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Trump to Take the Stand in Fraud Trial; Trump Holds Edge over Biden. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired November 06, 2023 - 09:00   ET

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

[08:59:57]

ANNOUNCER: This is CNN breaking news.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: OK, the breaking news this morning, Donald Trump about to take the stand in the $250 million civil fraud trial against him, his kids and his family business. Under oath in minutes, a former president, a current presidential candidate, a current defendant in at least four other cases. Among the open questions, will he take the Fifth. Will he attack the judge or intentionally create a spectacle? Will he implicate his children? Or will he slip in a way that might hurt him in any one of his criminal cases. Not just high stakes, high unprecedented stakes.

KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Great point, John.

Trump is expected to be leaving Trump Tower any minute now for what has become an oddly familiar drive to the Manhattan courthouse where once inside he could speak to cameras set up in the hallway. He's done it many times before. But today is different. He'll then head into the courtroom where cameras are not allowed, have not been allowed since the start of this.

Once in court, some very wild dynamics comes into play, including while testifying Trump is going to be sitting right next to a judge that he publicly called a wacko, unhinged and also Trump hating. Talk about weird dynamics there.

This also marks the first time that Trump himself is facing extensive courtroom questioning since he left the White House. Even before opening arguments some, you know, month and plus ago. This judge already found that Donald Trump is liable for persistent and repeated fraud. And since then has fined Trump two times for violating a limited gag order.

We have team coverage as this is going to be playing out all across the next few hours.

Let's start with Kaitlan Collins -- CNN anchor Kaitlan Collins, who is outside the courthouse.

Kaitlan, what are you learning about how Trump's been preparing for this and what his mindset is going into today? KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: I mean, this is a major moment for Trump,

Kate. He has been angrier about this than almost anything else that -- any of his other legal cases that have been surrounding him because this is deeply personal to him. It goes to the heart of what he has built his entire career upon, his real estate empire. And while we already kind of know the outcome of this, given this judge has already found him liable here. The question is how expensive this is going to be and just how much of a threat to that empire this truly poses to him.

And that is why he has been so angry about this. That's why he's shown up several days to this courthouse behind us to sit inside as he's watched other witnesses be called to the stand. At times where he has complained openly about how that questioning has gone. He's whispered things to his attorneys who then stand up and object to that. You've heard him speak about it in the hallways. Now it's going to be a very different dynamic for him today because he himself is going to be the one under oath on the witness stand. And I think that is a moment that shows just how much he cares about this, the fact that his children have been going to testify and really just the first time we've seen him testify himself in open court in over a decade. It's something he certainly has done before, but never in a moment like this one.

And so he has been preparing for it. Really just the logistics of what this is going to look like. And, you know, he's got three attorneys that will be inside that court with him today. But really Trump has been running this. He has been directing his attorneys what to do here. And so that's the question of what he says when he's actually under oath compared to what you've been hearing him say out in the hallway every day.

BOLDUAN: Absolutely.

BERMAN: Kara Scannell, I want to go to you.

You've been inside this courtroom for so much of this trial, specifically what do we expect to see unfold today?

KARA SCANNELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, I mean, as Kaitlan was saying, his rhetoric outside of Trump is going to be very different from what he is going to endure over the course of this entire court day. We expect his testimony to take the full day. He will be under oath. He will be sitting just feet from the judge, who he's criticized, in the same room as the New York attorney general, and he will have to answer specific questions about his business. The core of this case, these financial statements that the judge has already said are fraudulent, Trump will have to answer detailed questions about this, about how he valued certain of these assets.

Now, he did sit for a deposition in April and he did answer questions under oath then. So, we have a sense of what he's going to say. And that is that after he started running for president he said that he had little if any involvement in preparing these statements. And, like his sons, he also pushed some of the responsibility on to the internal accountants and the external accountants. But the thing here is, is he will be getting questioned. You know,

they'll be drilling down into these statements. They -- he is not one who emails. We have not seen his name on any email. But he will be asked pointed questions about this. And it does go to the heart of his business, the heart of his reputation as a successful businessman. And the judge already saying that this is fraud.

And the one thing that will be interesting to look for in terms of color, when Donald Trump is here, he's been in court seven days out of the 24 days of this trial so far. And when he is here the temperature rises. The tension in the room is palpable. He has been reacting to different things that have taken place in the testimony, he has become more expressive in that.

