A criminal defense expert offered analysis Tuesday on Michael Cohen’s testimony in Donald Trump’s hush money trial, in which he claimed the ex-president sought to cover up his alleged encounter with an adult film star to protect his presidential bid.
During an interview on “Mornings On 1,” Duncan Levin, a criminal defense attorney and former federal prosecutor for the Eastern District of New York, pointed to the strategic timing of Cohen's testimony by the Manhattan district attorney's office, suggesting they set up Cohen, Trump's former attorney, to be the puzzle piece in their presentation of evidence.
“I don't think it's an accident that the DA’s office left him for later in the trial. They basically have laid out a case, we can see the architecture of it now, where they've laid out a case first starting with this conspiracy to break the federal election campaign laws,” Levin said. “And then they brought out all the false business records. And then they got to their most problematic witness, who is Michael Cohen.”
While on the stand, Cohen said that when Trump allegedly asked him to conceal the encounter, he wasn't worried about the reaction of his wife Melania Trump, but rather concerned about how it could impact female voters.
However, the defense is expected to challenge that testimony and focus in on Cohen’s credibility.
“What they're trying to do is they're trying to set up this defense that Michael Cohen and Alan Weiselberger, who was the former CFO of the Trump Organization, we're working on their own. They were the ones who cooked the books and put in false records themselves and that Trump had nothing to do with it,” Levin said of the defense’s strategy.
Levin also touched upon the significance of falsified business records and their connection to campaign finance violations. Levin explained the DA’s strategy, noting they escalated what typically could be a misdemeanor charge to a class E felony.
“It's bumped up to an E felony because Mr. Trump is alleged to have falsified the business records or caused them to be thought of falsified with the intent to defraud the voters and with the intent to engage in this conspiracy to violate the federal campaign finance laws,” he said.
When asked about the possibility of calling Trump to testify, Levin stressed that he would not allow the former president to take the stand if he was a part of the defense team.
“He has so much baggage,” Levin said. “They don't know what is going to come out of his mouth.”