Ex-National Enquirer publisher dishes on seedy media deals with Trump, celebs

Pecker’s testimony in Trump’s New York criminal trial gave rare insight into the seedy backroom dealings that made the ex-National Enquirer publisher’s tabloid run, including agreements with celebrities and other political types.

Pecker confirmed he helped suppress stories for celebrities, including Mark Wahlberg and Arnold Schwarzenegger. The list also included Rahm Emanuel, dating back from his time running for mayor of Chicago, and strong-arming Tiger Woods into an interview with the magazine.

Much of Pecker’s testimony Thursday focused on keeping quiet ex-Playboy model Karen McDougal’s allegations of an affair with Trump, which he said he did at the behest of Trump and his fixer, Michael Cohen.

“We didn’t want the story to embarrass Mr. Trump or embarrass or hurt the campaign,” Pecker said under oath.

Pecker said he and a deputy struck a deal with McDougal where she would sell away her story in exchange for $150,000 and a slew of personal opportunities within American Media.

Cohen had promised to make Pecker’s company whole on the $150,000 payment to McDougal, but after orchestrating a reimbursement through Cohen’s shell company and another firm for Pecker, a lawyer advised the publisher to let the cash go, he said.

“I want you to rip up the agreement,” Pecker said he told Cohen, causing the Trump fixer to become “very, very angry.”

— Ella Lee

Among the things Pecker testified to was Trump asking him whether Karen McDougal was keeping quiet after he won the White House. Pecker said that he had not spoken to Trump since early 2019 because of the investigation, but he still considered him a friend.

On cross-examination, defense attorneys sought to undermine Pecker’s testimony portraying his deal with Trump as one-of-a-kind. They asked him about bad press he suppressed for other famous individuals, and the publisher listed off celebrities like Mark Wahlberg and Tiger Woods.

He also said he helped Rahm Emanuel eliminate an unflattering story in 2009, when the recent Obama White House official was mounting a campaign for Chicago mayor.

— Ella Lee

Trump spoke to reporters gathered outside the courtroom after court adjourned for the day, saying it was a “breathtaking” day of testimony.

“This is a trial that should have never happened,” Trump said. “This is a case that should have never been filed. And it was really an incredible day. Open your eyes. We can’t let this continue to happen to our country.”

The day was filled with testimony from the former publisher of the National Enquirer, David Pecker, who revealed several backroom deals he made with Trump and Michael Cohen to bury bad news about Trump during the 2016 campaign.

Trump again ripped President Biden over the protests happening on college campuses over the Israel-Hamas war, and he weighed in briefly on the “monumental” hearing earlier Thursday at the Supreme Court over presidential immunity.

“I heard the meeting was quite amazing,” Trump said.

— Brett Samuels

Judge Juan Merchan adjourned Trump’s trial for the day, after some cross-examination of Pecker.

It’s expected to resume Friday morning at 9:30 a.m.

— Ella Lee

Trump’s jury was dismissed for the day, after some cross-examination by the former president’s legal team of Pecker, who has also left the stand.

— Ella Lee

Emil Bove, Trump’s lawyer, pressed Pecker on other celebrities that he had “mutually beneficial relationships” with.

Pecker confirmed he helped suppress stories for celebrities, including Mark Wahlberg and Arnold Schwarzenegger when Bove brought them up during cross examination. The list also includes Rahm Emanuel, dating back from his time running as mayor of Chicago.

He also said AMI had a source agreement with Tiger Woods, saying AMI leveraged photos against Woods to get him to appear on the cover of a magazine and to get him to do an interview in 2007.

Defense attorneys are attempting to show that Trump’s relationship with the tabloid wasn’t overly unique, as Pecker previously had similar arrangements with other celebrities.

— Lauren Sforza

Pecker testified that the first time he heard the phrase “catch-and-kill” was from a prosecutor investigating the alleged scheme to shield Trump from bad press as he mounted his 2016 presidential bid.

The term has been used to describe a tactic Pecker’s tabloid used to purchase the negative stories and then withhold them from publication.

“Before this investigation started, you had not heard the phrase ‘catch-and-kill,’ is that correct?” Trump attorney Emil Bove asked him.

Pecker replied affirmatively.

— Ella Lee

Trump attorney Emil Bove kicked off his cross-examination of Pecker by asking him about AMI’s business model, which he described as “checkbook journalism.”

Pecker confirmed that AMI only published about half the stories they purchased and that they all included source agreements. He agreed that a story was “less valuable” to AMI if a source gave it to someone else.

Bove asked if it was correct to describe that as “standard operating procedure,” and Pecker said that it was. Pecker also replied “yes” when asked if AMI purchased stories to use as “leverage” against a celebrity.

— Lauren Sforza

Pecker’s direct examination has concluded Thursday afternoon.

The ex-National Enquirer publisher detailed the timeline of the alleged plot at the center of the hush money case, starting in August 2015 when Trump announced his presidential bid and Pecker met with him and Cohen, where he agreed to “catch and kill” bad press about Trump.