[09:05:02]

And so will he be able to keep his cool under questioning? And the question will be of how well the judge is able to wrangle him.

The judge has taken control of this, telling certain witnesses, you know, he doesn't want a speech. You answer the question yes or no. Donald Trump is known for wanting to give these speeches, wanting to give an explanation. And the attorney general's office has really pressed a number of witnesses here saying these are yes or no questions, answer it yes or no, and then asking for any, you know, superfluous things to be stricken from the record. So, it's going to be a point of tension there too of just trying to keep Donald Trump in line, keeping him focused on these questions, and not letting it get out of control because this is expected to go all day and court wraps around 4:30.

John.

BERMAN: All right, Kara, thank you very much.

BOLDUAN: Let's go from the courthouse to outside of Trump Tower where Donald Trump's going to be leaving very soon. Kristen Holmes is standing by.

And, Kristen, you have some great reporting coming out this morning just about how it's really become the Trump legal strategy has by force or by design kind of, maybe, sort of, has become a campaign strategy as well. How Trump's lawyers and campaign staff are managing all of this?

KRISTEN HOLMES, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: That's right, Kate. I mean there really is no separation anymore. And this is a massive undertaking by both of his lawyers and by his campaign advisers. I spent a lot of time talking to them about how exactly this was going to work. And essentially what it looks like is guesswork. You have the lawyers estimating when exactly these trials are going to be. They do believe that a lot of this is going to shift, that some of these days might change, but they have to build an entire campaign apparatus and schedule around those trial dates, when they expect Trump to be in court. And this is really just the kickoff of these enormous amount of trials

that he is expected to face for the election in 2024. And they do believe that they have put an infrastructure in place on the ground in several of these early states so that if Trump is having to be tied up in court, that they can actually still run a campaign without him on the ground.. But that is a very difficult thing to do.

So, again, this is a massive undertaking. One of the things that we really noticed when we were talking to these campaign advisers, to these allies of Donald Trump's is just how intermingled all of this was. We had a -- campaign advisers who are working directly with lawyers, campaign spokespeople who were getting messaging from the lawyers. The fact that fundraising appeals go between being attacks on these various cases to attacks on Ron DeSantis. There is no two lanes anymore. We are completely in a lane where the politics and the legal has combined and now his team is going to have to navigate that as we get closer to the election.

BERMAN: Just to let people know where things stand and who has moved so far, the judge just walked behind our Kaitlan Collins at the courthouse. Donald Trump just left Trump Tower behind Kristen Holmes there. So, the players are starting to move around right now.

Kristen, I want to go back to you with one question here because many legal analysts are suggesting that part of Trump's plan today may be to blow things up, to go in there and literally blow the trial up with, you know, histrionics and testimony like that. Have you picked up anything, any talk among the lawyers or I imagine campaign staff that he plans to make a show of this on the stand today?

HOLMES: I think we're going to have to wait and see how he handles this. That wasn't part of the prep session that I heard about from yesterday. They really just went through the logistics. There wasn't any kind of talk about there being, you know, histrionics. However, we do expect him to go to those cameras outside of the courtroom. He is going to want to take every opportunity that he possibly can to spin this narrative into what he wants it to be.

John, we have talked about this a number of times. Donald Trump does not want to play these cases out in the court of law. He wants to play these cases out in the court of public opinion. So what happens in those courtrooms, when he comes out he is going to say whatever it is that he wants and whatever narrative he wants to tell. And that's why he's going to likely go to those cameras.

And I am told by a number of sources that are close to the former president who say he's actually acting confident going into this hear - this trial about this testimony. But, again, a lot of this is going to be what he does on the outside of that courtroom.

Now, a really important thing, and I know Kara mentioned this, is that anything that he says in that testimony under oath can be used against him in other trials. And one thing that we have been watching is just the fact that there have been some concerns recently over verbal slip- ups that Donald Trump has had on the campaign trail. Is that something that could happen when he's under oath today, when he's making his testimony. That could cause problems for him in the future.

But, again, in terms of have I heard that he's going to have -- make a scene, try to take command of the stage when he's actually in the courtroom, no, I have not. But I have heard that there is a likelihood he's going to try to command the area outside of the courtroom to tell his own narrative.

BERMAN: All right. Well, we've got our best reporters and anchors in all the right locations.

