right? This -

HONIG: No, they merge together.

COATES: They merge together for a maximum of 20 years. And, of course, you've got also probation as a possibility for a non-violent offender.

Let's go back to Jake.

TAPPER: All right, Laura and Elie, thanks so much.

I want to go back outside the courthouse in Manhattan now where CNN's Kaitlan Collins is live.

Kaitlan.

COLLINS: Yes, Jake, and I should note, we are waiting for Trump to walk through those doors that you see there. He has walk through them before when he was pleading not guilty, when he has been here for many of the hearings that have been underway.

I should not, one person - given what Laura and Elie were just talking about, the dynamics here. One person who is not accompanying Donald Trump on his trip down here to this Manhattan criminal court is Melania Trump. She is not expected to be here. It is unclear if she'll ever attend this. And it's unlikely based on what we've heard from our sources. But she is not here today just given the personal nature of what is going to be talked about inside that courtroom, in addition to the legal aspect of this.

I'm joined here by Linda Moreno, who is an attorney and an expert in jury selection.

And, Linda, as you know, this is the only thing that Trump's attorneys have been talking about lately is jury selection because, you know, the prosecution has to convince 12 people to be on their side, to agree with their case. Trump's team only needs one juror to help them out here.

LINDA MORENO, JURY CONSULTANT AND ATTORNEY: Exactly. And how many times have you known 12 people to agree on anything at all?

But the truth is that Mr. Trump walks into this trial with a few advantages in jury selection. One of them is the rehabilitation aspect. And what I mean by that is the judge is going to ask the jurors, the prospective jurors, if they can be fair and impartial they've heard a summary of the allegations and the indictment in the case. And they'll have to self-identify, raise their hand, they'll come up to the bench, one-by-one. The court reporter will be there. The lawyer's, the parties will be there, and then they'll have to explain why they can't be fair. At that time the judge, and only the judge, will make the decision either to excuse that juror or not.

And it's important because he's not going to allow either side to inquire further about that excuse if it's valid or not.

COLLINS: It's just one and done.

MORENO: Just one and done. Typically in trials the -- if a - if a juror says I can't be fair, I think this person is guilty, I've read too much about it, the other side, usually the prosecution, can try to rehabilitate. We call it rehabilitate that juror to say, well, the judge will instruct you. You can follow the law. You can put those feelings aside, can't you? That won't happen here.

COLLINS: But it's Donald Trump. You know, it's someone that everyone kind of has an opinion on, you know? And I know you've worked on a lot of high-profile cases and the jury selection going into those, people like Elizabeth Holmes, you've worked on terrorism cases. You know, when it's - you're walking up there, you're that perspective juror, you're walking up in front of the former president of the United States, how did - how does Trump's team know if they're telling the truth? You know, you may see a juror on paper who looks like someone who would maybe be a potential for Trump's team. How do you know though?

MORENO: Well, there's a - there's - you know, it is, in a way, a guessing game. But - but it's - it's not very different from the human condition. Let's say you walk into an event. You walk into a gathering and you're listening to someone talk about a particular subject. You don't know anything about them. You've never met them before. And you sit there and you go, I don't believe a word out of his mouth, right? It's that internal radar that you have.

And the same is going to be happening here. I will tell you, Mr. Trump also has the advantage in this case of having had several campaign super focus groups. For years he's had focus groups - what I mean by that is all these gatherings and polls that tell him who likes him, who doesn't, who favors him. So, he has that.

COLLINS: Oh, that's interesting. So, you think they could benefit because his - his legal team could use politically what they know and what they've determined about the electorate and Manhattan itself.

MORENO: Yes. And the other interesting, unique thing about this jury selection is the questionnaire and how it's being disseminated. Usually, typically, questionnaires are mailed with the jury summons. So, the prospective juror fills it out at home or the court will instruct them to come into the courthouse a day early and fill it out.

[09:30:04]