Trump Trial Day 17: 'My Name Is Todd Blanche. You Went On TikTok And Called Me A Crying Little SH*T.’
That’s it, that’s the defense.
Like an exploding Trump toilet, court Tuesday was bombshells!
Michael Cohen is the last witness for the prosecution, and it was poor old Trump attorney Todd Blanche knee-deep without a plunger, unsure if he’ll have a defense witness at all. He’s got no exhibits. He’s got no defense, except that Michael Cohen and Stormy Daniels are a couple of player-haters who sell merch. And Thursday might just be the last day of testimony, because Blanche can’t think of anything else to do with himself!
Blanche doesn’t really know what he’s doing here. He’s used to putting drug dealers away, not shoveling at a Brooklyn-fatberg-sized pile of time-stamped evidence and multiple corroborating witnesses. He has no idea how to explain 34 FAKE NEWS payments tied to his client a hundred ways to Sunday, and doesn’t seem like he’s even going to try. Blanche is no brilliant legal mind, just another nobody lawyer who fell under Trump’s spell and wished a monkeypaw wish to be famous. Best he can do is convince his pussgrabber client not to dig himself a bigger hole by testifying or catching a contempt charge.
Tuesday morning started out with Defendant Trump lonely no more! A coterie of kiss-asses old and new dropped by court to pay homage, pose for some pictures, and fume out RIGGED UNFAIR in front of the building, including House Speaker Mike “Moses” Johnson, who was probably there to offer up himself and his son up to be Trump’s porn accountability partners.
There was North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, Florida Reps. Byron Donalds and Cory Mills (working for constituents, what’s that?), “Good Sport” Vivek Ramaswamy, plus an extra-oily-looking Eric and wife Lara, taking a day off from getting lip filler and looting the RNC’s accounts. And Grant Rood, one of the prosecutors who was working on Trump's stalled racketeering case in Fulton County, Georgia. Give him a glare, Grant!
Mike Johnson, Byron Donalds, Cory Mills, and Vivek Ramaswamy took turns lying about the judge’s daughter making money off the trial, all using the exact same script. Did Trump direct that? Gag-order violating if so! And lookie here, it’s New York magazine reporter Andrew Rice (the one who wrote that profile of fame-hungry sellout Todd Blanche), telling Alex Wagner last night:
“I was sitting close enough that I could actually look over Trump's shoulder and see what he was reading, and he's reading the quotes that these individuals, and going through and making notations with a pen on the paper. While testimony was going on, while Michael Cohen was testifying against him. He was actually going through and annotating and editing the quotes that these people were going to say.”
And dumb coach Sen. Tommy Tuberville went on Newsmax to explain that all Trump’s flunkies were showing up to “overcome this gag order” that the New York appellate court just upheld.
FFS! Look at his helpers’ matchy outfits! And none of their suits fit properly. Trump loves a humiliating beauty pageant!
Outside, Trump crowed to a reporter, “I do have a lot of surrogates and they are speaking very beautifully” and come from “all over Washington.” So will the prosecution just ignore all this? So it seems!
Trump treated everyone to a nine-minute ramble of his greatest hits, and grumbled on his way in, “signing an NDA is not a crime.”
Thought he didn’t even know one existed? And he never met these women?
Well, never mind, back to court! You can catch up on Monday’s proceedings here.
Vivek got a prime seat next to Eric, then Eric moved a row away from him, ouch.
And it’s Cohen back on the stand, for the rest of the day.
Michael Cohen’s tale resumes.
On February 8, 2017, Cohen testified, he visited The Big Boss at the White House, and Trump asked him if he needed money, an unusual ask for a man who’d shake grandma by her ankles to flush out a dime.
Cohen said no, and Trump added, “be sure you talk to Allen.”
The prosecution pulled up an email from Jeff McConney: “Get me the invoices you spoke to Allen about. Thanks, Jeff.” Cohen wrote back, “Please have the January and February checks payable to Michael D. Cohen, Esquire.” Jeff replied, “Please invoice me.” Cohen created an invoice and emailed it, “Dear Allen, pursuant to the retainer.”
