NEW YORK — One woman giggled and put her hand to her mouth while her seatmate raised her eyebrows. Other potential jurors craned their necks to get a glimpse of the world-famous defendant at the front of the room.
A New York judge on Monday started whittling hundreds of prospective jurors into a 12-person panel who will decide whether former President Donald Trump runs for the White House as a convicted felon or as a Teflon politician who vanquished the first — and perhaps only — Democratic prosecutor to get a crack at him before November.
State Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan welcomed an initial panel of 96 prospective jurors with words that may have shocked them.
“The name of this case is the People of the State of New York vs. Donald J. Trump,” Judge Merchan said.
Mr. Trump pursed his lips, leafed through papers and listened intently on Day 1 of his trial on charges he criminally concealed hush money payments to a porn star during the 2016 presidential race.
After a morning of last-minute motions, the first batch of potential jurors huddled in the courtroom to begin a multi-day process of landing an impartial panel, plus four alternate jurors, who could upend the contours of Mr. Trump‘s rematch with President Biden.
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The ex-president stood and turned around when he was introduced as the defendant, offering a tight-lipped smirk.
A young woman from Texas, who now lives in Harlem, was excused after she answered “yes” to a question about whether she had a strong opinion about Mr. Trump. She said Al-Jazeera was on her media reading list and enjoyed “going to the club” in her spare time.
Another excused juror, a woman in her 30s with short hair, was overheard in the hallway saying, “I just couldn’t do it.”
Mr. Trump is the first former U.S. president to be tried in criminal court. The trial is expected to last at least six to eight weeks, with no proceedings on Wednesdays, and could hinder the presumptive GOP nominee’s ability to campaign for president.
It will also impact how voters see Mr. Trump, for better or worse, heading into November. Polls suggest he is in a tight race.
“This is political persecution. This is a persecution like never before,” Mr. Trump said in the courthouse hallway. “It’s an assault on America and that’s why I am very proud to be here, this is an assault on our country and it’s a country that’s failing.”
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There was a heavy media and police presence outside the courthouse in lower Manhattan, near Little Italy and Chinatown. Demonstrators gathered early Monday, including anti-Trump protesters with a large “Loser” sign that mimicked the Trump campaign emblem. Another sign said, “Convict Trump already.”
By lunchtime, a mammoth pro-Trump flag waved in the park outside the courthouse.
Prosecutors allege that Mr. Trump paid $130,000 in hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels to cover up an alleged sexual encounter from nearly two decades ago, along with payments to a second woman who alleged an affair and a doorman who pushed an unproven story that Mr. Trump had a child out of wedlock.
They say Mr. Trump concealed the payments through reimbursements to his attorney-turned-accuser, Michael D. Cohen, recorded in official business ledgers on multiple dates in 2017.
Mr. Trump denies the claim of an affair with Ms. Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, and says the charges are part of a broad Democratic plot to thwart his presidential bid.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who sat in the courtroom Monday, charged Mr. Trump with falsifying business records in the first degree, meaning he must tie the records to the commission of some other crime. Prosecutors have suggested the payments were a 2016 campaign expenditure that should have been disclosed, or related to tax offenses.
“There is no case,” Mr. Trump said in the courthouse hallway. “People that don’t necessarily follow or like Donald Trump said this is an outrage that this case was brought.”
Donning his signature navy suit and red tie, Mr. Trump sat at the defense table between his attorneys and joked and conferred with his lead lawyer, Todd Blanche, throughout Monday’s proceedings. Other times he sat, stern and expressionless, as attorneys sparred with each other and Judge Merchan over permissible evidence.
Mr. Trump rarely spoke, uttering, “Yes,” when the judge asked Mr. Trump if understood that he could assist in his defense but would forfeit that right if he refused to show up or disrupted proceedings. Two key aides, Jason Miller and Margo Martin, accompanied the ex-president and sat in the courtroom.
The trial will not occur on Wednesdays and there may be short breaks for Passover. Otherwise, Mr. Trump is stuck in Manhattan at a critical juncture in his presidential campaign.
Mr. Trump is coasting toward the nomination after vanquishing all his GOP foes. He says a quartet of criminal cases, including indictments that fault his actions after the 2020 election, are designed to damage him politically.
During his presidency, Mr. Trump decamped from the Manhattan borough where he built his name and brand to the sunny climes of South Florida, where he holds court at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach with wealthy club members and lawmakers.
On Monday, he was back in the Big Apple, sitting at a defendant’s table while the court finished pre-trial housekeeping and began jury selection
The names of the jurors are not being made public, though will be disclosed to the parties in the case.
The lists are “not to be photographed or duplicated, in any way copied in any way shape or form,” Judge Merchan said.
Judge Merchan outlined the contours of the case and the names of potential star witnesses as part of a half-hour period of instructions.
Besides Ms. Daniels and Mr. Cohen, potential witnesses could include Mr. Trump‘s adult children, former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and former Trump advisers Steve Bannon, Kellyanne Conway and Jared Kushner, the ex-president’s son-in-law.
The men and women in the jury box stared at Mr. Trump at times during the judge’s instructions. Mr. Trump occasionally cast his gaze toward the box, though many of the potential jurors were seated behind him in the wooden rows.
Judge Merchan dismissed persons in stages, starting with those who felt they could not be impartial before moving on to other reasons. The process swiftly cut the initial pool of 96 to fewer than three dozen potential jurors, at which point jurors were questioned individually.
Earlier Monday, the judge rejected Mr. Trump‘s last-minute attempt to oust him from the bench over perceived bias.
“To say that these claims are attenuated is an understatement,” Judge Merchan said, though added the appeals court will review the decision.
Prosecutors said they plan to submit evidence related to the National Enquirer’s alleged plot with Mr. Trump to publish flattering and suppress unflattering ones before the 2016 election. And it will lean into the Access Hollywood tape in which Mr. Trump bragged about lewd behavior among women.
Prosecutors said the evidence related to Mr. Trump‘s motive to pay hush money and conduct damage control around salacious claims about him.
Judge Merchan allowed some of the evidence, including an email chain among Trump players about efforts to react to the Access Hollywood tape, though rejected attempts to submit the recording itself.
Prosecutors also said they would like to fine Mr. Trump $3,000 for perceived violations of the gag order that prevents him from commenting on witnesses. The judge said he would take up the matter on April 23.
At times, Judge Merchan got impatient with the back and forth during arguments over the nitty-gritty of motions.
“We have about 500 jurors waiting,” he said.
• Tom Howell Jr. can be reached at thowell@washingtontimes.com.