The most consequential moment of Tuesday’s trial happened just minutes after court began, when the judge held Donald Trump in criminal contempt over his social media posts and warned the former president that future violations could land him in jail.
Hours after Judge Juan Merchan said Trump violated the order’s prohibition against attacks on witnesses and jurors, the presumptive Republican nominee for president took to his Truth Social platform to call the trial “RIGGED,” while attacking the judge and vowing he would not stay quiet about the case.
When jurors returned to the courtroom, the focus was on the witness stand. The jury heard from four witnesses, including an attorney who helped broker the hush agreements involving two women who alleged they had affairs with Trump. He has denied their claims.
Here’s what you missed on Day 9 of the trial:
Trial proceedings opened with Merchan fining Trump $9,000 for Truth Social and campaign posts that he ruled were in violation of an April 1 gag order. Future violations could lead to jail time, the judge warned, and the offending posts had to be deleted quickly.
By Tuesday afternoon, the posts were gone. But Trump made clear he wasn’t about to go silent in his hush money trial.
“It’s totally unconstitutional,” he said of the gag order. Meanwhile, his campaign was fundraising off the judge’s ruling.
Merchan said the gag order was “lawful and unambiguous,” and that Trump ran afoul of it by posting messages on social media that involved witnesses and making public comments about jurors. One of the posts in question called Trump’s former attorney Michael Cohen and adult film star Stormy Daniels “sleaze bags.” Both Cohen and Daniels are expected to testify for the prosecution.
The reason Merchan said in his ruling that “jail may be a necessary punishment” was because his ability to fine Trump was limited under state law, and that the $1,000 fine for each violation of the order was unlikely to deter Trump from breaking the order in the future.
The scene around Trump was notably different compared to previous trial days. Seated behind him was a top campaign aide, one of his sons and other political allies.
Co-campaign manager Susie Wiles and Eric Trump were the most notable attendees. David McIntosh, a former congressman and president of the conservative anti-tax group Club for Growth, was also seated behind Trump, along with Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is dealing with his own yearslong legal troubles.
Trump often appeared stone-faced, at times whispering to his attorneys. Other times, his eyes were closed for significant periods — a running theme throughout the trial.
The most significant witness to take the stand Tuesday was Keith Davidson, an attorney who represented Daniels and Karen McDougal as they brokered hush money agreements. Both women alleged they had affairs with Trump in 2006.
Davidson said he was subpoenaed to testify in the case and secured immunity. He walked prosecutors through how he came to represent McDougal and Daniels and connect with Cohen.
When it came to the deal Cohen struck to keep Daniels silent about her allegation, Davidson told the court he suspected Trump would ultimately be the one providing the money. That comment drew more questioning from the prosecution, which was seeking to nail Davidson down on why he understood that to be the case, but Davidson said he was just working from an “assumption.”
Asked if he ever believed Cohen would be the ultimate source of the payout, Davidson said, “Never prior to the funding,” adding he figured it would be Trump or an affiliated entity.
Earlier, prosecutor Joshua Steinglass went through text messages that Davidson exchanged with Dylan Howard, then the editor-in-chief of the National Enquirer, as he worked to land an agreement to sell McDougal’s story.
“Did Trump cheat on Melania?” Howard asked Davidson in one text. “Do you know if the affair was during his marriage to Melania.”
“I really can’t say yet, sorry,” Davidson responded.
“Okay keep me informed,” Howard said.
As he did for most of the day, Trump reacted to the reading of that text message with little emotion.
Davidson also testified that the “Access Hollywood” tape, which surfaced just weeks before the 2016 election, reinvigorated interest in Daniels’ story, saying it “reached a crescendo” and led to new negotiations about a deal between Howard and Gina Rodriguez, Daniels’ manager. When that deal fell through, Davidson said he was pressured to negotiate with Cohen.
“The story is no one wanted to talk to Cohen,” Davidson testified.
“Gina approached me. She said, ‘Hey, we have this deal and it’s going to be the easiest deal you’ve ever done in your entire life, and it’s already been negotiated. All you need to do is pay for it and talk to that a——,’” referring to Cohen.
Davidson laughed after mentioning suggestion the arrangement would be the “easiest deal you’ve ever done.”
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