“The View” co-host Alyssa Farah Griffin drove a wedge into the prosecution’s chances of success at Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s trial.
Former porn actress Stormy Daniels testified in the trial regarding a $130,000 hush money payment made out to her by Michael Cohen, an ex-attorney for former President Donald Trump. The prosecution is accusing Trump of paying the hush money as a ploy to interfere in the 2016 presidential election by covering up his alleged affair with Daniels.
Griffin said the prosecution has not proven beyond a reasonable doubt that Trump’s use of the hush money interfered in the 2016 election.
“I actually, I hate to say this because I want to see him be held accountable. I don’t think that the prosecution’s throughly proven the case yet. I do think they showed this was about the campaign, that’s why he didn’t want it to come out. That’s half. They still have to definitively, beyond a reasonable doubt, convince them that he falsified the business records and they may get there. There’s two more weeks,” Griffin said during a Tuesday segment.
“They’ve got time, they got time,” co-host Sunny Hostin added, appearing to agree with Griffin.
“The court of public opinion, as we’re speaking, Stormy Daniels is talking about him asking her if she has STDs, if she was regularly tested,” Griffin continued. “And I hate to bring up salacious stuff like that, but people watching who don’t necessarily, you know, hadn’t paid as much attention—could sway some minds. So even if he’s not convicted, this may resonate with women.” (RELATED: ‘This Is Embarrassing’: Turley Says He Is In ‘Utter Disbelief’ Over Bragg Trial Opening Statements)
A slew of legal experts have argued the prosecution has failed to specify a crime committed and pointed out how it is unprecedented for an individual to be prosecuted for election interference at the state level. Jed Handelsman Shugerman, a law professor at Boston University, argued in a New York Times op-ed that the election interference argument is “vague” and “undermines” serious election fraud cases.
“As a reality check, it is legal for a candidate to pay for a nondisclosure agreement. Hush money is unseemly, but it is legal,” Shugerman wrote. “The election law scholar Richard Hasen rightly observed, ‘Calling it election interference actually cheapens the term and undermines the deadly serious charges in the real election interference cases.’”
Former Assistant U.S. Attorney Andy McCarthy accused the prosecution of attempting to “spin” a legal hush money payment into an election interference conspiracy. He argued it is standard procedure to cover up “politically embarrassing” information, such as an affair.