PROSECUTOR REBECCA HOFFINGER: Was this invoice a false record?
COHEN: Yes.
PROSECUTOR: And the other invoices were false?
COHEN: Yes.
Hoffinger took Cohen through all the checks: Was this one false? Was that one false? Who signed this one, and that one? Checks were signed by Junior, Eric, Alan, and Trump himself. She’s the Count Von Count of fraud. Thirty-four counts, ah ha ha!
Did Cohen actually work any hours in 2017 for that so-called $420,000 retainer? Ten total, he says. “One matter for Mr. Trump, Summer Zervos, and something about the likeness of Mrs. Trump.”
Summer Zervos, remember her? So hard to keep track of the 18 women who have accused Trump of various sexual disgustingnesses!
Zervos accused Trump of sexually assaulting her at the Beverly Hills Hotel, and sued him for defaming her when he denied it. After being given the Trump standard treatment, five years of court-assdraggery and a countersuit, she eventually settled for nothing. Just another day at the office for a creep who’s been proudly leering, grabbing, groping, tonguing, and poking his grody boner at unsuspecting women since the ‘80s. He could’ve hired sex-working professionals to service his hog and we wouldn’t have to be here, but that wouldn’t have been predatory enough to rustle his droopy jimmies.
So Cohen did nothing more to earn that fake “retainer” in 2017, other than stalling Zervos, and less than 10 hours of other work. He was busy with four other clients. He’d been dropped by Trump like a dirty, sleazy potato. But getting subpoenaed by Congress for questions about Trump Tower Moscow, oh-so-many scandals ago, brought him back into Trump orbit.
Trump paid for Cohen’s lawyer, and Cohen sat there in Congress and lied his face off about all the contact they’d had over the deal. “I was staying on President Trump's message that there was no Russia, Russia, Russia.”
He spoke with Trump, via weepy Madeleine Westerhout, before she was YOU’RE FIRED for drunkenly telling a reporter that Trump thought Tiffany was too fat to stand next to.
Then UH OH, cat out of the bag, and UH OH, here came the FEC, complaining about those peener payments! Cohen warned talking hairpiece Jay Sekulow that they were sniffing around, and corroborated how he reassured David Pecker that the target letter he got was nothing to worry about, because Jeff Sessions, who at one point in time, incredibly, was the nation’s attorney general, was in Trump’s pocket like a little Confederate elf.
In 2018 the Trump Org filed for arbitration against Stormy Daniels to try and make her shut up, but enter that bald smokeshow con man, Michael Avenatti, who did one thing right before stealing from Stormy, his ex-wife, and the disabled, and extorting Nike, which was getting her out of that NDA. “President Trump would be required to sit for a deposition. So the NDA was stricken.”
Then April 2018, here came the FBI, to raid Cohen down to his asshairs — his apartment, offices, two phones, and a TD Bank safety deposit box. Cohen said Trump did eventually call him back on the burner he ran out to get, to say, “Don't worry, I'm the president of the US. Everything's going to be okay. Stay tough. You're going to be okay.” And that was the last time they personally spoke. Though Trump’s new set of flying monkeys also got in touch to reassure Cohen to say, “He has your back.”
Obstruction of justice, anyone?
The prosecution introduced three Trump Tweets:
April 21, 2018
“The New York Times and a third rate reporter named Maggie Haberman, known as a Crooked H flunkie who I don’t speak to and have nothing to do with, are going out of their way to destroy Michael Cohen and his relationship with me in the hope that he will “flip.” They use........non-existent “sources” and a drunk/drugged up loser who hates Michael, a fine person with a wonderful family. Michael is a businessman for his own account/lawyer who I have always liked & respected. Most people will flip if the Government lets them out of trouble, even if........it means lying or making up stories. Sorry, I don’t see Michael doing that despite the horrible Witch Hunt and the dishonest media!”
