Trump trial live updates: Hope Hicks resumes testimony in hush money case

Emil Bove is up for the defence.

Hicks is visibly upset. She moves her face to the side to hide her tears. Bove asks whether we need a break.

Judge Merchan asks if Hicks would like one.

“Yes please.” She reaches for a tissue.

The cameras in the overflow are off but we can hear what sounds like Hicks crying.

Hicks says Trump told her that Cohen made the Stormy transaction because “Michael felt like it was his job to protect him” and that “he did it in the kindness of his own heart and he didn’t tell anyone about it.”

Did the idea that Cohen would’ve made a $130,00 payment out of the kindness of his own heart consistent with what you knew about him?

“I’d say that would be out of character for Michael”

“I didn’t know Michael to be an especially charitable person, or a selfless person. The kind of person who seeks credit.”

No more questions from the prosecution.

We’re going over Hicks’s White House roles.

She joined in January 2017 as the director of strategic communications, then became the communication director in August of that year.

She left in April 2018 and became the executive vice president of communications at the Fox Corporation, before returning to the White House in 2020.

The overall response to the article was “muted,” Hicks says.

“Relative to some of the other stories we dealt with … it just didn’t get a lot of traction.”

Trump “was concerned about the story. He was concerned how it would be viewed by his wife, and he wanted me to make sure that the newspapers weren’t delivered to their residence that morning.”

Was he concerned about the campaign?

“Everything we talked about in the context of this time period and this timeframe was in the context of the campaign. … Something Trump said a lot was ‘How is it playing?’ … Could’ve been a speech, an article, a tweet.”

Cohen texted Hicks on November 4 2016

“Any news?” at 8.50pm

“Any news???” at 9.02pm

Cohen: Lots of innuendos with little fact

Cohen: Poorly written and I dot [sic] see it getting much play

“A little irony there,” Hicks says, laughing a bit on the stand as she reads the texts aloud.

Hicks: I agree with most of that!! It will get play bc the media is the worst but should just ignore and blow past it

Cohen, the next morning: Even CNN not talking about it. No one believes it and if necessary, I have a statement by Storm denying everything and contradicting the other porn stars statement. I wouldn’t use it now or even discuss with him as no one is talking about this or cares!

“I didn’t know what he was talking about and I didn’t want to know,” Hicks says.

“I just mean that the election was taking place in three days and we were doing five-six rallies a day. There was a lot going on and it wasn’t like this story was consuming the news cycle and I didn’t need to be aware of every little detail.”

We also see another portion of the WSJ article mentioning Stormy Daniels, and Hicks’ quote to the paper that it is “absolutely, unequivocally untrue” that she had a relationship with Trump.

She testifies that’s consistent with what she told the WSJ and a grand jury.

A string of text messages between Hicks and Cohen is shown to the court from the aftermath of the publication of the 4 November 2016 WSJ article about Karen McDougal.

She clarifies that the “denial” part for both women came from Trump, but she’s not clear where the “no knowledge” part came from.

“As I sit here now I don’t have a strong memory of him saying, ‘we have no knowledge of any of this.’ … These are hectic conversations, there’s a lot of people weighing in.”

On the stand, Hope Hicks recalls that on 4 November 2016, after a stop in Ohio, the campaign landed in Hershey, Pennsylvania. In a car getting to the next venue, Trump was speaking on the phone with Michael Cohen. Reince Priebus was also in the car.

“I don’t know who initiated the phone call.” There was “nothing memorable” about the call and “I don’t remember what was said.”

We see the Wall Street Journal article on Karen McDougal and the quote from Hicks on behalf of the campaign in the story, in which she says “we have no knowledge of any of this” and that the claim of an affair was “totally untrue”.

Did Trump tell you to say that?

“I don’t remember him verbatim saying that but that was the consensus of the conversations we were all having.”