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The Lead with Jake Tapper

Full Jury Panel Selected For Trump Trial; Right Now: Appeals Court Hears Change Of Venue Request. Aired 4-5p ET

Aired April 19, 2024 - 16:00   ET

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

[16:00:01]

BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN HOST: He becomes the first former president to ever face a criminal trial. And right now, a Sandoval hearing is underway. It's a complex legal process, but ultimately we are anticipating that opening arguments are set potentially for Monday.

JESSICA DEAN, CNN HOST: All right. A big day on Monday, there's also that appeals court about a change of venue hearing going on right now. We're keeping an eye on it. We'll be back with you on for Monday, or you guys will. Thanks for having me.

SANCHEZ: Yeah, it was good to have, Jessica.

DEAN: THE LEAD WITH JAKE TAPPER starts right now.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN HOST: In a split second, this courthouse went from the scene of a high-profile trial to a high-profile security scene.

THE LEAD right now.

A horrific scene outside this courthouse after man lit himself on fire. Inside the courthouse, there's a major development in the hush money case against former President Donald Trump, a full jury, plus alternates now all seated, setting the stage for opening statements.

This hour, we're going to go all in on this case, dissecting the next steps. How long can the prosecution hold out and keep its witness list out of the hands of Donald Trump and his defense team.

Also this hour, in an ordinary move, some 165 House Democrats came to the aid of Republican Speaker Mike Johnson, drawing the ire of hardline Republicans in putting Johnson even close closer to potentially losing his job.

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MATTINGLY: Welcome to THE LEAD. I'm Phil Mattingly, in today for Jake Tapper and we are live outside the New York courthouse where the former president's criminal hush money trial is playing out as we speak.

The jury selection process that is now complete. Today, Judge Merchan seating five more alternate bringing the total number to six. Yesterday, of course, a full jury of 12 were seated, made up of seven men and five women. And total of 18 needed for the trial to begin.

Now, Judge Merchan now holding a Sandoval hearing, what's known as a Sandoval hearing. That's going to determine whether the prosecution can ask Trump if he testifies about certain aspects of his legal past, including the E. Jean Carroll defamation case in the civil fraud judgment handed down earlier this year.

Now, Trump attorneys are fiercely pushing back. The outcome could factor in whether Trump decides to testify at all later in the trial. So he said he was going to do.

We start off with CNN senior justice correspondent Evan Perez, who joins me now.

Evan, let's talk first about a San -- what would a Sandoval hearing actually is. For people who don't know, what's happening right now inside the court?

EVAN PEREZ, CNN SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT: Well, in New York, what this hearing does is it allows the defense and the prosecution to fight it out in front of the judge as to what types of evidence they can bring in if Donald Trump chooses to testify. So one of them things they want to do is to impeach his credibility as a witness before this jury.

And so, what's going on right now in this hearing, does that is still ongoing? Is the defense is pushing back on every single instance that the prosecution wants to bring up. You pointed out, not only the E. Jean Carroll ruling, right. One of the things that they got into a big back-and-forth over is the prosecution wants to be able to cite the earlier civil fraud judgment against the former president.

And one of the things that they're -- but the defense is saying is that, look, that is a civil proceeding the standard of evidence, a standard of -- that you need to prove for the judge to rule in favor of the prosecution is much lower. It's just a preponderance of evidence as opposed to a criminal trial where you have to have beyond a reasonable doubt -- doubt.

And so defense is saying that's just not fair. And so is they're pointing out that if you do that, then we should be able to bring in some of the various problems as Michael Cohen as a witness as well. And so, that's going back and forth. The judge saying we're not going to mix apples and oranges here as part of his decision-making in this.

So, this is -- we expect it's going to keep going for at least another hour.

MATTINGLLY: Yeah. It's been a fascinating back-and-forth, Jeremy Herb and Kara Scannell, our team inside the courtroom and reading everything out and it's been pretty fierce up to this point.

I want to ask you because our colleague Kara Scannell also broke that there's going to be a hearing happening, I think right now in an appeals court tied to this case, there's like 70 moving parts right now, what is this? All of a sudden, we heard that there's a hearing that is going on just

uptown here. The appeals court a full panel is now hearing the former president's motion to change venue. Now, he's already made this request. A judge had ruled against -- an appeals court judge had ruled against that motion, but now the appeals court itself, though, the panel, that they feel court, is now hearing that motion.

