Legal Analyst Spots ‘Weirdest Moment’ Yet Of Donald Trump’s Trial
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MSNBC legal analyst Lisa Rubin on Thursday said the “weirdest moment” in Donald Trump’s ongoing hush money trial was the former president’s legal team’s “brutal” cross-examination of a computer forensics analyst who was ostensibly only in court to authenticate data.
Trump, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee, is accused of falsifying business documents in a bid to cover up payments to porn actor Stormy Daniels in the run-up to the 2016 election that intended to silence her over their alleged affair.
In a thread on the X platform, formerly known as Twitter, Rubin acknowledged that “many Trump trial watchers are still knee deep in the world of [former Daniels’ lawyer] Keith Davidson, where lurid details about people like Hulk Hogan, Charlie Sheen & Lindsay Lohan are bought and sold like candy.”
She noted, “But the weirdest moment for me was the cross of a guy who does cell phone data extraction” for the Manhattan District Attorney’s office.
NEW: I know many Trump trial watchers are still knee deep in the world of Keith Davidson, where lurid details about people like Hulk Hogan, Charlie Sheen & Lindsay Lohan are bought and sold like candy. But the weirdest moment for me was the cross of a guy who does cell phone data…
— Lisa Rubin (@lawofruby) May 3, 2024
The Iraq war veteran who took the stand was just there to “authenticate data taken off two cell phones provided to the DA by [former Trump attorney] Michael Cohen” and came across as “knowledgeable, earnest, and honest,” said Rubin.
But he was still grilled by Trump’s defense team, which is “looking to sow seeds of mistrust” because they need “only one juror” to find the former president not guilty, she added.
Trump’s team suggested Cohen’s devices or data “could have been manipulated and/or deleted by the FBI,” she wrote. Cohen was Trump’s fixer for years before being sentenced to prison over his role in the hush money scheme. He is now a vocal critic of Trump.
“And here’s where Trump’s lawyer ended for the day: implying that ‘a prior acquisition and extraction could impact the data’ the DA’s office looked at in 2023 when it was provided to them,” Rubin said.
The trial continues Friday.
Read Rubin’s full thread on X here.
