Daniels

NEW YORK — New York appeals judges grilled President Trump’s lawyers and prosecutors Thursday about his bid to erase his historic hush money conviction, but the court didn’t signal how or when it would rule.

The judges delved into legal theory, presidential immunity and some evidence in Trump’s 2024 trial. Convicted of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records to obscure a $130,000 payment to adult film performer Stormy Daniels, Trump denies any wrongdoing. He has turned to state and federal courts in hopes of unwinding the verdict.

Trump, who denounced the case on social media as recently as September, didn’t attend Thursday’s court session.

Much of the back-and-forth focused on prosecutors’ theory that the hush money was meant to keep unflattering information about Trump away from the electorate before the 2016 vote, and that it amounted to an illegal campaign contribution under the Federal Election Campaign Act.

Trump lawyer Robert Giuffra Jr. told the judges that Manhattan Dist. Atty. Alvin Bragg’s office has no place tying a case to a federal election law.

“We think it’s the most obvious ground for reversal,” he said.

Prosecutors argued that they weren’t prosecuting an alleged federal campaign finance offense, but rather presenting it as a factor underlying what they claim was a Trump-orchestrated conspiracy.

“So are you relying upon FECA in order to prove your falsifying business records [charge]?” Justice Troy Webber asked.

“Only partially,” replied Bragg’s appeals chief, Steven Wu, adding that it was “important only to show that the purpose for the falsifying business records here was to conceal that conspiracy.”

Judges drill down on question about White House conversations

The appeal also concerns whether jurors should have been allowed to hear testimony about supposed White House workflow and conversations — some with then-Communications Director Hope Hicks — and even Trump social media posts during his first term. His lawyers cite presidential immunity for official acts, and they argue his official conduct included responding to the Daniels drama once it became public in 2018.

“Ms. Hicks was serving as a White House official,” talking with the president about how to respond to press inquiries that implicitly concerned his fitness for office, Giuffra told the appeals judges.

Wu countered later: “In this conversation, they were not speaking about a press response. … The president was talking to her about his private opinion.”

The appeals judges pressed both sides about the matter and the specifics of Hicks’ testimony. She told jurors that she asked Trump how he wanted to respond, but as for what he said, she testified only that he expressed relief that the Daniels story hadn’t emerged during the campaign.

Bragg’s office contends that all the White House-related evidence was fair game. The conversations were “unofficial conduct,” some of the other evidence was public record, and some was a general description of office practices, prosecutors say. They maintain that even if some of the evidence should have been excluded, its admission was a “harmless error” that doesn’t warrant overturning a conviction that rested on “a mountain” of other proof against Trump.

Justice Bahaati E. Pitt-Burke wondered aloud about that.

“If you take all of those things cumulatively, right, and there’s a problem with this evidence, there’s a problem with this evidence, at what point … does it stop being harmless error and turn into something else?” she asked.

“It would have to be a lot more than there was in this case,” Wu responded.

Trump’s lawyers also have argued the case was political

While the appeal turns on complex legal disputes, political overtones aren’t hard to find. The very first paragraph of one of the Trump team’s court filings contended that the case was the flimsy product of “immense political pressure” on a Democratic prosecutor to go after Trump — rhetoric that echoes the Republican president’s own oft-repeated claims in the court of public opinion.

The May 2024 verdict made Trump the first former — and now current — U.S. president with a criminal conviction. Though historic, it didn’t impede his return to the White House or subject him to any punishment.

The trial involved $130,000 that Daniels got from Trump’s then-fixer and lawyer, Michael Cohen, weeks before the 2016 election. The money bought, for a time, her silence about an alleged sexual encounter with the married Trump a decade earlier. He says that nothing sexual happened between them.

Trump’s company reimbursed Cohen in 2017, logging those payments as legal expenses.

Trump’s lawyers argue there’s only “weak” evidence that he even knew about Cohen’s dealings at the time. His trial attorneys also said that payments to Cohen were indeed legal expenses, and that any hush money expended on Trump’s behalf wasn’t hidden campaign spending, just an effort to avoid embarrassing his family.

The distinction matters because, under New York law, falsifying business records isn’t a felony unless it’s done with an intent to commit or conceal a separate crime.

While pursuing his state appeal, Trump also has been trying to shift the case to federal court and have it dismissed on immunity grounds. A federal judge said no — for the third time — in August. Trump’s attorneys are appealing that decision, with arguments set for Nov. 16.

Peltz and Sisak write for the Associated Press.

Magic Johnson is relentlessly positive, a quality that has served him well as a player, a businessman and even while living with HIV since 1991.

The former Lakers great generally keeps his social media comments upbeat. Yet, a last-second mental lapse Sunday by one of the five professional sports franchises Johnson co-owns prompted him to tweet the equivalent of a distress signal.

“I’m in total disbelief my Commanders had such poor clock management in today’s overtime game against the Giants. All we had to do was kick the field goal and we would have won the game!”

The tweet ended with an emoji of a man facepalming, conveying Johnson’s exasperation over the last play of Washington’s 27-27 tie with the New York Giants.

The Commanders were at the Giants 24-yard line with 12 seconds to play, no timeouts and the clock running. What needed to be done was obvious: Quarterback Jayden Daniels takes a snap, spikes the ball and the field-goal team trots out.

Nope. Daniels took a snap, danced around, was tackled and the clock expired.

Head coach Dan Quinn ripped off his headset and slammed it to the ground. Daniels stood on the field looking stunned. Johnson, who acquired 4% of the team when his pal Josh Harris bought it for $6.05 billion in 2023, vented on social media.

Johnson’s public comments are usually motivational gems such as “When you face a crisis, you know who your true friends are.” Or “Life doesn’t stop because something happens to you.” Or “I’m the one who will take chances, not worry about the backlash.”

When the Commanders lost their first two games this season, Johnson stayed silent. When they upset the Seattle Seahawks two weeks ago, Johnson took to his keyboard to congratulate the team, tweeting a photo of himself in a luxury box.

The last time he had expressed frustration about the Commanders on social media was three years ago, shortly after Harris became majority owner and Johnson had chipped in $240 million as a limited partner. On Oct. 5, 2023, he tweeted “Tonight the Commanders played with no intensity or fire. We didn’t compete in the first half and got down 27-3 heading into halftime. It was too big of a hole to climb out of and that is why we ended up losing 40-20.”

This time, he didn’t need nearly as many words. Quinn and Daniels both took responsibility for the lapse.

“The right call is honestly, we can go clock it early and don’t put ourselves in that spot,” Quinn said. “That’s my responsibility.”

Added Daniels, whose nonchalance after getting tackled seemed to indicate he thought his team had a timeout: “We’ve got to stop the clock. We’ve got to know the situation. We’ve got to relay that as an offense. It starts from everybody, from the top down. Ultimately, you know, it’s on me.”

For his part, Johnson could turn his attention to another of the teams in which he has a financial interest: the Dodgers, who lost Game 1 of the National League Championship Series to the Milwaukee Brewers on Sunday. He remained mum about that game, having last posted several congratulatory tweets when the Dodgers sailed through the NLDS against the Atlanta Braves last week.