I haven’t been closely following Trump’s criminal trial in Manhattan, just reading headlines. It got pretty lurid today (Stormy: “it was lousy sex”), but I’m not interested in salacious details. I’m a lawyer, and my attention is directed at courtroom tactics.
Prosecutors have charged Trump with falsifying business records, which in New York by itself is a misdemeanor offense for which he would pay a fine. (Unless done to evade taxes or defraud someone, but those aren’t factors in his “hush money” payoff to Stormy Daniels.)
But they’re really not interested in fining Trump for lying, which he does all the time. They’ve charged him with doing it to commit another crime, which turns it into a felony, and possible jail time.
Normally prosecutors don’t have to prove motive, but they do in this case. That’s because it’s not a crime to hide an extramarital affair from one’s wife or family, and if the defense persuades the jury that’s why he did it, he’s likely off the felony hook (even though the evidence he falsified business records is strong).
To get the felony conviction, prosecutors have to prove he did it for an illegal purpose. This gets murky, because they’re saying he committed a state crime in furtherance of a federal one (influencing an election, or something like that). To do that they have to rule out hiding his Stormy Daniels affair from Melania as the motive.
Melania may have saved them the trouble. If you can’t read it, her self-lettered jacket says,
I REALLY DON’T CARE, DO U?