Keeping Up With the Trump Trials: What We Learned From the Testimony Leak

Keeping up with Donald Trump’s court schedule is a dizzying task, since he faces two federal trials, a criminal trial in Georgia, and a separate civil trial and criminal trial in New York. (Oh, and he’s running for president.) To make things easier, we’ll be recapping the biggest Trump trial news at the end of each week. 

This week, testimony from four of Trump’s co-defendants in the Georgia election interference case leaked to the press in what prosecutors are calling an attempt to intimidate future witnesses.

Meanwhile, in New York, Trump’s lawyers began presenting their defense in his New York civil fraud trial. And in Florida, the judge made a decision about whether the federal government’s classified documents trial should be moved.

Video footage of the testimony of four key defendants in the Georgia election interference case—Jenna Ellis, Sidney Powell, Kenneth Chesebro, and Scott Hall—leaked to the media. (Both ABC News and the Washington Post reported the leaked videos.) All four recently pleaded guilty to lesser charges in exchange for their testimony against co-defendants in Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ election interference Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) case.

Attorneys on both sides immediately began blaming one another, and Willis’ office filed for an emergency protective order with Judge Scott McAfee. Prosecutors said in a court filing that the leak was “clearly intended to intimidate witnesses in this case, subjecting them to harassment and threats prior to trial.”

Ultimately, the leaker turned out to be an attorney for another one of Trump’s co-defendants: Jonathan Miller, who is representing Misty Hampton, a former elections director in Coffee County. In a hearing Wednesday, he argued that the leak was necessary to help his client’s case and that the testimony contained information the public needed to know. “All four of those people that did their proffers in front of you, they did their plea, it was all recorded, it was sent out there for the world to see,” he said.

After hearing Miller’s admission, McAfee agreed to draft an order protecting only some of the evidence shared during pretrial discovery, a compromise between prosecutors and the defense.

The leaked testimony revealed a few new details about the plan to overturn Georgia’s 2020 election results.

Powell told prosecutors that she tried to convince Trump, in the last months of his presidency, that she should be appointed special counsel to investigate allegations of voter fraud. If he had done so, Powell said she would have seized election equipment, possibly using the military’s help. She said she still believes there was “machine fraud” in the 2020 presidential election (the federal government’s cybersecurity agency found no evidence of flaws in voting machines). She also said she was in frequent contact with Trump in the weeks following the November 2020 election and filed a flurry of lawsuits challenging state election results, despite having no experience practicing election law.

Ellis testified that Trump’s former deputy chief of staff Dan Scavino told her he believed Trump and his close aides planned on staying in the White House regardless of the outcome of the many legal challenges his lawyers were bringing. Ellis also said she was initially unaware of the fake electors scheme and felt it had intentionally been hidden from her, though she didn’t explain why.

Chesebro, the attorney who suggested Jan. 6 was the “hard deadline” to get Trump elected and that a new slate of electors needed to be presented to former Vice President Mike Pence before the Electoral College certification, told prosecutors that he flew to Washington around Jan. 2, 2021, to be available for potential meetings with Trump’s campaign, but didn’t end up being invited to any. He insisted that he did not know what was about to happen at the Capitol and didn’t witness any of the violence himself on Jan. 6, despite joining the mob of protestors as they walked to the Capitol.

Then there’s Hall, who was charged with unlawfully accessing voter data and voting machines, and became the first defendant to plead guilty in the Georgia case. In his testimony, he said he considers himself a “water boy” and a “political tourist” in the breach of Georgia’s rural Coffee County elections office. He claimed Robert Cheeley, another defendant, was the “brain trust” in that entire scheme. However, Hall testified that he was recruited to help locate Ruby Freeman, a Fulton County election worker who was targeted and harassed over claims she had committed election fraud.

The former president’s lawyers kicked off their defense in his New York civil fraud trial by calling Don Jr. back to the stand. Trump’s eldest son spent most of his time painting a glowing image of his family’s real estate empire and his father’s business acumen—“He’s an artist with real estate,” said Don. Jr.

A series of expert witnesses came next, testifying about the way the Trump Organization’s financial documents were prepared and how it compares to standard practices. Accountant Jason Flemmons testified that when valuing assets, it’s normal practice to consider a property’s future revenue streams. That can lead to “wildly different values” on a personal financial statement versus a tax-assessed value, one of the key discrepancies the Trumps are on the hook for in this case.

On his second day of questioning, Flemmons noted that Trump disclosed that 95 percent of his assets listed on his 2014 financial documents did not follow generally accepted accounting principles—known as GAAP. But because Trump’s documents included a disclaimer clause—which Flemmons described as the “highest level of disclaimer” available, likening it to a “buyer beware” sign—lenders would have known what they were getting into.

However, when lawyers for the attorney general’s office stepped in for cross-examination, Flemmons acknowledged that he personally worked on less than five financial documents, all of which were done before 2000. (The AG’s lawsuit is focused on Trump’s financial documents between 2011 and 2021.)

After making a lot of noise about how he’s supposedly been mistreated in his New York trial, Trump’s lawyers finally did the thing and filed a mistrial motion with the New York Supreme Court, alleging bias by Judge Arthur Engoron and his law clerk Allison Greenfield.

The motion noted that Engoron and Greenfield are both Democrats and listed activities both engaged in that Trump’s attorneys claim serve as evidence of “apparent and actual bias.” For example, Engoron allegedly shared articles disparaging Trump, his two sons, and his lawyers to his high school alumni newsletter while the trial was ongoing. Trump’s lawyers also claimed Greenfield was given “unprecedented and inappropriate latitude” during the trial, accusing the court staff member of the appearance of “co-judging” the case.

In the motion, Trump’s attorneys also took issue with the gag orders Engoron issued—preventing Trump and his legal team from publicly posting or speaking about any members of the judge’s staff—arguing that not being able to address issues in court was “simply not justifiable and certainly not consistent with the avoidance of an appearance of impartiality.”

The mistrial motion was filed while Trump’s attorneys were still presenting their defense. In the meantime, an appeals court judge temporarily lifted the gag order and Trump and his campaign team immediately resumed their attacks on the clerk.

It was up to Engoron to decide on the motion, since he is the judge and arbiter of the court, regardless of the substance of the mistrial request. As you might expect, he denied Trump’s request on Friday, saying the arguments for a mistrial were “utterly without merit.” Trump is likely to appeal the decision.

Judge Aileen Cannon announced her decision to Trump’s request to postpone his May classified documents trial, and it was a (soft) no.

Cannon said that for now, the May date will remain, but it could be pushed back at a later time, specifically when the defense and prosecution meet in March at a planned scheduling conference. She noted that the case involves “an unusually high volume” of classified and unclassified discovery evidence that can be tricky to access, since some of it requires security clearance. Cannon did push back several deadlines for filing and responding to pretrial motions.

Though it wasn’t exactly what Trump’s lawyers had hoped for—they want this trial pushed to after the 2024 election—they seemed satisfied with Cannon’s ruling. “It is clearly in the best interest of justice for President Trump to have adequate time to prepare and file motions as he works to defeat these hoaxes and marches back to the White House,” said Steven Cheung, Trump campaign spokesperson.

Some legal commentators have noted that by holding off on her ruling on whether to delay the case, Judge Cannon may have frozen movement to set a quicker date in the Fulton County proceedings.