Trump trial hears 2016 scheme in opening statements: ‘It was election fraud. Pure and simple’

In their opening arguments to jurors, Manhattan prosecutors outlined Donald Trump’s alleged criminal conspiracy to influence the 2016 presidential election by paying off publishers to bury compromising stories.

“This case is about a criminal conspiracy and a cover up,” Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Matthew Colangelo told jurors on Monday.

“The defendant Donald Trump orchestrated a criminal scheme to corrupt the 2016 presidential election. Then he covered up that criminal conspiracy by lying in his business records, over and over and over again,” he said.

The former president, who sank in his chair and stared in front of him during the prosecution’s opening statements, is accused of drawing up an agreement for a “catch-and-kill” scheme in 2015 with help from his-then attorney Michael Cohen and National Enquirer publisher David Pecker – an alleged plot that is central to the so-called hush money case at the centre of the 34 criminal charges facing the former president, according to prosecutors.

“No politician wants bad press. But the evidence of trial will show that this was not spin or communications strategy,” Mr Colangelo said. “This was a planned, coordinated, long-running conspiracy … It was election fraud. Pure and simple.”

The case from Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg is the first among Mr Trump’s four criminal cases to go to trial, and likely the Republican nominee’s only criminal trial before November’s general election.

Prosecutors have grounded the case in a straightforward narrative – his former attorney paid $130,000 to adult film Stormy Daniels to prevent her from speaking publicly about her affair with Mr Trump, who has denied ever having sex with her. Prosecutors allege that Mr Trump’s reimbursements were disguised as legal fees across 34 business records – 11 invoices, 11 cheques, and 12 ledger entries.

Prosecutors plan to detail a months-long “catch-and-kill” agreement – in which the National Enquirer’s publishing company would buy up potentially politically damaging stories and boost positive ones for Mr Trump’s campaign, all leading up to the release of the so-called Access Hollywood tape just one month before Election Day.

Mr Trump’s campaign “went into immediate damage control mode” to ensure that other allegations against the Republican candidate would not see the light of day – including allegations that Mr Trump had an affair with Ms Daniels years earlier, Mr Colangelo said.

“Tune out of the noise. Focus on the facts,” he told jurors. “Focus on the logical inferences that follow from those facts. Focus on the evidence, listen to the testimony, read the documents, emails, text messages, bank statements, handwritten notes, all of it.”

After the trial, when prosecutors return to the jurors for closing arguments after reviewing that evidence, all of it “inescapably leads to only one conclusion: Donald Trump is guilty of 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree,” according to Mr Colangelo.

Todd Blanche, Mr Trump’s lead attorney in the case, argued that there is “nothing wrong with trying to influence an election.”

“It’s called democracy,” he said in his opening remarks on Monday.

A series of payments to Mr Cohen in 2017 were merely for payments to a retainer agreement for legal services, according to Mr Blanche. “What on earth is a crime? What is a crime about what I just described?” he said.

The 34 counts against his client “are really just 34 pieces of paper,” including invoices, checks, and ledger entries from invoice that said “for retainer agreement for legal services,” according to Mr Blanche.

“None of this was a crime,” he said.

Any attempts to bury politically damaging information sought to suppress stories designed to “embarass” Mr Trump and his family, during a period of time when there were “all kinds of salacious allegations going around about President Trump,” Mr Blanche said.

“President Trump fought back” to “protect his reputation, his family, his brand,” he said.

The defence also will seek to undermine testimony from Mr Cohen and Ms Daniels, who “doesn’t have any idea” or “know anything” about the invoices, checks and ledger notes in the indictment, according to Mr Blanche.

“Her testimony, while salacious, does not matter,” he told jurors.

As for Mr Trump’s former attorney, a close ally turned nemisis: “He cannot be trusted,” Mr Blanche said.

“He rants and he raves about President Trump,” he added. “He criticizes President Trump. He talks extensively about his desire to see President Trump go to prison. He has talked extensively about his desire to see President Trump’s family go to prison.”