And so, that is ongoing began about 30 minutes ago obviously, the former president is made very, very clear. He does not believe he can get a fair jury from people here in Manhattan. Of course, what we've seen play out, Phil, tells us otherwise, right?

[16:05:02]

I mean, you've heard some of these 18 people who've been chosen to sit on this jury. You've heard people who have empathy for him or at least have political views that support his. So its not clear to me that he has a leg to stand on, that he needs to move this trial now out of Manhattan because it's clear that this jury is a lot more diverse than the former president would have people believe.

MATTINGLY: Yeah. And unlike when he lost earlier, that jury is now seated, everything seems to be moving in the direction. We'll see where that goes.

PEREZ: Very quickly.

MATTINGLY: Evan Perez, thanks so much. Appreciate it.

With me now, Stacy Schneider, a Manhattan criminal defense attorney. She was also a contested on Trumps TV show, "The Apprentice."

Also with me, Jeremy Saland, who was a prosecutor in the Manhattan district attorney's office.

Stacy, I want to start with you.

We now have all the alternates needed. The jury is seated. In what -- can you explain to people who maybe wondering why there are 12 and then six? What's the instance in which an alternate would have to step in here? Is that something you expect?

STACY SCHNEIDER, CRIMINAL DEFENSE TRIAL ATTORNEY: Sure. In this case, in particular, I actually expect an alternative to step in. I think they're very valuable here. We saw what happened in jury selection. They had picked seven jurors and then two jurors came back the next day and wanted to be off the panel.

So anything can happen here. This is a wildcard case. It's extremely different, obviously prosecuting a former president. So what will happen is if a juror gets sick during the trial testimony or has a family emergency or something goes wrong in their personal life and they need to step off the case, they will go to the judge and ask permission. Hopefully that never happens.

But the alternates are sitting next to the jury while the trial is underway, they are hearing the same evidence that the sworn in jury panel is hearing, and they will be immediately available to step in if needed.

MATTINGLY: You know, I'm glad you could have mentioned the process that we witnessed or at least read about it, in terms of jury selection and Evan alluded to this too, as well, Jeremy, where in one case, in particular prospective alternate after or talking in started to cry.

She asked to be dismissed after she said, quote, this is so much more stressful in her words than I thought. These jurors without question, I could be under a ton of pressure and I think this morning we saw the emotion come out of some that underscores that these aren't just kind of random unnamed individuals. These are real people and this is something that you can't even fathom unless you're one of those jurors.

How does that affect this case, Jeremy?

JEREMY SALAND, FORMER PROSECUTOR, MANHATTAN DISTRICT ATTORNEY'S OFFICE: It's extremely problematic and I've said multiple times, there's the Donald Trump who was the innocent until proven guilty, and if proven guilty beyond reasonable doubt in that courtroom. And deserves the same due process and the same presumption of innocence at any one of us have. And then there's a Donald Trump outside that courtroom who says a lot of very vitriolic and frightening and aggressive things that gives pause, be very gentle and nice, the potential jurors.

We know that about the judge we know that about prosecutors and witnesses, and it has a really negative and frightening impact on those potential jurors who are scared potentially to say, I don't want to be a part of this process. I don't want to be subject to scrutiny. I don't want the media talking about me and my family. I don't want people showing up at my house or saying things about me online.

So it's very -- again, I use the term frightening repeatedly because it has a way to taint the jury. It's not good for the jury to have that constant agony or angst. So the best thing Trump can do and Judge Merchan can do. And this can be discussed later on, is really good Donald Trump to stop saying that things he has that incites people to do things that are adverse to the criminal justice the system.

MATTINGLY: Yeah, it's a critical point, I think open question as you noted. We're going to talk about it in a little bit.

I do, though, Stacy, before we get to that, talk about what we know about the five alternate selected today, because Evan made the point, whatever the former president says on truth, social, or what he's been talking about, about this trial and a fair trial and the jury isn't necessarily lined up with a woman who's originally from Spain, married with an adult child does not really, at least according to her follow the news, says she doesn't quote, have strong opinions about former president Donald Trump, there's a man, all we know about him is he's a native New Yorker who lived -- who loves martial arts.

Stacy, when you at least read through the end of those top-line things, what stands out to you?