(Ellipses Trump’s own.)
HOFFINGER: Despite these tweets, three months later, did you plead guilty to making false statements to Congress related to the Russia probe?
COHEN: Yes, I stated and submitted as part of the record that I had spoken to President Trump about Trump Tower Moscow.
Cohen pleaded guilty to lying, tax cheating and finance fuckery, and got sentenced to 36 months in the can plus supervised release, then got out for home detention after 13 months because COVID hit.
But when he started to write a tell-all book, he was abruptly taken back to Otisville, and put in solitary confinement in a cell with a broken toilet, of course, until a judge ruled that his re-arrest was illegal retaliation. WEAPONIZED DOJ! Trump can’t wait to lock up ALL his enemies that way!
There was a quick break, and Doug Burgum, Byron Donalds, and Vivek Ramaswamy fled the courtroom, not to return. Mike Johnson never made it in at all, he was only there to look miserable in the photo op and repeat his lines. Outside, Ramaswamy ranted to reporters that court was “a sham,” “third-rate banana republic,” “Kafka-esque,” “boring,” and “dingy.”
Back in court, we learned Trump Org controller Jeff McConney wasn’t only good for stiffing contractors and cutting checks: He got in touch with Cohen to set up a backchannel to Trump, via one Robert Costello. (Rudy’s lawyer, as it happens. Yr Wonkette reported Costello possibly dangling Cohen a pardon back in 2019.)
“He said he was very close with Rudy and it could be a backchannel communication to the president, to make sure you are still good and still secure.”
The prosecution offered up those emails. Costello wrote, "You have friends in high places, sleep well."
If this was a mafia movie, it would be too cliche.
PROSECUTOR: What'd you think of Costello writing about his friend speaking to his client?
COHEN: It was ‘I-Spyish,’ it was weird. I think they were dangling a pre-pardon. They were concerned I was going to hire another lawyer, from a boutique firm. [...] Bob Costello sent me a link to a YouTube. It was ‘Rudy Giuliani on possibility of Cohen cooperating in Mueller probe.’ I wrote, ‘Why send this to me?’ Costello wrote, ‘SDNY is trying to drain you until you see them as your only salvation. These leftwing journalists want you to fail. If you want more from your former boss you should make that known.’
A “pre-pardon,” is that like a promise ring? Cohen didn’t trust Costello. “There was something really sketchy and wrong about him.” He hung around with Rudy, that should have been plenty!
And Cohen’s family had had enough. “I hired other lawyers. I spoke with my family, ‘What to do?’ They said, ‘Why are you hanging on to that loyalty? We're supposed to come first.’”
PROSECUTOR: After you pled guilty, did President Trump tweet?
“If anyone is looking for a good lawyer, I would strongly suggest that you don’t retain the services of Michael Cohen!”
“I feel very badly for Paul Manafort and his wonderful family. ‘Justice’ took a 12 year old tax case, among other things, applied tremendous pressure on him and, unlike Michael Cohen, he refused to ‘break’ — make up stories in order to get a ‘deal.’ Such respect for a brave man!”
Cohen said prosecutors had sweated him that if he didn’t plead guilty within 48 hours, they were going to indict his wife. He lost his law license, had to sell his taxi medallions and all of his real estate besides one house, and he’s still under supervised release today.
But back when the Wall Street Journal catch-and-kill story broke in early 2018, Cohen was onboard to take the fall. “I was referred to Mr. Sekulow by Sean Hannity to speak about the FEC complaint.” Fucking Sean Hannity, the backchannel of backchannels.
PROSECUTOR: Who is Maggie Haberman?
COHEN: She is a reporter for the New York Times.
FROM MICHAEL COHEN TO MAGGIE HABERMAN: Big boss just approved me responding to complaint and statement. Please start writing and I will call you soon.
Cohen issued his statement:
"In a private transaction in 2016, I used my own personal funds to facilitate a $130,000 payment to Ms. Stephanie Clifford, Neither the Trump Org nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction..."