His testimony concluded by noting that even though he hadn’t talked to Trump since early 2019, when the investigation began, he still considered Trump a “friend” and his “mentor.”

“I have no ill-will at all,” Pecker said. “Even though we haven’t spoken, I still consider him a friend.”

Now, Trump’s attorneys have the chance to cross-examine Pecker and attempt to poke holes in his testimony.

— Ella Lee

Pecker said he entered into a non-prosecution agreement with the Manhattan DA’s office on Oct. 25, 2019. He agreed to speak to the district attorney’s office about his knowledge of meetings with Trump, Cohen and other members of the Trump Organization.

He also agreed to speak about the transactions between AMI, Karen McDougal and Michael Cohen and those between Cohen and Stormy Daniels, as well as any other relevant information, Pecker said.

— Lauren Sforza

Pecker said he called Michael Cohen after he received a letter from the Federal Election Commission (FEC) in 2018. He said he told Cohen he was “very concerned” about receiving the letter.

Cohen responded by asking him why he was worried, Pecker said.

He said Cohen told him: “Jeff Sessions is the attorney general and Donald Trump has him in his pocket.” But Pecker still reiterated that he was “very worried.”

— Lauren Sforza

Pecker said Trump called him after Stormy Daniels sat down for an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper in 2018. He said Trump asked him whether he saw the interview with Daniels and he replied that he did.

He said Trump told him Daniels could not mention his name or do anything like this under the terms of an agreement the then-president had with her. Pecker said Trump told him every time Daniels breached the agreement it was a $1 million penalty.

Trump said Daniels owed him $24 million based on her interview with Cooper alone, Pecker testified.

— Lauren Sforza

David Pecker, the former publisher of the National Enquirer, has retaken the stand.

He is in a days-long testimony that lays out the agreement he made with Trump and ex-fixer Michael Cohen to bury negative stories about Trump when he ran for president in 2016.

A top Trump aide said the former president will speak to reporters assembled at the courthouse at the end of Thursday’s proceedings in the hush money case.

Jason Miller, a senior adviser to Trump, said the former president would “speak to the courthouse press at the conclusion of today, which is expected to be at approximately 4:30 p.m.”

As the former president returned from break, he did not respond to a shouted question about the Supreme Court hearing.

“Mr. Trump, are you happy with the Supreme Court?” a reporter asked as he reentered the courtroom.

— Brett Samuels

Court is back in session in Trump’s New York hush money case with the former president at the defense table and the judge returning to the bench.

Trump took a deep breath before returning to his seat. He chatted with his attorneys, smiling and shaking his head.

The New York hush money trial has taken its lunch break for the day.

Proceedings will resume around 2:15 p.m.

Trump was more concerned about the impact negative stories about him might have on his campaign than on his family, Pecker testified.

After Trump became president-elect, he thanked Pecker for buying the stories of Dino Sajudin, the Trump Tower doorman, and Karen McDougal, the Playboy model, and for “helping the way I did.”

Trump extended Pecker an invitation to his inauguration, but the publisher did not end up attending.

— Ella Lee

Oral arguments on the matter of presidential immunity have wrapped up at the Supreme Court in Washington.

The justices are expected to issue a ruling on the matter before the term ends in June.

Their decision could determine the timing of three of Trump’s criminal trials in which he is arguing that he’s safe from prosecution both when he held and after he left office.

Arguments in Trump’s New York hush money case are continuing in Manhattan.

After The Wall Street Journal revealed in a Nov. 4, 2016, article that the National Enquirer helped shield Trump from Karen McDougal’s affair allegations, Trump phoned Pecker “very upset.”

“He was very upset, saying, ‘How could this happen? I thought we had this under control. Either you or one of your people have leaked the story,’” Pecker said. “I said, ‘Donald, there’s no way on earth that I would leak the story.’”

The publisher indicated he didn’t think Trump believed him and was “very agitated,” hanging up without saying goodbye. The article, and exchange, was just four days before Election Day.

— Ella Lee

Pecker testified that he would not buy adult film actress Stormy Daniels’s Trump story, fearing backlash from retailers of his magazine.

The publisher said that at the time, the National Enquirer’s largest retailer was Walmart and that being “associated with a porn star” could be “very bad” for his company.

On a call with Michael Cohen, Pecker expressed that he already paid $30,000 for Trump Tower doorman Dino Sajudin’s story and $150,000 for Playboy model Karen McDougal’s story.

“I am not a bank,” Pecker said he told Cohen, “And we are not paying out any further disbursements or loans.”

The assertion made Cohen “upset” and he indicated that “the boss would be furious” at Pecker.

“I said, ‘I am not doing it. Period,’” Pecker said.

— Ella Lee

The editor in chief of the National Enquirer during Trump’s 2016 campaign suggested to one of his own family members that if Trump won that year’s election, he could be pardoned for “electoral fraud.”

