Donald Trump arrived at the Manhattan courtroom Tuesday morning for the second day of jury selection in his historical criminal trial over paying hush-money to a porn star.
Trump winked at a court security officer and took his seat at the defense table at about 9:30am ET, with his longtime aide Jason Miller seated at the back of the courtroom.
On Monday afternoon, of the 96 potential jurors whoo were asked if they would have trouble being impartial, 50 raised their hands and were excused – further evidence of the challenge facing the judge, Juan Merchan, of finding 12 people who don’t have strong biases either for or against Trump.
The Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, brought the case against the former president over payments purportedly aimed at keeping secret his alleged affairs with the adult film star Stormy Daniels and the Playboy model Karen McDougall. Prosecutors said Trump schemed to keep these alleged liaisons hidden from American voters so he would not suffer in the 2016 presidential election.
The trial is unfolding amid a presidential contest in which Trump is all but guaranteed to be the Republican nominee facing Joe Biden in November.
Bragg’s office contends that Trump, whom a grand jury indicted in spring 2023 on 34 counts of falsifying business records, was part of an alleged “catch-and-kill scheme” from August 2015 until December 2017, with his then attorney, Michael Cohen.
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Trump’s former consigliere, who in 2018 admitted to federal charges for his involvement in that particular hush-money scheme, wired $130,000 to Daniels’s then attorney less than two weeks before the election. Cohen funneled these funds via a shell company.
After Trump won the presidential election, he repaid Cohen with a smattering of monthly checks, initially from the Donald J Trump Revocable Trust, which was set up in New York to hold the president’s company’s assets during the 2016 presidency.
The company, however, framed the payments as legal expenses which prosecutors say indicate that Trump was liable for making false business records “with intent to defraud and intent to commit another crime” – specifically, violating campaign finance laws in an effort to influence the outcome of the US election.
One prospective juror on Monday who had made it to questioning was ultimately dismissed after saying she had strong opinions about the ex-president that would hinder her being fair and impartial. She also told the courtroom that her hobbies included going “to the club”, eliciting chuckles from the court.
When selection resumed on Tuesday another prospective juror was excused after citing his Texas upbringing, and while he did not seem to lean in any particular political direction he said that “growing up, a bunch of family [and] friends [were] Republicans” meaning it was “probably going to be hard for me to be impartial”.
“I appreciate your candor,” Merchan replied. “I’m going to have to excuse you at this time.”