Laura Coates Live

Donald Trump attorney Todd Blanche raised his voice and flailed his arms at Michael Cohen, accusing the prosecution’s star witness of making up a phone conversation with Trump just before he sent $130,000 to Stormy Daniels’ attorney in October 2016. Blanche confronted Cohen with text messages he sent with Keith Schiller – whom Cohen had said put Trump on the phone – which were unrelated to anything having to do with Trump or Daniels. It was the most dramatic moment of the cross-examination of the key witness in the hush money case, and the clearest example yet of the defense’s effort to cast doubt on Cohen’s memory of phone calls and other significant interactions with Trump in 2016. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump agreed on this: they needed to debate. After months of speculation over the traditional pre-election face-offs – when they would happen, what they would look like and whether the candidates would actually show up – the 2024 showdowns were quickly announced Wednesday morning after Biden’s campaign laid out its criteria for participating. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In the New York hush money cover up trial, Donald Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche began his confrontation with Michael Cohen on Tuesday by throwing the former fixer’s language back in his face. For roughly two hours, Blanche began a cross-examination to try to discredit Cohen’s allegations against Trump. Over two days, Cohen has detailed the hush money scheme involving adult film actress Stormy Daniels before the 2016 election, walked the jury through the $130,000 he paid at Trump’s direction and described his fallout with the former president. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Just do it.” With three short words, more famous for selling sports gear than exposing conspiracies, star witness Michael Cohen on Monday depicted Donald Trump’s order of a hush money payoff to an adult film star to allegedly save his 2016 campaign. Prosecutors will seek to build on his testimony when he returns to the stand Tuesday to nail down their case that the ex-president broke the law by falsifying financial records to hide the pay-off in the culmination of a scheme to mislead voters. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Former President Donald Trump’s lawyers continued their attack on the credibility of Stormy Daniels for several hours on Thursday, with defense attorney Susan Necheles accusing the adult film star of making up the story of having sex with Trump to make money. Daniels pushed back on claims she was untruthful about her sexual encounter with Trump, saying that the story was true, even as she was confronted with inconsistencies in some of the small details of her account. Plus, a Florida sheriff publicly released bodycam footage from a deputy who fatally shot a Black airman in his home last week – and disputed claims from the victim’s family that the deputy had gone to the wrong apartment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

President Joe Biden said for the first time he would halt some shipments of American weapons to Israel, which he acknowledged have been used to kill civilians in Gaza, if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu orders a major invasion of the city of Rafah. “Civilians have been killed in Gaza as a consequence of those bombs and other ways in which they go after population centers,” Biden said referring to 2,000-pound bombs that he paused shipments of last week. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Adult film star Stormy Daniels dished out salacious details of her alleged sexual encounter with former President Donald Trump in 2006 from the witness stand. She described how they met at a celebrity golf tournament and what she says happened when she went to Trump’s Lake Tahoe hotel room. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Prosecutors in Donald Trump’s hush money trial dove into the paper trail at the heart of their case on Monday, revealing to jurors exactly how Michael Cohen was repaid by Trump’s trust and personal accounts in 2017 after he paid hush money to Stormy Daniels. Judge Merchan began the session by announcing he found Trump in contempt for violating his gag order a 10th time, after fining him last week for nine violations cited by prosecutors. Each violation came with a $1,000 fine, the maximum allowed under New York law. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Donald Trump’s former campaign press secretary and White House communications director Hope Hicks took the stand Friday, sitting feet away from her former boss as she described the fallout from the “Access Hollywood” tape and the Trump White House response to stories about hush money payments. Hicks was visibly nervous, and she mostly avoided eye contact with Trump while answering questions from prosecutors for more than two hours. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Donald Trump’s attorneys on Thursday sought to paint one of the witnesses at the heart of the hush money deal with Stormy Daniels as someone with a long history of extracting money from celebrities while going “up to the line without committing extortion.” Plus, at Tuesday’s pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University and The City College of New York, 282 people were arrested, according to the New York Police Department. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Police are at UCLA and have declared the pro-Palestinian protest on campus an unlawful assembly, a source told CNN. About 300 protesters were arrested at Columbia University and City College of New York on Tuesday night, and at least a dozen people were arrested at the University of Wisconsin-Madison on Wednesday. While the demands among protesters vary at each university, the majority of demonstrations have called for the divestment from companies that support Israel and the war in Gaza. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Over 100 protesters were arrested at Columbia University and City College of New York — most at Columbia — according to a law enforcement official. Columbia University property, including Hamilton Hall, was cleared two hours after officers entered the campus to remove people protesting Israel's war in Gaza. The university has asked NYPD to maintain its presence on campus until May 17. Columbia has been the epicenter, but protests have been roiling universities across the country, with administrations taking different approaches to the encampments that have sprouted up in support of the Palestinian cause. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Four officers were killed in a shooting while attempting to serve a warrant at a home in Charlotte, North Carolina, including one deputy US marshal and two local task force officers, authorities say. A total of eight law enforcement officers were shot during the incident, Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Chief Johnny Jennings said. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

David Pecker finally stepped down from the witness stand after more than 10 hours of testimony across four days, where the former American Media Inc. chief described in detail how he helped Donald Trump suppress negative stories and pummel Trump’s rivals in the National Enquirer during the 2016 campaign. The back-and-forth over Pecker’s story set the stage for the further brawls ahead when witnesses such as adult film star Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer and fixer, take the stand. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The former president was the epicenter of attention Thursday during key testimony from media magnate David Pecker at his first criminal trial in New York. Plus, the Supreme Court appeared ready to reject former President Donald Trump’s claims of sweeping immunity and the broad protections he has sought to shut down his federal election subversion case, but also reluctant to give special counsel Jack Smith carte blanche to pursue those charges. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Justices will be hearing oral arguments in his sweeping immunity case that could have profound implications for his legal fate and poses never-before-resolved questions about the powers of the presidency. Plus, a grand jury in Arizona has handed up an indictment against former President Donald Trump’s allies over their efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss, including the fake electors from that state and several individuals connected to his campaign. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Judge Juan Merchan appeared poised on Tuesday to sanction Donald Trump for violating the gag order in his criminal hush money case after peppering the former president’s lawyers with questions about why Trump’s social media posts were acceptable. Tuesday began with a hearing on Trump’s 10 alleged violations of the gag order. The day ended with former American Media Inc. chief David Pecker talking about how he vetted allegations of an alleged affair between Trump and Playboy playmate Karen McDougal in 2016 while in constant communication with Trump’s then-fixer, Michael Cohen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The very different story as a jury is being asked to believe in Donald Trump's hush money trial. Plus, new revelations in the classified documents case. What a top Oval Office insider warned Donald Trump and who allegedly got promised a pardon. And police intervening during pro-Palestinian protest at New York University after intimidating chants and anti- Semitic incidents. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tonight’s show begins with Laura reflecting on an unbelievably disturbing moment after seeing a man lit himself on fire in front of the New York City courthouse where Donald Trump’s hush money coverup trial is underway. Pus, we explore the question: how does the prosecution prove Trump paid hush money to win the election? Also, Speaker Mike Johnson risks the wrath of GOP members with a foreign aid bill. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

If Donald Trump opts to testify at his New York criminal trial, Manhattan prosecutors want to use his past legal run-ins to discredit him to the jury. In a filing released Wednesday, prosecutors for the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office say they’ll ask the former president about the recent verdicts against him, including the recent civil fraud trial with the New York attorney general, where a judge found Trump and his company liable for committing persistent and repeated fraud by inflating the value of his assets to get better loan rates. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices