vegas: for me, now, i am looking at him wishing james would have seen you get white kid that can do rap and freestyle like black kids the political ramifications is that we are closer together even in a divided time. i was sitting there ever wonder we preaching, you freestyle we can start a whole new thing >> that has to happen. that has to happen. >> you had the president at this year's conference, next one you have harry mack, yourself and the president. >> i am there. >> all we have to do is get the president. [ laughter ] >> are you okay being the opening act for a president? you would not be headliner >> that seems fair >> james brown says we have to close, we are the closer. [ laughter ] >> you said it, man, you said it. >> our good friend al sharpton and everyone knows and someone you need to know, harry mack. talented artist. >> thank you for spending time

with us again on this unusual and special time on "the beat" that does it for us. you can find me on line. the last word with lawrence o'donell is up next. at 10:11 a.m. today, donald trump's lead lawyer stood and said, your honor, the defense rests. the truth was, there was no defense. the team of high-priced trump defense lawyers are actually paid by the deluded people who send in contributions in response to donald trump's relentless begging for money from people he promised he would never ask for money. when he began his first presidential campaign major selling point was he was so rich he could pay for his own campaign and he was incorruptible and would never ask him or anyone else money and then he proceeded to never

spend not a single penny. he loaned his campaign some money at the beginning but the campaign paid him back through the donations of those poor deluded people who sent the money to the liar who promised he would never ask for money. and now their money has gone to a high-priced legal team who could not come up with any defense at all in the trial. they came up with theories that they offered in cross- examination questions of some of the witnesses who testified for the prosecution. but, an actual defense in a criminal case is not measured by questions defense lawyers ask in cross-examination. those questions are not evidence. next week when judge merchan is instructing the jury he will tell them, lawyers questions

are not evidence. witnesses answers are evidence. and, so, the trump defense presented no evidence. none in defense of donald trump, against the crimes he is charged with. none. no defense. the first witness they called was a technical witness who did not add any evidence or information to the case what so ever. a young paralegal assistant fraworks for the trump defense team that created a spreadsheet of a list of phone calls. that was it. his testimony took only a few minutes and the document that he created was accepted as an exhibit in the case. that was done. yesterday, the trump lawyers possibly at the insistence of donald trump, made what every fair-minded observer of the trial has called the grotesque mistake of calling criminal

lawyer robert costello. whose chief currency judging by the emails in this trial he is a close friend of rudy jewel goney. giuliani. he was his boss and costello was working for giuliani. his turn under oath yesterday was the witness equivalent of drunk driving. at this hour last night i read you the full transcript of what the judge did when robert costello decided to vocally disagree with the judge's ruling on objections while he was sitting there on the witness stand. the transcript entry that we in the courtroom all heard shows robert costello saying jeez. j-e-e-z was the chosen spelling by the court reporter. that is what we heard. i can hear it in the last row

of the courtroom yesterday. none of us in the courtroom had seen anything like that or heard anything like that. especially from a witness who say lawyer and should know better. much better. judge merchan was chocked. leaned forward. he asked costello to repeat himself which he said strike it, lawyer talk for never mind what i just said. then, we found out later, the judge saw costello to continue to signify his irritation for him and disrespect for the judge in ways we could not see from the audience. the judge ordered the courtroom cleared so he can talk about it directly to costello. clear the courtroom were the words no one in the courtroom ever heard before. before the judge said that. including the court officers. they never had to do that before. with everyone out the courtroom, we learned later in the transcript that was kept of what happened when we were all

out of the courtroom, judge merchan said to costello. sir, your conduct is contemttuous right now. if you try to stair me down one more time i will remove you from the stand, i will strike his entire testimony, do you understand me? yes, judge, i understand. when donald trump's criminal defense said yes, judge, i understand. he and the rest of the legal team fully understood what a catastrophic mistake it was to put an uncooth bafoon on the witness stand for for another

buffon. the day before costello had specifically insulted by telling her to speak into the microphone. ordering her to speak into the microphone when she already was speaking into the microphone and everyone in the courtroom could hear her. that was a moment to expose more of the ugly essence to costello. when the jury entered the courtroom three minutes after the witness this morning the community of the courtroom that the jury has come to know so well had changed dramatically. the presence of armed court officers who have been the most kurtious to all of us taking our places in that courtroom had more than doubled. there used to be one standing, there were three. at the back of the room where there used to be two there were

four. there were more higher ranking officers in the room we ever seen at one time. one of the officials who has been especially helpful to members of the news media but who is rarely in the courtroom was now standing in the back of the courtroom observing everything in that room. this dramatic demonstration of extra control of the courtroom by the court officers was completely lost on the defense lawyers and the defendant and the prosecutors because they had their backs to that part of the room. their backs to the court officers. they were just facing front where they could just see the judge and the witness and some of the jury. but the jury could see everything in that room. the jury could look out there and see at least double the amount of those friendly court officers who they have come to know. more than double of those court

