Robert De Niro unleashes at Donald Trump on Joe Biden’s behalf outside criminal trial
Acting legend Robert De Niro has let loose on Donald Trump outside court as the former president’s hush money trial wraps up.
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Donald Trump’s lawyer pleaded with the jury not to put the former US president – and the frontrunner for this year’s election – behind bars in the dramatic climax of his criminal trial.
But prosecutor Joshua Steinglass told the 12 New Yorkers who will decide Mr Trump’s fate that his hush money deal with a porn star on the eve of the 2016 election “could very well be what got Mr Trump elected”.
“In the simplest terms, Stormy Daniels is the motive,” he declared.
Both sides made their case during closing arguments in the Manhattan Criminal Court on Tuesday (local time), amid reports the Secret Service had met with New York prison officials to prepare for the possibility that Mr Trump could be put in prison.
In a bizarre twist, Hollywood legend Robert De Niro arrived at the courthouse for a campaign event on behalf of US President Joe Biden, Mr Trump’s opponent in November’s election.
Mr Biden had previously avoided weighing in on the trial, but with his team reportedly in a “full-blown freakout” over Mr Trump’s advantage in the polls, De Niro faced the cameras to blast the former president as a “tyrant” who would be a “dictator for life” if re-elected.
Mr Trump, speaking outside the courtroom flanked by three of his children, said he “did nothing wrong” and claimed the case was part of an “election interference” plot.
“This is a dark day in America,” he said.
Wrapping up the first criminal trial of a US president in history, Mr Steinglass sought to convince the jury that Mr Trump was guilty of falsifying 34 business records to cover up $US130,000 he paid to Ms Daniels to cover up their claim of a brief affair in 2006.
The prosecutor accused the 77-year-old Republican of trying to “hoodwink the American voter” during his first presidential run with what he said was a corrupt and fraudulent scheme to buy and bury negative stories that could have harmed his chances of victory in 2016.
And he said there were “smoking guns” in the form of handwritten notes from Mr Trump’s chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg detailing how Michael Cohen – Mr Trump’s lawyer who paid Ms Daniels on his behalf – would be reimbursed.
“In New York State, bottom line: You cannot lie in your business records,” Mr Steinglass said.
During a break in his argument, Mr Trump posted on his social media platform: “BORING!”
His lawyer Todd Blanche earlier declared his client “did not commit any crimes” in what he called a “paper case” that was not related to Ms Daniels’s claim of a one-night fling – which Mr Trump has always denied.
He said the charges were “absurd” and “preposterous”, and that Mr Trump was too busy being “the leader of the free world” to oversee any arrangement to repay Mr Cohen.
Mr Blanche attacked Mr Trump’s former fixer – the prosecution’s star witness – as “the MVP of liars” and the “greatest liar of all time”.
“You cannot send someone to prison based on the words of Michael Cohen,” he said.
But he was rebuked by Judge Juan Merchan for the “outrageous” and “highly inappropriate” comment, because jurors are not supposed to consider sentencing in their deliberations.
If Mr Trump is convicted, the judge could also elect to put him on probation or issue a fine.
Mr Steinglass acknowledged Mr Cohen’s flaws but said that “we didn’t pick him up at the witness store”.
“Mr Trump chose Mr Cohen for the same qualities his attorneys now urge you to reject,” he said, adding that it was “difficult to conceive of a case with more corroboration”.
Outside the courthouse, De Niro was heckled by Mr Trump’s supporters during his fiery speech on behalf of Mr Biden. Raising the spectre of the 9/11 attack, the New Yorker said the city “vowed we would not allow terrorists to change our way of life” after September 11.
“I love this city. I don’t want to destroy it,” De Niro said.
“Donald Trump wants to destroy not only this city, but the country, and eventually he could destroy the world.”
Mr Trump’s senior adviser Jason Miller hit back by saying: “The Biden folks have finally done it. After months of saying politics had nothing to do with this trial, they showed up and made a campaign event out of a … trial day for President Trump.”
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Originally published as Robert De Niro unleashes at Donald Trump on Joe Biden’s behalf outside criminal trial
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