[09:10:02]

Keep us posted as to what you see and hear over the next several minutes.

BOLDUAN: Yes, we could be hearing things publicly in the 9:00 hour. They head into court in the 10:00 hour. There's going to be a lot coming out in the next minutes.

So, as we wait for Donald Trump to arrive to court, what could this testimony from the stand mean for his business empire and for his campaign? And is he going to actually testify or could he still plead the Fifth? There's a lot to discuss here. That's next.

Plus, we're also live in Tel Aviv as the Israeli military says that it has effectively cut Gaza into two and is advancing toward Gaza City. The weekend of huge strikes there. The developments on the Israel- Hamas war, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BOLDUAN: We're standing by for Donald Trump to arrive at the courthouse in Manhattan.

[09:15:04]

His business empire at stake. He's getting ready to take the stand.

BERMAN: Yes, just minutes away.

With us now, Elie Honig, CNN's senior legal analyst and former assistant U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York. Also with us, former Manhattan prosecutor, Jeremy Saland.

And, gentlemen, I mentioned what I was talking to our reporters before, that there has been some speculation that when Trump, when he gets on the stand in a few minutes, he will go in there and try to blow things up. And by that I mean just derail the trial, go after the judge, go after the clerk. The reason being -- and this is a quote from Alan Dershowitz in a "Rolling Stone" article, Dersh says, quote, "when a defendant honestly believes he can't possibly get a fair trial from the judge, one of the tactics is to antagonize the judge" - I think we have a graphic of this - "to the point of causing reversible errors." In other words, go after the judge, taunt the judge, draw the judge into doing something that will hurt the case going forward. JEREMY SALAND, FORMER MANHATTAN PROSECUTOR: You normally would never

say poke the bear of the judge, that the ramifications could be quite serious. But when you're looking in this situation, it's a potentially - potentially a double win for Donald Trump. And what I mean by that is you have his court of public opinion, which we know that's where he's going with regularity. It's a campaign fundraising opportunity and galvanize the masses. But when you already have, to a certain and large extent lost because there's already been a ruling by the judge as to this fraud, then this is the opportunity to say, I'm going to push that judge to a point where he or she, in this case Judge Engoron may do something inappropriate that results in an error - a reversal error.

So, yes, you're setting up an appeal possibly.

BOLDUAN: How is that possible? How is it a good idea when this is not a jury trial, this is a judge-only trial, to go in there with the intent and think it's going to be a win to blow things up?

ELIE HONIG, CNN SENIOR LEGAL ANALYST: Yes, I'm not sure it's a conservative strategy, lowercase c, but it's a strategy when you're desperate, when you've already lost, as Donald Trump has, right? One of the counts the judge has already found against Donald Trump, on the persistent fraud count. This is going to be a test for this judge as well because the judge has to resist taking the bait. Donald Trump --

BOLDUAN: Keep talking, Elie.

HONIG: Yes.

BOLDUAN: We're looking at Donald Trump arriving at the courthouse as we speak.

Continue, please.

HONIG: And this same Donald Trump has already been poking the judge, both in the court proceedings but also in public, on social media. I mean Donald Trump has said over the top things about the judge. Technically does not violate the gag order.

BOLDUAN: Right.

HONIG: Because the gag order only applies to the judge's staff. But this judge is going to have to sort of find the sweet spot here between, on the one hand keeping Donald Trump in line, not letting Donald Trump make this trial into a circus, but on the other hand not sort of lashing out at Donald Trump, not making a potentially incorrect ruling against Donald Trump, just in the heat of the moment. So, I'm going to watch the judge here.

BERMAN: Can we role play for a second here, Elie?

HONIG: Sure.

BERMAN: If I'm Donald Trump and I'm on the witness stand and I'm saying, harrumph (ph), harrumph, harrumph, witch-hunt, harrumph, harrumph, harrumph, you know, judge, Democratic judge, Democratic clerk, harrumph, harrumph, what does the judge then say?

HONIG: First he says, Mr. Trump, the objection -- presumably there will be an objection. Objection sustained. Mr. Trump, you are to stop. Please, you know, stop what you're saying. Objection sustained. And I'm striking what you said from the record. I'm removing it from the record.

BERMAN: And then I say, Donald Trump, harrumph, harrumph, harrumph, witch-hunt, Democratic judge.

