Hope Hicks, Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign press secretary, testified during the former president’s New York criminal hush-money trial, describing when a tape emerged of Trump bragging about groping women His staff panicked, she said: “This is his presidential campaign in crisis.
Hicks also put Trump at the center of his campaign’s media strategy, telling jurors “we are all following his lead.” The testimony marks a turning point for prosecutors, as she is the first Trump staffer familiar with the Trump campaign to testify about alleged misconduct.
Prosecutors accuse him of trying to use bribes to cover up stories that could damage his candidacy. While her name came up several times during the trial, Hicks placed Trump in the middle of this alleged media strategy, a shocking development.
“Who is overall responsible for brand strategy?” prosecutor Matthew Colangelo asked.
“I would say Mr. Trump bears responsibility for this,” Hicks said. “He deserves credit for the different messages he put out in the agenda he put forward on the campaign trail.”
Hicks — who was reportedly close to Trump until her anger over the Jan. 6 insurrection surfaced — was visibly uncomfortable. When Hicks took the witness stand Friday at the former president’s New York criminal hush-money trial, he followed her with his eyes as she passed him. Hicks, a slender man who took small steps into the well, his voice trembling as he introduced himself to jurors.
“My name is Hope Charlotte Hicks and my last name is spelled HICKS,” she said. Not sure if the microphones picked up her voice, she said: “I was really nervous.”
Hicks has been interviewed many times by Robert Mueller because of her longstanding close relationship with Trump, and she also served as Trump’s communications director in the White House.
Hicks was asked about the leaked “Access Hollywood” tape in early October 2016, in which Trump boasted that when a person is famous, he can “catch [women] By the vagina – Jurors saw a transcript of the tape.
When asked what her first reaction was when she received an email from a Washington Post reporter about the tape, Hicks said she was “very concerned” about the email’s content and didn’t have time to respond. .
She said she forwarded the email with the subject line “Urgent Washington Post Inquiry” to others in the campaign. “This is a disruptive development,” Hicks said. “[The] We all agree that this is devastating – this is a crisis.
Former tabloid boss David Pecker, who prosecutors say colluded with Trump and Michael Cohen to cover up stories that could have hurt his campaign, said Hicks attended the trio’s summer 2015 Trump Tower meeting.
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Peck also testified that Hicks participated in a conference call in which Trump angrily complained about a television interview given by one of his alleged lovers.
Jurors had previously seen text messages between Hicks and Cohen in which she repeatedly told him to “pray!” Claims that adult star Stormy Daniels had a romantic affair with Trump will not surface.
Manhattan prosecutors allege that Cohen paid Daniels $130,000 to keep quiet about the allegation of a sexual relationship with Trump. They say he coordinated bribes from Enquirer parent company AMI to Playboy model Karen McDougal, who also claimed to have had a sexual relationship with Trump.
They claim Cohen did this to prevent damaging messages from hampering Trump’s presidential campaign.
Trump, who faces charges of allegedly falsifying business records, described the repayments to Cohen as legal fees in company documents. Prosecutors allege that Trump, Cohen and Pecker planned their arrest during a meeting at Trump Tower in the summer of 2015.
