Defense Attorney Ron Kuby on Trump Criminal Trial & Representing Climate & Pro-Palestinian Protesters

AMY GOODMAN: We begin today’s show with the criminal hush money election interference trial of former President Donald Trump. New York prosecutors are wrapping up their case that alleges Trump falsified business records in an illegal effort to influence the 2016 presidential election, when he allegedly hid the reimbursement of a hush money payment to his lawyer Michael Cohen made to adult film star Stormy Daniels.

On Tuesday, Trump’s former fixer Michael Cohen admitted he misled the Federal Election Commission about hush money payments made to Daniels. Cohen said he did so in order to, quote, “demonstrate loyalty to Mr. Trump,” unquote, and described a February 2017 meeting with President Trump in the Oval Office at the White House about the hush money repayment. Cohen also recalled Trump trying to stop him from cooperating with federal investigators. In cross-examination, Trump’s defense attorneys tried to suggest Cohen was motivated by vengeance against Trump.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, Senator J.D. Vance, North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum and others were among a number of allies of President Trump who visited the courthouse Tuesday to bash the — to bash Michael Cohen. This is Speaker Johnson.

SPEAKER MIKE JOHNSON: This is the fifth week that President Trump has been in court for this sham of a trial. They are doing this intentionally to keep him here and keep him off of the campaign trail. And I think everybody in the country can see that for what it is.

AMY GOODMAN: This comes as a New York appeals court rejected Trump’s request to overturn a gag order against him in the case.

For more, we’re joined by Ron Kuby, criminal defense and civil rights lawyer based here in New York, closely following all Trump’s cases.

Welcome back to Democracy Now!, Ron.

RON KUBY: Thank you.

AMY GOODMAN: Talk about the significance of this week. You had Stormy Daniels testifying last week. Now you have Michael Cohen. The prosecutors began, and then he has been grilled by Trump’s defense attorneys.

RON KUBY: Michael Cohen, essentially, is the narrator of the entire case. He’s the person who has come forward. He’s tied all the disparate pieces together — the documents, Stormy Daniels and everything else the prosecution has introduced. And he is the one who has firsthand knowledge of the actual deal that he and Donald Trump struck in order to pay the hush money, create a phony retainer, and ultimately falsify the business records.

And while his credibility is important — and I think that most people can agree that he’s a loathsome lackey — he was a loathsome lackey for Donald Trump, and he’s just like every other mob underboss who gets called in a criminal trial, although he’s not as bad as the average mob underboss. He didn’t actually kill anybody, arsonate anybody on behalf of his boss. But he is a guy who would have taken a bullet for the boss, did all these things for the boss. Then the boss betrayed him. And now he, indeed, is out for revenge.

Unfortunately for Donald Trump — and I hate to start a sentence like that — but, unfortunately for Donald Trump, the story that Michael Cohen tells is an eminently believable story and is corroborated in significant respects, so the defense is going to have a hard time with him, all the more so because Trump’s lead lawyer has never tried a criminal case in state court and has only defended two criminal cases in his entire life. This is not the on-the-job training, learning case that you really want sort of starting out in the world of New York criminal defense.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Ron, first of all, greetings. It’s been a long time since we’ve talked. But I wanted to ask you about two things. One is this — you’re a veteran of decades of criminal cases. Have you ever — do you ever recall political leaders from Washington coming to a local criminal case like this, like the speaker of the House and these other members of Congress, and publicly criticizing the prosecution in the midst of a trial? And secondly, you’ve had a lot to say about the media coverage of this trial. So, I’m wondering if you could comment on both the politicians involved in this case and also the way the media have covered it.

RON KUBY: Unfortunately, Juan, I have seen this before. It’s the advantage or disadvantage of being around as long as I’ve been around. We saw it, for example — and I don’t know how many people even remember this — the Bernhard Goetz case, a deranged white man, carrying around a handgun, shot down four Black youth who he encountered in the subway, the subway vigilante. He had huge support. We had people like Senator Alfonse D’Amato coming to his defense, showing up at his trial; of course, Rudy Giuliani showing up, and other political leaders. When there is a high-profile case and you see elements that are attractive to, really, one side or the other — usually the right wing — they tend to show up and use the trial as a background to posture for their views.