HONIG: Mr. Trump, I'm going to warn you once again, the objection has been sustained. This is an inappropriate answer. And again I'm striking it from the record. And if you do it again, I may have to strike your entire testimony.

BERMAN: And then, just - just for emphasis, one last time, Trump goes -

HONIG: Yes.

BOLDUAN: Can I guess? Harrumph.

BERMAN: Harrumph, harrumph, Democratic judge, witch-hunt.

HONIG: I think the judge is going to say, OK, that's it, you've -- I've warned you several times, Mr. Trump. I strike your testimony. I strike your testimony from the record. I'm going to consider this case without it. You have disobeyed this court over and over again. I've given you many, many chances.

BOLDUAN: So, if this is a choose your own adventure that we're playing out, that's avenue a.

HONIG: Right.

BOLDUAN: Avenue b - avenue b could be pleading the Fifth when he takes the stand?

SALAND: Yes, it could. And I always loved those books as a kid, the choose your own adventure.

BOLDUAN: Me, too.

SALAND: But that all being said, I just want to follow up. You know - you know, there's always the possibility, though I don't think it will happen, that the judge can remand somebody, remand Trump, basically put you in or -- whether it's temporary for the afternoon or put you in overnight, that would be a catastrophe, I think, for the case and it would be a win for Donald Trump.

BERMAN: In a cell? You're talking about prison, to be clear?

SALAND: Correct. Correct. Correct. To - correct, correct, to a cell.

Now, do I think that would happen? That would be extreme. I don't think that will happen. I don't think that's the way it goes. And as to the Fifth --

BOLDUAN: Yes.

SALAND: This is not a criminal case where I or you or anyone could say, I'm not going to speak and, you know, hurt myself. I'll take that Fifth. You can do that in a civil case but at the same time this judge, and there's not a jury here, can say, I'm going to have an adverse inference as to why you are taking that Fifth.

BOLDUAN: But if he's already lost, why give them anything else?

SALAND: Well, there's also the deniability, and we've said this, and I've said this to you, John, before, and I believe to you, Kate, you know, you admit what you can't deny and deny what you can't admit, which means, you know, yes, I may have seen this, I may have done this but it wasn't my fault. So, he's going to push off blame, push off blame.

HONIG: Legally speaking, this is an easy, strategic decision, you take the Fifth. Now, all indications from Trump's camp and people are that he will not take the Fifth and he will, in fact, testify. But if you're just doing this by the book, as a lawyer, you say, OK, you have the right to take the Fifth, even though this is a civil case.

[09:20:04]

There are any number of prosecutors who already have charged you with various crimes, not relating to this fraud, but they could still do that. And so why would you take the stand, testify and give them any opening, any basis to revive an investigation? And on the flip side, as Kate said, I would say, Donald Trump, you've already lost one of the counts in this case. There is going to be a penalty imposed. We're going to appeal for sure, but by testifying you don't really stand to gain much here unless, of course, you're playing the PR and political game, which is out of my court as a lawyer.

BOLDUAN: Yes.

BERMAN: All right, again, Donald Trump arrived at the courthouse just minutes ago. Presumably he will speak in front of cameras before he walks into the courtroom. We are standing by to hear that.

We've asked a lot about what he might do. We've asked about what the judge might do. I want to talk about the state here because if he's a state witness today, the state has called him to the stand, what is it that they want to do? How will they approach this?

HONIG: So, they want to confront Donald Trump, doesn't necessarily have to be aggressive or over the top but they want to confront him with documents, with tangible, objective documents. You know what I would ask as the first question. I would say to Donald Trump, how big is your apartment? Right. This is the famous apartment that's 10,000 square feet. He claimed it's 30,000 square feet.

BOLDUAN: And, what was it, yes, 3x what it actually was, what he claimed for years.

HONIG: Right. And so if he -- if he says 10,000 square feet, which it is rounding off here, you go, OK, so here's this document that you signed year after year saying 30,000 square feet. That's false, isn't it? If he says it's 30,000 feet, I mean, I don't know, you call - you call a surveyor or something that says it's not 30,000 feet. So, I think they want to confront him.

You have to know what you have locked in. What there's no or little wiggle room on and you have to have documents. They did this to Eric Trump last week.

BOLDUAN: Right.

HONIG: When Eric Trump tried to deny things, they had emails showing that he was involved in the creation of the financial statements. So, that's how I'd go about this.