“At least if he wins, I’ll be pardoned for electoral fraud,” Dylan Howard said in one of the texts to his relative.

The revelation came while Judge Juan Merchan was considering whether to admit it as evidence. Merchan said he would exclude such text messages for the time being.

The jury for the New York trial was not present as they discussed the potential evidence.

“Ultimately what we have here is a private conversation between the co-conspirator and a family member,” the judge said.

— Lauren Sforza

Michael Dreeben argued that the broad presidential immunity Trump’s team has proposed would prohibit punishment for a president carrying out a number of serious crimes.

“The entire corpus of federal criminal law — including bribery offenses, sedition, murder — would all be off limits if it were taken to the total to the extent that some of the questions have suggested,” Dreeben said.

— Rebecca Beitsch

Justice Samuel Alito asked the special counsel’s office to respond to arguments from Trump that presidents risk politicized prosecutions after leaving office.

“Right now, if an incumbent who loses a very close, hotly-contested election knows that a real possibility after leaving office is not that the president is going to be able to go off into a peaceful retirement, but that the president may be criminally prosecuted by a bitter political opponent — will that not lead us into a cycle that destabilizes the functioning of our country is a democracy,” Alito asked.

Michael Dreeben, counselor to special counsel Jack Smith, rejected those arguments.

“I think it’s exactly the opposite, Justice Alito. There are lawful mechanisms to contest the results in an election,” he said, getting at the key conduct at question in Trump’s case.

Dreeben noted that Trump’s legal team filed dozens of legal challenges to the election results, none of which achieved success in court.

“You need evidence; you need proof. And none of those things were manifested,” Dreeben said.

— Rebecca Beitsch

Michael Dreeben, counselor to special counsel Jack Smith, said former President Trump had no official role to play in the certification of the votes on Jan. 6.

“The president has no functions with respect to the certification of the winner of the presidential election. It seems likely that the Framers designed the Constitution that way because at the time of the founding, presidents had no two-term limit. They could run again and again,” Dreeben said, adding that having another branch of government handle that role was designed to prevent a president from acting in “self interest.”

— Rebecca Beitsch

In the months before the 2016 election, Michael Cohen told Pecker that Trump wished to acquire the limited lifetime rights to Karen McDougal’s story, to avoid any possibility that it could get out.

Pecker used Investor Advisory Services to set up the deal with Cohen, who created a shell company called Resolution Consultants that Pecker would bill. The agreement was signed but was never actually executed, Pecker said.

But Pecker said that, after discussing with his company’s general counsel, he determined that the deal was a “bad idea,” and he did not want to be reimbursed for McDougal’s lifetime rights.

“I want you to rip up the agreement,” Pecker said he told Cohen, causing the Trump fixer to become “very, very angry” and begin basically “screaming” at the publisher.

— Ella Lee, Lauren Sforza

Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who was appointed to the high court by Trump, suggested two of the statutes used to charge the former president in his Jan. 6 election interference case could be used creatively by prosecutors who want to “go after” a commander in chief.

“Obstruction and [Section] 371 conspiracy to defraud the United States can be used against a lot of presidential activities historically with a creative prosecutor who wants to go after a president,” Kavanaugh said.

— Rebecca Beitsch

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson suggested the broad immunity pitched by Trump’s attorney’s could “embolden” presidents to commit crimes.

Jackson seemed to reject arguments from Trump’s attorneys that the justices must distinguish between personal and official acts to determine whether a president could be prosecuted.

She noted that presidents have access to “the best attorneys in the world” to determine whether any of their actions are lawful.

“Why would we have a situation in which we would say that the president should be making official acts without any responsibility for following the law?” she asked.

She later said she was concerned by Trump’s arguments that a president might be “chilled” in office if they must fear prosecution after they leave.

“I think that we would have a really significant opposite problem if … someone with those kinds of powers — the most powerful person in the world, with the greatest amount of authority — could go into office knowing that there would be no potential penalty for committing crimes,” Jackson said.

“I’m trying to understand what the disincentive is from turning the Oval Office into, you know, the seat of criminal activity in this country.”

— Rebecca Beitsch

Trump appears to be captivated by Pecker’s testimony about McDougal, sometimes craning his neck to get a better look at the ex-National Enquirer publisher as he speaks.

Though he’s hardly broken his gaze with the witness stand, the former president has leaned over to whisper with one of his attorneys, Todd Blanche, several times throughout the duration of Pecker’s remarks.

— Ella Lee

Pecker said AMI, the publisher of the National Enquirer, purchased the Karen McDougal story so no other organization would. When asked why they did not want anyone else to purchase it, Pecker said he did not want it to negatively impact Trump’s campaign.

“We didn’t want the story to embarrass Mr. Trump or embarrass or hurt the campaign,” he said, referring to himself and Michael Cohen.

— Lauren Sforza