Cross-examination of #MichaelCohen resumes, an opportunity for the defense to poke holes in his testimony & perhaps trip up or provoke the state’s key witness. The questioning of Cohen, #Trump’s fmr fixer, is the beginning of the end of Trump’s #criminal trial, which began April 15 & might conclude before Memorial Day weekend at this pace.
>> Demonstrators — both pro- & anti-Trump — crowded in w/reporters inside the protest area designated by the NYPD as several of Trump’s allies in Congress made statements.
Nobody cared about #Trump until these elected #Republican enablers in #Congress came to New York to commiserate with him in his #criminal trial, some of them no doubt hoping to pick up #pardons or something for who knows what they might have done.
What emerged in 2 interviews w/ #Trump, & conversations w/more than a dozen of his closest advisers & confidants,were the outlines of an imperial presidency that would reshape #America & its role in the world. To carry out a #deportation operation designed to remove >11M people from the country…he would be willing to build migrant detention camps [#ConcentrationCamps] & deploy the #US#military…
He is weighing #pardons for all of his supporters accused of attacking the Capitol on #Jan6, >800 of whom have pleaded #guilty or been #convicted by a jury. He might not come to the aid of an attacked #ally in Eur or Asia if he felt they weren’t paying enough for its defense. He would gut the US civil service, deploy the #NationalGuard to US cities as he sees fit, close the WH #pandemic-preparedness office, & staff his Admin w/acolytes who back his false assertion the 2020 election was stolen.