BOLDUAN: So, Trump's attorneys didn't question either of the sons when they took the stand last week. Why would they or wouldn't they want to question Donald Trump? And they would be going, obviously, second here in doing so. What do you think?

SALAND: Correct. So, almost like they're crossing their own witness.

BOLDUAN: Yes.

SALAND: Absolutely. And it's different. There's leading - there's different types of way you can ask the questions. But depending on what Donald Trump says and how he acts will really dictate the response from his team, his attorneys. He could --

BOLDUAN: You think that could change kind of as the day progresses their thinking in this?

SALAND: I think so. You know, keep in mind that he's not the average witness.

BOLDUAN: OK.

SALAND: Meaning, I think that most witnesses, and I -- certainly my clients are going to be controlled and you never know exactly what they're going to say but you really have an idea where this guy will go off the teleprompter even if it's right in front of him.

So - but if Donald Trump does something that's extremely self- destructive as opposed to I don't recall or I don't know or the Fifth. Then there is the greater possibility that his attorneys will try to fix that error to make sure that record is correct. But, at the same time, they don't want to give him too much air and too much oxygen to damn himself further on the stand.

BOLDUAN: Yes, cleanup on aisle Trump in the midst of a court -

SALAND: That's a big spill.

BOLDUAN: A court hearing could be --

SALAND: Yes, a big spill.

BOLDUAN: A big spill.

Thanks, guys. Much more to come. Please, stick with us.

BERMAN: Yes, again, we are live down at the courthouse, outside Trump Tower. We're watching all of -- inside the courthouse, watching this very carefully.

In the meantime, there is a brand-new poll out this morning that shows what the impact of convictions in the criminal cases would be -

BOLDUAN: Yes.

BERMAN: Or rulings against Donald Trump in this case might be. How could that impact Trump's standing in the polls?

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:27:40]

BERMAN: All right, you're looking at the brand-new poll from "The New York Times" and Sienna College that has Democrats very, very nervous this morning. What it did is it looked at the six battleground states, Nevada, Georgia, Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, head to head matchups between President Biden and former President Donald Trump. And in all these states but Wisconsin, five of the six states, Donald Trump is leading. And in Nevada, for instance, by a fair amount. Again, this is what has Democrats nervous at the top level. What's going on underneath?

For that we have CNN's senior data reporter Harry Enten.

So, this is the head-to-head matchup with Biden against Trump. I said Democrats are nervous this morning. Would any Democrat besides Biden do better against Trump?

HARRY ENTEN, CNN SENIOR DATA REPORTER: And I love the way that you said all of those states at one time. I'm going to make it simple here. And I should note, of course, that this is --

BERMAN: Trump. OK.

ENTEN: Trump. Yes, that's Trump. Trump versus the Democratic margin. Look here. What we see is across those six battleground states, this is what we have with Biden. Vice President Harris does no better. She actually does a point worse. But here's the interesting nugget in that. Look at a generic Democrat versus Trump. The generic Democrat beats Donald Trump by 8 points. By 8 points. So, now I think there's this question, if you ask some Democratic strategists, hey, wait a minute, maybe we should be looking beyond who's in the White House right now and who's his vice president and maybe saying, is there somebody else out there?

BERMAN: Again, just to be clear, you know, Biden loses to Trump in these polls, Harris loses to Trump by worse this these polls.

ENTEN: Yes.

BERMAN: Generic, faceless, nameless D right now beats Trump again by a lot.

ENTEN: A lot.

BERMAN: In these states.

ENTEN: It's not even close. It's not even close.

BERMAN: All right, the flip side of that. We say, you know, Trump is leading Biden, but how would another Republican do?

ENTEN: OK. So, obviously, you have a somewhat competitive GOP primary going on, right? Across those six battleground states among likely voters Trump leads by three. Ron DeSantis also leads by three. So, no better.

But look at Nikki Haley. Look at this. She's up by 9 percentage points. By 9. So, at this particular point, if you're a Republican, you're probably saying, you know what, DeSantis doesn't do any better, but Nikki Haley would blow Joe Biden right out of the water in these six battleground states, at least according to this one poll.

[09:30:03]

So, the fact is, hey, Nikki Haley has a real argument to make on electability.

BERMAN: So, there's a debate Wednesday night. And when Nikki Haley gets up on that