SCHNEIDER: What stands out to me is this alternate panel of five is perfect for both sides. This is the most neutral vanilla the panel out of all the jury selection that has gone on this week most of these five jurors are not really that into the news. They're not working watching as much. They tune into certain news stations, but it's not a hobby or a habit.

And that's good for both sides. That's the ideal juror in this case. Is the most neutral person possible who doesn't have an opinion about Donald Trump either way and is willing to listen openly to the evidence presented by the people of the city if New York.

[16:10:05]

I will add one funny thing though, the second juror who is picked, what we know about them, enjoying martial arts I predict that this trial is going to be a martial arts display between Donald Trump and Michael Cohen. So that should be interesting for that person sitting there listening to the evidence come in.

MATTINGLY: Yeah, if they're entertained by martial arts as part of their love, they're certainly going to get a lot of that back-and- forth. Were seeing something in the Sandoval hearing right now.

Jeremy, a couple of the other alternates, but there's a woman who says she's not a big news person looks at the "New York Times," "Reuters," and BBC, does not have social media. Another one when who works for a clothing company is married, gets her news from Google.

When you kind of think through this in your former role, how are you approaching this as this all plays out?

SALAND: Well, there are some people who would say just pick the first 12 and then you pick the next six if that's how many alternate you're going to have. I don't necessarily subscribe prior to that view. What you want people who are smart enough to understand some things which might be a little complex, meaning this is not a hush-money case. This is about whether or not these records are falsified and those elements and whether or not there was an effort to conceal a separate crime.

So you want people who are smart enough to grasp that and take themselves out of this and look from the outside in and say, well, did the -- did the did the prosecution prove their case and not holding to some unrealistic burden? And you want those jurors who also are going to not concerned with the lawyer who are jurors, not to impose their beliefs, but follow what the judge says, an understand that there's going to be a witness here.

For example, Michael Cohen, but not just Michael Cohen, who is admitted to lying, who has been convicted of crime and say, I can still be objective. Yes prosecution, I'm going to hold you to the burden, but no criminal defense. I'm not just going to side with you and say because Michael Cohen, for example, has a criminal record, I can find him credible. So I think they've done a good job. And to Stacy's point, this is a fairly mundane group, at least on the six alternates, but they've done a good job to find jurors who appear to be smart enough, engineers, attorneys, a teacher, to follow the law and be above and beyond. But at the same time, they have that a common sense to say, I can understand credibility, I can look at that person and see what they say and then make that assessment.

MATTINGLY: If you're watching right now, you see on your screen the hallway where the president has -- the former president is departed from in the past, will certainly be keeping an eye on that camera over the course of the coming minutes and hours.

Stacy, the idea of objectivity -- you know, I've talked to some people were just kind of passively observing all this to the extent anybody can passively observe something related to the former president who said, it's not possible. Everybody has an opinion. This guy has got to 100 percent name ID basically at this point, everybody likes him or hate him and it's one of the two.

You disagree with that?

SCHNEIDER: That there's really nobody can who can be that objective about Donald Trump is that, is that what you're asking?

MATTINGY: Yeah. Essentially, can you objectives -- can you look at this case for what it is and separate, however you feel about the individual?

SCHNEIDER: I see, which is exactly the question the jurors were asked by the attorneys on both sides. I mean, I think all of us as human beings want to thank we're fair people and that we're not going to be judgmental and we're going to sit in the room and listen with an open mind.

But again, we're all human and for those of us who've watched you know, Donald Trump on television. And I certainly been in the room with him many times through my experience, it's hard to separate that from the man sitting at the defense table who looks really tired and grumpy right now.

So, you know, those preconceived notions, those opinions, even though jurors have sworn that they can put them aside and make a judgment, they always come in. It's just human nature.

MATTINGLY: Yeah, and that's -- that's a challenge for lawyers on both sides. Stacy, Jeremy, hang with me. We've got much more to get to as we go forward.

As I noted, you're looking at the camera in the hallway, former president departs. Now, Donald Trump has also continued to rail against a gag order in this case, he claims that it violates his free speech rights. We're going to get into the validity of that claim and prosecutors refusing to share their witness list, how typical is that? We're going to get the expert opinion.

Plus, the heightened security around the courthouse even before today's horrific fire.

We're going to be back in a moment. Stay with us.

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[16:18:36]

MATTINGLY: Looking a live look inside the courthouse were a key hearing in the hush money case have been underway. Judge Merchan just announcing Sandoval hearing is complete. He will reserve his judgment for right now, but should have an answer on Monday.