Mike Johnson, it was kind of remarkable in the sense that he did one of the things that Trump specifically was doing: He attacked the judge’s daughter, which was kind of amazing. And as for Mike Johnson, remember, he’s the guy who publicly announced that he and his son are internet buddies. They monitor each other’s internet traffic to make sure that none of them are looking at porn or off-color websites. I wonder how Mike and Mike Jr. dealt with Stormy Daniels. Was anybody tempted to google her body of work there, or did they just stay on the straight and narrow? It was pretty disgusting show all around from Mike Johnson.

The media coverage of the case, they tend to view this as a sporting event — “The defense had a good day,” “The prosecution scored heavily here.” The danger with that is we have no idea who’s ahead or who’s behind, until the jury speaks. In a sporting event, you can say, “OK, the Yankees are up by nine runs in the seventh inning. They have never lost with this much of a lead. And you can confidently predict, happily, the Yankees will win.” But you can’t do that with a criminal trial. So, so much of the speculation is just uninformed, because it can’t be informed. And, of course, the next body of uninformed speculation will be: Will Donald Trump testify? Donald Trump will not testify. I think we should speculate on the reasons he’s going to use to explain why he’s not testifying. And I have, you know, my own selection on my bingo card. But, of course, he’s not going to testify.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And Judge Merchan, I wanted to ask you: If he is convicted, your sense of the likelihood of him imposing a jail sentence?

RON KUBY: Judge Merchan is notoriously harsh on white-collar criminals. Judge Merchan is one of these judges who seems to think that the more you have, the more you’ve accumulated, the more advantages and privilege you’ve had in your life, the more you should really follow the rules, because the rules make it easy enough for you to become wealthy. Like, if you’re violating them out of greed or personal motivation, you will be sentenced to jail. So I have no doubt that Judge Merchan will impose a prison sentence. I also have no doubt that that prison sentence and the conviction will be stayed while Donald Trump pursues a whole plethora of multiple appeals.

AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to ask you about where you’re going today, to court, to represent the climate activists arrested on Earth Day in front of Citibank headquarters — many are now appearing in court — and also to ask you about the pro-Palestinian student activists at Purchase. I think 68 were arrested. This is State University of New York. Westchester DA said many of the charges will be dropped against them — as well as the students arrested at Fordham. You’re representing all of these people.

RON KUBY: OK. So, from the top, this morning in criminal court, in the summons appearance part, the climate protesters who were part of the New York Communities for Change set of actions, “it’s getting hot out there,” “it’s going to be a hot summer” actions, young people, for the most part, climate protesters, desperately trying to get into people’s consciousness about the existential need to save this planet, which has always been a difficult thing, because people tend to look at the crisis of today and tomorrow rather than the crisis of a year from now. Unfortunately, today is now. The future is now. And so, they are all charged with criminal trespass. I expect those charges will be dismissed.

Following that, there are three Palestinian protesters at 100 Center Street today who disrupted the Easter vigil at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in a respectful but firm protest against the slaughter in Gaza. Yesterday, the Purchase students began their series of appearances, and they are, for the most part, taking a three-hour course called “Fresh Start” — sounds nice — and all of those charges will be dismissed. And the Fordham students are due on Monday also in the summons part, where they face trespass charges. And it is likely those cases will ultimately be dismissed, as well. I don’t think I missed anybody.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you, Ron Kuby, for —

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Ron, I wanted to —

AMY GOODMAN: Oh, go ahead, Juan.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Yeah, I just wanted to ask, Ron, you — for decades, of course, you have been one of the go-to lawyers in New York for social protesters, and especially during your period of partnership with the late, great William Kuntsler. I’m wondering: Have you seen over these years this kind of upsurge of young people protesting like you’ve seen in the last couple of years?

RON KUBY: It’s a great question. I tend to view these struggles, very much the way William Kuntsler did, as perennial struggles with each generation kind of rising up to do their part. We saw that in Occupy Wall Street. We see it now. And I just have mad respect for the young people who are literally risking their education, their careers and their futures to stand up for the planet, to stand up against the slaughter in Gaza. And it’s so impressive to see them. And I’m always happy to serve those movements in any small way that I can.

AMY GOODMAN: Ron Kuby, criminal defense and civil rights lawyer based here in New York.

Next up, we go to Gaza to speak with an American doctor who saved the life of Senator Tammy Duckworth 20 years ago when she was injured in Iraq. He’s now part of an American medical volunteer delegation at European Hospital in Khan Younis who’s trapped. Stay with us.