officers than they have ever seen before. the jury could not know why. they had been sent out of the room by the judge yesterday, the first time the judge decided to, as he put it, speak directly to robert costello about it. it was only when costello continued his disrespectful courtroom conduct that the judge cleared the courtroom of all of the rest of us, of the reporters, everyone else in the room and he had, the judge had a more private one-on-one with costello while, of course, lawyers were all still present. the jury could not know that this huge new show of force and control in that courtroom this morning was all because of the contemptuous conduct of the only witness that donald trump's team brought into that

courtroom to offer actual testimony in this case. and his testimony had absolutely nothing to do with the crimes donald trump is charged with. robert costello was one of the lawyers who the prosecution star witness, michael cohen, consulted after the fbi executed search warrants at his home, hotel room where he was temporarily living and his office. when michael cohen became a cooperating witness in that fbi investigation it eventually led to michael cohen pleading guilty to crimes including crimes involving the payoff to stormy daniels that michael cohen said was at the direction of donald trump. under cross examination today it became clear that robert costello was eager to be michael cohen's lawyer, so eager he wrote a letter boasting how he was going to be the defense lawyer for the personal attorney to president

donald j. trump. he told his son, quote, i will be on the team. the trouble is, his emails revealed that the team was bigger than michael cohen. cross-examination it became clear that michael cohen was not robert costello's primary interest. it is customary for lawyers to ask witnesses to read their own emails aloud as evidence. assistant district attorney tried that yesterday. on cross exam nation but costello could not do it. he could not read his own emails without constantly inserting comment on his own emails so, today, she read the emails herself. >> can you please blow up the last 11 paragraph, please in yellow. and then she read, robert costello's email to his law partner. quote, our issue is to get cohen on the right page without giving him the appearance that

we are following instructions from giuliani or the president. in my opinion, this is the clear correct strategy. that is not a strategy to help michael cohen. yesterday, when the district attorney asked robert costello to interpret one of his emails his answer was that the email quote speaks for itself. and so, today, after reading that email that i just read to you, the attorney said, question, and as youd yesterday, the email speaks for itself, correct? >> answer, sometimes. >> and it got worse for robert costello. district attorney quoted another email to his partner about michael cohen. quote, this is a quote from the email, what should i say to this a hole? he is playing with the most powerful man on the planet. now, that email certainly

speaks for itself, does it not mr. costello? answer, yes, it does. >> it was clear that his interest in trying to become michael cohen's lawyer was to be on the team not of michael cohen, but the team of the man who costello thinks of as the most powerful man on the planet the man who was sitting across the room from robert costello in the defendant's chair. robert costello left the witness stand in disgrace at 10:11 a.m. this morning after 42 minutes on the witness stand this morning establishing absolutely nothing for donald trump's defense against the criminal larges of falsifying new york business records in order to illegally help his 2016 presidential campaign. the judge then explained the scheduling dilemma. he told the jury he likes to keep it by the defense and the

prosecution together so that they are not separated by a day or a weekend and that he would need additional time to prepare his legal instructions for the jury. so, he pointed out that because they were already scheduled not to meet on wednesday this week that the earliest they could begin the lawyers summations without having to break them up would actually be thursday this week and that might not allow everything to be completed before the memorial day weekend or send the jury off into deliberations at the end of the day on friday. so, the best way for the judge to handle it he decided was to send the jury off today. into what will become its memorial day long weekend. that happened right after the last witness today robert costello left the witness stand. the judge spent the afternoon considering arguments from both sides about what should be included in the judge's

instructions to the jury that will probably be delivered next wednesday. the day after the lawyers make their final arguments to the jury on tuesday which, of course, will be the day after the holiday memorial day. so, here we are. the case is in. there will be no more evidence. the prosecution presented evidence to support every element of the crimes donald trump faces in that courtroom. the jury of 12 residents will dell iberate next dell iberate. there is nothing that is showing how they will be leaning or what evidence they think is important. they are also attentive to

everything in that room. they will be attentive to the judge. they will be attentive when they hear the last words they hear before they deliberate to their this case. he hopes to keep his instructions to an hour or less. this afternoon in a hearing, lawyers on both sides argued about what the instructions should be. did not go well for the trump criminal defense lawyers. and although they brought up something that the judge had ruled out of the case a very long time ago, long before the trial began, this was frustrating for the judge, judge merchan said, look, mr. bove, this is an issue that has been going on for a very, very long time. i wrote a decision on this, my decision is dated february 7th, in that decision i directed the defense to provide notice of disclosure of your intent to

rely on the defense of advice of counsel by march 11th, 2024, and produce all discoverable statements and communications within his possession and control by the same day. what that means is the judge told the trump defense team if you are going to use the "my lawyer made me do it defense" you have to tell us before the trial because there are many requirements for making that defense. that defense would essentially be, i just followed the advice of my lawyer michael cohen. there are technical requirements for making that legal defense that the lawyers chose not to do. and, so, in his mounting frustration this afternoon the judge said. later on, the defense on advise of counsel moved into something called the presence of counsel. which i never heard of and i was not familiar with but i