Stacy Schneider and Jeremy Saland are backed with me right now. Both defense attorney, former prosecutor, in Jeremy's case.

Stacy, back to you. On the issue of the gag order because I am someone flummox, again, not a lawyer by someone having a gag order posting regularly on social media in a way that doesn't seem to imply, feels that constraint. But he did post earlier today, Judge Merchan is railroading me, in quotes, that he has gagged, in quotes, me so that I cannot talk about the most important topics, including his totally disqualifying conflict of interest and taking away my constitutional right of free speech.

Look, it all snark and joking and back-and-forth aside, the idea of what he's saying right now, the gag order violating his free speech, particularly in such a high-stakes legal moment for him, is there validity to that?

SCHNEIDER: There is zero validity to that. In fact, Donald Trump doesn't understand the law behind the First Amendment. The First Amendment only protects certain types of speech. It's limited and the law does not allow someone to engage in speech that could cause harm to the community.

[16:20:01]

There's a very famous Supreme Court case, you're not allowed to yell fire in a crowded movie theater if there's no fire. That's not free speech.

In this particular case, this just gone on forever that judges have put gag orders in effect during trials. There are witnesses to protect, there are litigants to protect. This is perfectly reasonable behavior by the court.

And in fact, I would argue that the court, Judge Merchan is constitutionally protected by imposing this type of gag order. He's not going to be overturned on appeal for doing this. This is not a violation of Donald Trump's rights in any way. This is more of a Donald Trump PR move.

But if you're going to invoke the Constitution, at least do it correctly, if you were the former president of the United States.

MATTINGLY: Jeremy, the flip side of this, that being kind of the back- and-forth about where the former president says, prosecutors have already accused the former president of violating that gag order. I guess what the questions I had is if this issue is so important, why is the hearing not until next Tuesday more than a week after the jury selection actually started here?

SALAND: Yeah, I think that Judge Merchan just wants to get this moving forward because you delay you have this hearing, it's going to delay the jury selection some process, and the more time you get stuck with that, I think that's bad for the case.

But understand there's two different types or well call it two different types of contempt or are violations of that gag order? One would be, for example, if it was in front of the judge and he could summarily say you have violated my the conditions of whatever I set forth and I can make a decision now. And then the second, like we're seeing here, is it's not in his presence. And then we have that hearing.

And Donald Trump has a right to protect himself and respond to them and it has to be proven it's beyond a reasonable doubt. It can be a civil or it could be a criminal. Here, it would likely be criminal because it would be to punish him for his actions as opposed to making someone hold, for example, up to $1,000, up to 30 days in jail.

I think the judge is delaying it, not because he doesn't think it's important, but I think because there's other practical things that we get bogged down with, you must be saying to himself, we're not going to move this case forward and you have to get this moving. Otherwise, we're never going to get to an end whenever that may be.

MATTINGLY: Stacy, we got about a minute left. Would an average person in this situation face consequences here?

SCHNEIDER: Yes, I mean, this is multiple violations. I think a judge, the magic number in Manhattan is probably two or three at a judge will kind of let someone skate along the line, but this has multiple, multiple violations, and I don't think Donald Trump would really care if he was fine. What's the difference? It's worth its weight in gold and publicity just to get these statements out, to get a couple of thousand dollars a hit -- fine from the judge.

Judges have put people in jail for contempt of court. But that's not going to happen here. It's unlikely.

I mean, that would just bring extra scrutiny onto the judge in the middle of the trial. I don't think that's realistic. But there has to be some way to stop Donald Trump from doing this and respect the process the trial process -- and if any judge is capable of coming up with a formula for that, I believe it's Judge Merchan.

He is such a no-nonsense judge who takes control of his courtroom. We saw the way he moved jury selection, along at the speed and the pacing, no nonsense again. He reprimanded Donald Trump four grimacing at the jurors. So he will have a solution to this eventually, but Donald is still going to test his patience, I'm sure.

MATTINGLY: Yeah, as he's done with all of his legal cases, no doubt about that.

Stacy Schneider, Jeremy Saland, thank you guys very much. And we are continuing to show you pictures from inside the courthouse, just outside the courtroom. We'll keep an eye if the former president comes out.

