Conservative legal scholar Jonathan Turley criticized the prosecution of Donald Trump’s state criminal trial in Manhattan, calling it a politically motivated “legally absurd” case.
Turley argued the hush money charges against Trump had expired and were revived only for political purposes by the Democratic district attorney.
“Everything about this case is, in my view, legally absurd. This case is basically a state misdemeanor that had run out on the statute of limitations, and Bragg was forced after he declined for a long time to bring this charge to do so. His predecessor rejected it,” Turley said.
He noted the key witness, Michael Cohen, has been deemed a serial perjurer.
Turley said the trial would improperly rely on testimony from Cohen and attempt to “bootstrap” a dead state misdemeanor into a federal crime rejected by the DOJ.
“They took a dead misdemeanor and bootstrapped it into effectively trying a federal crime. But the federal crime here under election law was rejected by the Department of Justice. They didn’t feel that this should be charged,” Turley said.
Trump denounced the trial as “political persecution” as he entered court.
“This is political persecution,” Trump said.
The judge denied prosecutors opportunities to introduce Trump’s “Access Hollywood” tape or allegations from E. Jean Carroll, limiting their ability to portray Trump was trying to help his election chances.
Elsewhere, Turley has highlighted time pressures on the DOJ special counsel investigating Trump, noting a potential end if Trump were re-elected and could dismiss the cases.
“You have this crazy case that’s going to go forward and it’s going to turn on the testimony of people like Michael Cohen, and Michael Cohen just recently had a judge call him a serial perjurer. He’s going to appear as the center of this case,” Turley said.