Jay Sekulow texted Cohen on Signal: "Client says thanks for what you do."
Come by Satriale's for some gabagool!
Trump was back to dozing off again.
The prosecution wrapped up by asking Cohen if he has any regrets, and he pulled out his violin.
“I regret doing things for him that I should not have. Lying, bullying people to effectuate the goal. I don’t regret working for the Trump Organization; as I expressed before, some very interesting and great times. But to keep a loyalty and to do the things he asked me to do, I violated my moral compass and I suffered the penalty, as has my family.”
THEN IT’S TODD BLANCHE HOT OUT OF THE BOX!
His opener, I shit you not:
“My name is Todd Blanche. You went on TikTok and called me a ‘crying little shit.’”
Well NO LIES DETECTED THERE, TODD!
“Sounds like something I would say,” Cohen said.
Did Cohen once call the former president a "dictator douchebag”?!
"Sounds like something I said.”
SAME!
“Do you recall saying Trump should go back to ‘where he belongs, in a fucking cage, like a fucking animal.’”
“I recall saying that.”
I think we can all say that!
“Do you recall saying on TikTok, on April 23, that from everything that you heard from people today, David Pecker is corroborating everything you’ve been saying for six years?" Blanche asked.
“Yes, somebody called me, told me that Mr. Pecker had corroborated what I’ve been saying for a long time.”
Are you helping, Todd? Are you a big helper? Blanche raised his voice to chastise Cohen for “going on TV,” having a podcast, and hating Trump. Only Trump is allowed to be on TV, hate people, and shill merch! He huffily entered into evidence “a $32 T-shirt depicting President Trump in an orange jumpsuit behind bars” plus a coffee cup that says, “Send Him to the Big House Not the White House.”
Blanche is outraged! Cohen still lives in a Trump building! Cohen has praised The Art of The Deal as a “masterpiece”! HOW CAN ANYBODY TRUST ANYTHING COHEN SAYS?!
He lied to Congress and blah blah.
“Did Anthony Scaramucci visit you in Otisville?”
Random question, and relevant to nothing, and yes he did. Strange character, that Mooch. Blanche brought it up then dropped the subject. He was spinning like a Big Wheel stuck in a mud puddle.
HE PULLED OUT MORE COHEN BARBS!
“You called Trump a boorish cartoon misogynist? You called President Trump a Cheetos-dusted cartoon villain? You said, ‘I fucking want to see him locked up?’ You said President Trump should be in handcuffs?”
“Sounds like something I would say.”
Sounds like something we ALL would say!
HOW DARE COHEN NOT TAKE BEING FUCKED OVER WITH A SMILE?
Hey, wasn’t the defense just bitching about how this was a documents case? Didn’t all of Cohen’s piquant mots come years after the events in question? Maybe the defense is getting paid by the word?
Blanche even got earphones for the jury to listen to Cohen’s podcast. Then he bitched some more about Cohen going on TV, and asked Cohen if he’d met Alvin Bragg in person. (No.)
This is a man who’s really got nothing.
The jury was dismissed, and Blanche said he wasn’t going to decide if he will have a defense witness until he knows what “the charge” will be. Sure, whatever.
Court will be back Thursday, after Blanche thinks of some more nonsensical things to scream about. And then no court until next Monday!
Trump had a statement when he left the building. “If you’re Jewish and you’re a Democrat, and that includes Alan Dershowitz, you ought to have your head examined. You see what’s going on with Israel.”
Er, okay, grandpa. Let’s get you to bed!
Until next time!
I'm livid that the orange asshole is writing scripts for his discount-menswear mafioso-lite flunkies to regurgitate as a way to circumvent the gag order. It's not clever and it's not subtle and all those assholes need to see punishment for violating the judge's orders.
Marcie, your updates on this shit show are first rate. Look after yourself (all of yoooz) as it's hard to find the bandwidth to bear witness to it all for very long without a break.
That said, keep up the great work. Am loving your posts.