Also outside the courthouse, the safety of those inside the courtroom and those outside very much an issue right now, the heightened situation this trial creates for law enforcement and first responders just illustrated earlier this afternoon by an intense incident just a few feet away from where were sitting right now.

Stay with us.

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[16:28:15]

MATTINGLY: We're back right outside the courthouse where the former president's criminal hush money trial is taking place as we speak, and also getting new information about what's happening inside that courtroom.

CNN's Evan Perez and John Miller join me now.

Evan, I want to start with you because said last block that the Sandoval hearing was over. There is still a back-and-forth. There's also a very intense back-and-forth during that Sandoval hearing. What's happening? Well, one of the things that's going on is that the Trump team is trying to argue to try to exclude certain things and try to essentially re-litigate certain things that the judge has already decided and he's responding quite sharply.

He's saying, you're not go -- I don't want you to relitigate things -- decisions that I've already made. For instance, they wanted to -- there's a discussion right now about the "Access Hollywood" tape. The judge had said you cannot play that tape, but you can make reference to it. And so the Trump team is trying to have another go at that discussion.

And so that's, you know, one of many things that apparently the Trump team wants to try to bring up again, and the judge is having none of this. He seems quite -- quite annoyed that he believes they've tried to go back and essentially revisit decisions that he's already made.

And so a look at the end of this, the judge says that he is going to go back and look to see whether earlier statements he made, whether he was inconsistent but he's trying to shut down at least some of this discussion because he believes he's already made some rulings that address these questions.

MATTINGLY: Should we expect that this is strategic to some degree, right? I think there may be merit to this particular issue, but they're trying -- they're going to keep bringing as many things up as they can to slow things down, muddy the waters, complicate this process. PEREZ: Right. I mean, look, the other thing that they're trying to do is we know there's another hearing right now. They're trying to buy a little bit of time because just in case they do get their -- their motion to move this trial to another venue, you know, perhaps slowing things down could buy them time in case they get their way.

[16:30:11]

We don't anticipate that that's the way it's going to go. But certainly, if you're the defense, you have to take every shot you have.

MATTINGLY: But we're watching right now inside the courthouse is people are filing out the courtroom after today's activities appear to be complete. We'll keep you posted as that continues to play out as we watch the former president has come out and spoken several times this week before and after these hearings.

And obviously, it has been a long week. There's now a jury that is seated, 12 jurors, six alternates as well, moving forward very clearly. You know, John, I do want to ask a couple of hours ago, there have been a lot of security concerns, a lot of questions about what this would actually look like.

In a courtyard about -- well, have football field away from where we're sitting right now, an individual lit himself on fire we don't really know his condition, didn't seem to be good based on the press conference. We also have jurors talk about their concerns about security, about the public nature of this.

When you talk to officials inside the NYPD, inside the federal government, what are you hearing right now about how this is all going to work?

JOHN MILLER, CN N CHIEF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND INTELLIGENCE ANALYST: Well, this is something they've been planning in a triangle between the New York state court officers. They're in charge in the building, the Secret Service, they are in charge of the closest its protection of former President Trump and the NYPD, which is in charge of the overall security outside and the movements of the former president to and from the court house and they have had a lot of chance to do some dress rehearsals.

There was the trial in federal court. There were the earlier hearings here. So they have a very detailed plan. The last piece of this is the courthouse itself lends itself to a secure environment. They screen people coming in every day.

So for this case, there's a second screening. If you're going into are near that courtroom. So it's built for that in some ways, which makes it easier.

MATTINGLY: The event that happened earlier, the incident, have you were on live television when it happened? What do we know about what that was? Was there a broader threat as are bigger concern about what that means in the individual itself? MILLER: So this is an individual who had been here over the last couple of days carrying his signs and being a presence on the outskirts of the demonstrations. But a bit of a loner in that he didn't fit in what the pro-Trump demonstrators or the anti-Trump demonstrators and so today when he showed up, it didn't give any one particular alarm until he took off his hoodie, poured the accelerant over having thrown that leaflets in the pamphlets that he carried in the air. And then quite suddenly set himself on fire with whatever this accelerant material was, which made him catch fire very quickly and very totally.

MATTINGLY: Evan, again, you witnessed this. It was a horrifying moment, not connected seemingly to anything that was happening inside the courtroom, which I think almost happened at the same exact time they finished with getting the sixth --

PEREZ: Right.

MATTINGLY: -- alternate for the jury seated.

