NEW YORK — If there are any bragging rights connected with Donald Trump applauding your legal skills following a day of testimony at his criminal trial, Fox News analyst Andy McCarthy has already been mentioned at least a dozen times.
The former president and current presidential candidate has often approached a metal barricade outside the courtroom in lower Manhattan to confront cameras and deliver the final word on the day’s proceedings. As the trial progressed, his statements became more informal, with him reading the words of supportive commentators from a stack of papers. He rarely acknowledges shouted inquiries.
Donald Trump May Be Stuck In A Manhattan Courtroom, But He Knows His Favorite Legal Analysts
Besides McCarthy, a former Manhattan prosecutor and writer for National Review, Fox commentators Jonathan Turley, Gregg Jarrett, and Mark Levin are frequently mentioned.
“Every legal scholar says, ‘They don’t have a case,'” Trump stated several times while reading back supportive statements.
McCarthy, whom the former president mentioned three times on May 13, is a “great analyst,” according to Trump. Some favorites receive personal praise: Byron York is “a great person, great reporter.” Alan Dershowitz is also “a great person,” according to Trump. Occasionally, someone from CNN appears. MSNBC gets the quiet treatment.
For television, New York’s restriction on cameras in the courtroom provides lots of airtime for legal experts. It recalls the form’s peak three decades ago when the O.J. Simpson murder trial elevated Jeffrey Toobin, Nancy Grace, and Greta Van Susteren to celebrity status. Jarrett, who worked at Court TV in the 1990s, is a cross-generational figure at Fox.
Naturally, people who disagree with Trump are easy to discover. On the television news networks that have extensively covered the trial, dominant sentiments tend to reflect the viewers they seek: little sympathy for the prosecution’s case on Fox, and equally tough to find admiration for the defense on MSNBC. On CNN, the results are more mixed.
The more experienced legal minds, such as Chuck Rosenberg, who spoke on MSNBC on Wednesday, point out that predicting the conclusion would be stupid. The jurors’ opinions are the only ones that matter.
Offscreen, there is typically more complex coverage. For example, the Sunday edition of The New York Times contained a news piece featuring experts that concluded: “Several experts say the case remains the prosecution’s to lose.” In the same day’s opinion section, columnist Ross Douthat concluded that Trump has won the argument politically thus far.
“Just as even paranoid people can have enemies, even sinful demagogues can face a politically motivated prosecution — and stand to gain from the appearance of legal persecution,” wrote Douthat. “And that appearance, so far, has been the trial’s political gift to Donald Trump.”
MSNBC spent a significant portion of its day discussing Trump’s legal difficulties well before the current trial. Former prosecutor Andrew Weissmann is a prominent figure there; he also co-hosts the podcast “Prosecuting Donald Trump” with fellow analyst Mary McCord.
Even MSNBC’s biggest personalities, such as Rachel Maddow, have spent time in court. Earlier this week, she described Trump’s defense as “discursive, sprawling, and uninteresting.”
Donald Trump May Be Stuck In A Manhattan Courtroom, But He Knows His Favorite Legal Analysts
Trump has paid close heed to Fox’s pundits in this instance. According to the liberal organization Media Matters, Turley made 47 appearances on Fox’s weekday programs to discuss the trial between the beginning of the trial and May 15, while McCarthy made 35.
McCarthy previously prosecuted terrorism prosecutions for the United States Attorney’s Office in New York’s Southern District and represented Rudolph Giuliani. Turley, a law professor at George Washington University, founded the Project for Older Prisoners, which advocates for releasing senior prisoners.
McCarthy wrote about the trial in the National Review, saying, “Trump ought to be acquitted for the simplest of reasons: Prosecutors can’t prove their case.” On TV, he slammed prosecution witness and former Trump attorney Michael Cohen, claiming that Cohen’s dishonesty and bias against Trump will be issues for him to overcome with the jury.
Speaking to Fox’s Jesse Watters last week, Turley described Cohen as “the most compromised, unbelievable witness in the history of the federal legal system.” On another Fox appearance, Turley stated that the judge, Juan Merchan, should not present the case to the jury.
“I believe this case is over,” Turley remarked. “They didn’t state the basis for a crime.”
Trump began to rely more on conservative commentators after Merchan found him in violation of a gag order prohibiting him from criticizing prosecutors, court officials, and witnesses. He occasionally stops himself from reading paragraphs and cites the order.
Trump’s legal team once requested whether they might submit items to the judge for pre-approval before posting them on his Truth Social website. Merchan refused.
Donald Trump May Be Stuck In A Manhattan Courtroom, But He Knows His Favorite Legal Analysts
On Fox this week, presenter Martha MacCallum stated, “If you watch the legal experts on the other channels, this case is airtight.”
On Monday, the network aired Trump’s daily wrap at 5 p.m. ET—the time slot of “The Five,” cable news’ most popular program. MSNBC did not carry Trump. CNN aired the former president and promptly followed up with a fact check.
Trump praised certain CNN commentators, as he had done on that day and prior occasions. He cited CNN’s Laura Coates, Elie Honig, and Tim Parlatore, a former Trump lawyer who works as an analyst.
Tom Foreman, CNN’s fact-checker, stated that Trump’s citations involved “a lot of cherry-picking.”
“It is certainly true that we have some panelists who say this is not a good case,” CNN’s Jake Tapper stated. “There are people who feel the opposite way. And that’s what we aim to accomplish here: provide a variety of perspectives.
SOURCE – (AP)
