After being fined $9,000 by Judge Juan Merchan, Donald Trump deleted all posts from his social media, mostly his Truth, that violated the gag order. The American media reported it.
Trump’s trial over payments to porn star Stormy Daniels, as part of a more complex scheme to keep compromising information away from the campaign and thus win the 2016 election, has entered a crucial week. When the hearings resumed, the tycoon immediately saw a fine of $9,000 hit his head for having repeatedly violated the gag order in rallies and posts, and a warning that the next infraction risks prison.
But it was also the day of the testimonies of two key figures: the lawyer of Daniels and the Playboy bunny Karen McDougal and the banker who helped the tycoon’s fixer to make the payments.
“I am acutely aware of and vouch for the rights that the First Amendment affords the defendant,” said Judge Juan Merchan. However, “I will no longer tolerate violations of my orders,” he said, warning that he is ready to “impose a prison sentence” if Trump does not stop making inappropriate comments about the trial.
The judge also complained that he could not, by law, establish a fine “more in line with the finances” of the former president, and therefore higher, thus limiting himself to establishing a figure of 1,000 for each of the most egregious violations, despite there being no There is no doubt that Trump has violated his silence more than nine times in recent months. That said, Merchan granted the tycoon permission to attend his son Barron’s graduation ceremony on May 17th.
As for the testimonies, if last week was dominated by the former editor of the National Enquirer David Pecker, this time the scene is all for Gary Farro, former director of the now defunct First Republic Bank of New York, who in October 2016 opened an account in Cohen’s name to pay the hardcore actress two weeks before Election Day.
“If the bank had known that Cohen was acting for someone else, there would have been more paperwork to do,” Farro said. “If a customer had told me it was a shell company, I would never have authorized the opening of the account,” he added, revealing that Trump’s fixer “was a difficult customer because he was always in a hurry.” “Ninety percent of the time he came he told us it was an urgent matter,” he pointed out.
The other key witness on the stand was Keith Davidson, Daniels and McDougal’s lawyer, who helped both handle media relations and revealed in 2018 that he had had several conversations with Cohen. The lawyer began by saying that the Playboy bunny had confessed to him that she had had a “romantic relationship” with the tycoon and then confirmed Pecker’s testimony that the National Enquirer paid to buy and “kill” the story of the affair.
It was Davidson himself, with a message on June 7, 2016, who contacted the then editor of the tabloid, Dylan Howard. “I have a blockbuster story about Trump,” wrote McDougal’s lawyer, who had also contacted ABC. And the director replied :”I can pay you more than anyone else for it. You know why…”.
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