What was your sense of the reaction of how quickly the NYPD was involved, how quickly kind of everything John's laying out about what's around this place?

PEREZ: Yeah. Look, I mean, I think one of my observations from just coming here and watching this scene, I think that there's certainly -- I understand that the NYPD in New York want this the attitude of this entire area to be, you know, business as usual? We're going to keep going on.

This is not were not going to stop for this, right? That's a very New York way of reacting to this, but I've been quite surprised at how open an access there was at least before for this.

For instance, the park where this is the gates were locked over here, but there was free access on the other side. So when this happened, the police had actually run all around the whole block to be able to get to the scene. There were no cops right there that I could see.

And so I was quite surprised at how open access it was. There were just a couple of protesters. Trump protesters who were there. You know, we've been doing this at various courthouse around the country for the former for president. This one has been, I think the most open access that I've seen and, you know, I get -- I get that that's what New York wants, but I have to wonder what whether they're going to revisit that security posture.

MATTINGLY: John, it's a really -- it's a really interesting point because I understand the balance, particularly allowing people protest. There's a lot of just normal traffic that's coming through here throughout the course of the de, given where it is.

What I was also interested in during the press conference earlier about this issue. They make clear there's a lot of stuff we don't see. They have a lot of things in place that maybe aren't as visually apparent as some of the stuff that we do see around here. How significant is the presence outside of the people were actually looking at security officials, were seeing can every single day?

MILLER: Well, there's a network of cameras. There are teams that are scanning social media, looking for any prompts.

[16:35:03]

They're monitoring very carefully whether there are calls for demonstrations, particularly if one came from former President Trump, that would bring larger crowds, there is an entire system that links to the NYPD's Intelligence Bureau to a command center, the joint operations center where all that information is processed and then shared with the other agencies.

So there is a lot you don't see, but to take Evan's point, you have to be clear about what it is you're protecting and what it is you're protecting against. Can you stop a person walking down a public street from setting themselves on fire? Know you can respond quickly to it to attempt to save their lives.

The key is to protect the courthouse, to protect the proceedings, to protect the former president, to protect the jurors, the judge in the prosecutors, and the area from some kind of attack. This was a bit of an anomaly.

MATTINGLY: Yeah, yeah. No question.

John Miller, always appreciate your expertise. Evan Perez, great work, but also level hundred purporting earlier as this was all happening when we appreciate it. I'm glad you guys are okay.

We see the former president walking out right now is coming to the cameras on court just wrapping. Let's listen.

DONALD TRUMP, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT & 2024 PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: We just had another hearing and the trial starts on Monday, which is long before a lot of people thought. The judge wants to go as fast as possible. The history's not from my research.

And this is really a concerted witch hunt, very simple. Everything you heard, this is a witch hunt by numerous judges, Democratic judges.

You take a look at Engoron. He's a whack job. What he did was a disgrace. It's being reviewed by the appellant division, and I hope they do justice because everybody's looking.

And nobody no business is coming into the city. None whatsoever. They're looking at that case. That case is a threat to democracy, frankly, what took place with the A.G., A crooked A.G. Letitia James, who campaigned and the fact -- who campaigned with the fact that I'm going to get Trump, I'm going to get Trump. That's all she said for two years.

And it's -- people don't want to see this stuff. We have violent criminals all over the streets of New York and nothing happens. So even when they catch him, they let him go. No bail, no bail whatsoever.

So this is just a concerted whether it's Judge Kaplan with a person I have no idea of (INAUDIBLE) suing us, and I had no idea who this person was or this judge or if you look at Engoron, where he said that Mar-a-Lago, whichever was worth a billion or a billion and a half dollars. He said it was worth $18 million because that suited his narrative.

But what -- what's happening in this city and all over the country, but what's happening in particular in this setting, some very good, but way, some are very fair. Those are really the cities that are thriving.

But what's happening here with me judicial system is an outrage and all over the world, they're watching it and all over the world, they're saying that this is a giant witch hunt to try and hurt a campaign that's beating the worst president in history. Biden is the worst president in the history of our country, beating him a lot, and this is the only way they think they can link, but it's not going to work.

Thank you very much, everybody.

(CROSSTALK)

MATTINGLY: You've been listening to the former president who went through a litany of issues that he often talks about, just for complete clarity. There's no evidence that the current president or the White House have anything to do with this current case that he's facing here in New York, in the courtroom behind me.

Evan, I want to go to you because I thought -- beyond this of them, we always hear from the former president, what's most fascinating is what preceded that, which was a Sandoval hearing where there was an argument over what could be brought into play, if the former president testifies, which gives you a good read on what is last year has been named checking Judge Kaplan, Judge Engoron.

PEREZ: Yeah.

MATTINGLY: Judge Merchan. Why?

PEREZ: Well, he's got a lot of beefs and so he's going to name check every single one of those. And, you know, literally as this was happening, just uptown, there was another hearing, an appeals court hearing, where a judge was hearing a request, a last-minute requests for a stay. Again, they're trying to figure out a way to move this trial and what the former president's lawyers were doing there. Were trying to argue that citing things that happen inside this court, saying for instance a woman who had been seated who said that she felt pressure from the media attention.

And so came was removed from the jury and citing that is an example of why she cannot he cannot get a fair trial. If the opposite is true from this from what we've seen. MATTINGLY: Yeah, it's -- the number of beefs the former president has is a good way to frame that. Kaplan is the E. Jean Carroll case, Engoron is the civil fraud case. Obviously, Merchan is what he's dealing with right now, but it's a lot -- it's a lot of legal stuff going on.

[16:40:06]

Evan Perez, John Miller, we appreciate you guys very much.

The breaking news just in, court has wrapped the day in Judge Merchan's courtroom, a motion denied in an appeals court where Trumps legal team, as Evan has been talking about, argued for a change of venue in the hush money case. We've got much more from New York and what's happening in the courtroom behind me ahead.

Stay with us.

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MATTINGLY: Welcome back to New York, where just moments ago, court adjourned for the day, day four of the trial, wrapping up when asked whether he will testify in his hush money criminal trial, the former President Donald Trump sat again, yes. Plus, in an appeals court, a request for interim stay of the criminal trial was denied.

Back with me now, Stacy Schneider, Manhattan criminal defense attorney, and Jeremy Saland, a former prosecutor in the Manhattan district attorney's office.

Stacy, in terms of what we heard from the president after court adjourned, you're making very clear that he believes the judges and several of his legal issues were clearly targeting him or out to get him, given everything that you've seen over the course this week, do you have the sense that there is a political tilt to what the president is dealing with in the courtroom behind me?

STACY SCHNEIDER, CRIMINAL DEFENSE TRIAL ATTORNEY: I think there's an emotional tilt to what the president was dealing with just a few minutes before he came out with that statement. He just came from a Sandoval hearing which is its where the prosecution in the presence of the judge and the defense counsel lays out all your prior bad acts through your lifetime that they're aware of and he's had to listen to them site all those things, all the cases and trials and problems he's had that he's railed against in the press. He's now had to listen -- listen to that up close and personal.

And the moment he came out was just before that happens. And I think that statement and was not his typical railing about this as a political witch hunt, but more his own emotional response to what he just heard.

Defendants coming out of a Sandoval all hearing are not pleased. It's just the nature of the hearing. It's kind of the worst preview of what could come if you take the stand.

So he's -- it's rattling. I think he was rattled.

MATTINGLY: Yeah. I mean, he was so very specific about the judges that he's had issues with in his cases, cases he's lost, cases he's had issues going forward.

I think, Jeremy, to that point, is this a one-off because as Stacy's laying out, this is a tough -- Sandoval hearing is where you're hearing the worst possible things that could be coming at you if you testify or is this just a signal of what's going to be coming, as things get underway on Monday.

JEREMY SALAND, FORMER PROSECUTOR, MANHATTAN DISTRICT ATTORNEY'S OFFICE: I think this is going to be typical Trump response and I'm looking down at some notes and I apologize. But he said what's happening with the judicial system here is an outrage.

I think if you care about law and order, you care about justice, his behavior is outrageous and its incredibly destructive to the criminal justice system. And it's single-handedly dismantling it. And you'll look at what things he says and as a prosecutor. It kind of excites you a little bit because he's lying.

And why do we know he's lying, he says about he didn't know -- no idea about E. Jean Carroll and Judge Kaplan. Well, we know you knew about E. Jean Carroll because you were found responsible for some sort of ugly sexual abusive behavior towards her, you're found for defaming her.

He says, going on about A.G. James, Attorney General James and Judge Engoron. He just cant control themselves and all that comes from that man's mouth is damaging not just to his credibility, but sets him up for further violations and giving all sorts of evidentiary fodder to prosecutors.

And it dumbfounds me that his attorneys, who are incredibly experienced are not proverbially grabbing him by the collar and say, Mr. Trump, Don, you've got your certainly or political issues here in terms of your campaign. But we have a court proceeding, a criminal one, where if you are convicted, you are going to be a felon forever, it doesn't get expunged. He may never see a day in jail, but a felon forever. And if that's what's outrageous -- that's what's outrageous.

MATTINGLY: Yeah. Inside the courtroom, his attorneys fighting very fiercely to have those issues not be on the table to be asked about if the former president does end up testifying. Outside the courtroom, remember, there's a political campaign shaping this.

This is much with the former president is doing, is anything else.

Stacy, Jeremy, standby. We've got much more to discuss. We'll be right back.

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[16:52:37] MATTINGLY: And we're back with more on the former president's hush money trial. Back with me, Stacy Schneider, a Manhattan criminal defense attorney, and Jeremy Saland, a former prosecutor in the Manhattan district attorney's office.

Hi, guys.

Looking ahead to Monday this weekend, Stacy, if you're on the former president's defense team, what are you doing to prepare?

SCHNEIDER: Well, I know what my defense is if I'm on the president's defense team, and the defense is that I have to point out to the jury that Michael Cohen is convicted felon. That's Trumps former attorney who's pled guilty in federal court, and served a three-year jail sentence involving this alleged scheme.

So I'm going to open up probably on Michael Cohen who's the elephant in the room. And give the jury an opinion about how awful he is. And the next thing I'm going to do is open up and explain to the jury what Donald Trumps life was like before he ran for president. He was an international celebrity. He had people coming to him all the time for money.

And that I'm going to show the jury that this situation was nothing different from something he would already take care of. It had had nothing to do with his election prospects. And that you should really understand who Donald Trump is as a person and how he's operated for his entire life.

So I'm creating a narrative that's favorable to my client to show that the prosecution is on a witch-hunt.

MATTINGLY: And, Jeremy, if you're on that prosecution team, what are you doing on Saturday and Sunday?

SALAND: Well, I think that Josh Steinglass, and Chris Conroy these guys have done there homework and they'll do it twice on this Saturday and another time on Sunday. They know what they're doing. They know this inside out. They know it frontwards and backwards.

And they're either going to simplify this in terms of their opening. This is not going to be a salacious, sexy, hush money case. This is a falsifying business records case.

We're going to break it down to its essential elements. We're not going to make it something that it's not. We're not going to allow and were going to preempt Donald Trump and his team for taking this on the sideways that it shouldn't go.

I'm overwhelmingly confident that Josh and Chris and those guys who are overlapped with are ready to go. They've been ready yesterday, the week before and they're not going to get distracted no matter what happens outside that courtroom, they are staying the course.

These are Morgenthau guys who've gone for Morgenthau, to Vance now to Bragg, they've been around the block. [16:55:03]

Chris was in the homicide investigations unit as a chief. This is a team the team Trump does not want to mess with. They still have the burden to prove beyond a reasonable doubt, but they're going to do their thing.

MATTINGLY: The stakes are certainly high.

Stacy, Jeremy, thanks so much. Very grateful for you guys hanging with us the entire hour. Much more to come next week.

We're also working to get the particulars on what went down in that appeals court after Trump's legal team's request for an interim stay. And the case was denied.

We'll be back in a moment.

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MATTINGLY: We're back live from New York outside the Manhattan courthouse. There is a huge day coming up on Monday. We expect opening statement since to begin in the morning in Donald Trumps hush money cover up trial. CNN will have special live coverage.

Jake Tapper will be here to lead that as our team of correspondence inside at the courtroom monitor what's going on throughout the course of the proceedings. Coverage begins Monday at 9:00 a.m. Eastern.

And also coming up on Sunday on "STATE OF THE UNION," Republican Governor Kristi Noem of South Dakota. Plus, Democratic Governor J.B. Pritzker of Illinois. That's Sunday morning at 9:00 Eastern and again at noon here on CNN.

And if you are like us here on THE LEAD and have been listening to the new Taylor Swift album, it's very long, on repeat, we hope you enjoy your weekend listening sessions. You see what we did there?

Our coverage continues now with Wolf Blitzer and "THE SITUATION ROOM."