addressed it. at that time i indicated you are precluded from arguing this legal claim of presence of counsel. there was no such thing. it is just a way to get around having to turn over documents related to the advise of counsel. now, this term presence of counsel has morphed into something else. my decision has not changed. mr. bove tries to get up and the judge said please do not get up. i let you speak, right? i let you speak. all right. judge, it was corning when the term was changed to presence of counsel. i couldn't believe when i saw it again in your submission now calling it involvement of counsel. i understand the argument you are making i am telling you that my ruling is that jury will not hear from instruction from the bench nor are you

permitted to make that argument. period. the trump lawyers can not stop testing judge merchan's patients and humiliating themselves professionally in their representation of the bufoon they said be side all day at that defense table. we will be right back defense t. we will be right back an alternative to pills, voltaren is

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. we are joined once again by the courthouse. msnbc correspondent in the courtroom, almost every day. and general counsel, chief of criminal district of new york. msnbc legal analyst and author of "the trump indictments" i want to begin with the witnesses that were not called. the witnesses the defense left out beginning with the defendant. let's take a look at what the defendant said about this today. >> that is everything he said about deciding not to testify in this case. andrew, he has not figured out his public lie yet why he did

not testify. of course this program never pretended there was a decision to make. as soon as there was an indictment with his name on it we knew lewas not going to testify in his own defense. you have a jury sitting now and important scenes that trump is in, that the defense wants to contest. a meeting with allen weisellberg and michael cohen and trump talking about the payoff scheme and other things. that defendant can take the witness stand and really help the jury and he didn't do it. not only did he not do that he could not keep his eyes open during the trial which all of the jurors did all of the time. >> a couple points, one, i think he did mention something about how he was, he wants to testify. >> that is the lie he tells every time. his lawyers tell him not to. it is absurd and it is his decision and legally it is his decision. he will say it but he can not

credibly say it. welcome to a list of many things he can not credibly say. the jury will be instructed strongly by the judge that they can not in any way consider the defendant not testifying, a constitutional right that we all have to just sit back and let the state prove its case. they have to carry a high burden. the defense does not have to do anything. will some jurors think about it? they may think about it but they will adhere to that instruction. that being said, the danger with what the defense did here which is to actually present a case, it raises the issue of not so much the defendant not testifying, although look, somebody is going to be thinking about that, but when you do that and the person you present blows up in your face and just a terrible, terrible witness. he was the best thing ever that

happened to the prosecution. i kept thinking the two best exhibits were 35 and 36. the handwritten notes. now i think one of the best is actually the one that you started the show with where they have to give the appearance that we are representing you but we are working for that man. the defendant. that puts him in the very heart and top of the conspiracy. so, i think that in many ways sort of subtly works to shift the burden. you actually have taken on as a defense a burd tone go forward. it has -- a burden to go forward and it has been terrible. the jury has been able to consider that. presented the defense and that is it. not considering the defendant not testifying but, you know, i am a lawyer. i separate the two, i am not sure how much a jury will do that mental gymnastics. >> i never known a criminal defense lawyer to be confident in the judge's instruction to please ignore the fact that the defendant did not testify in this case and please don't

think you should hold it against him in any way. >> and i don't know a lot of criminal defense lawyers who are equally confident about the same witness charge that might be given here as well. in addition to trump being absent the other person who is glaringly absent is alan. weisselberg i have to imagine that is something that both sides agree upon. if i were a juror i would say that. i don't know if i can resolve that to my satisfaction. >> and, the next one, i think there are three big ones, donald trump, alan weisselberg and keith slort. we saw that photograph that was fought into evidence yesterday, strategically and brilliantly

done, there is a photograph of trump's head and that red necktie is on him. that is a night when michael cohen says he called keith's cell phone at 8:02 p.m. to have him pass his phone to donald trump, because they knew they were together like that. bodyguard. it is the presidential campaign of 2016. so that he could have that conversation which lasted 1 1/2 minutes according to the cell phone records getting the okay from trump on a stormy daniels payment. not the only okay he got. but one of the okay's he got. keith could of come in the courtroom and said i never got that phone call and handed that phone to trump. so many things he could of testified to. saying stormy daniels is lying. i did not bring her to donald trump's hotel room. i did not stand outside of his hotel room while stormy was in

there with donald. that is a complete lie. but, he is very much under the control of this defense was not called into that courtroom. >> absolutely. and, todd blanche placed such a bet on it. everyone agrees it was the highlight of his cross- examination. >> he especially agrees. [ laughter ] >> he keeps bringing it up. >> absolutely. and, as you said, not only was keith schiller at the center of the stormy daniels he was said to be literally standing outside of the hotel room during her dramatic reason why the power dynamic was off. so, this was another situation where both sides could of called him but because of the litigation decisions of todd blanche, there was a strong reason to, for the defense, to bring him as a witness and they

didn't deliver him. >> so, i was thinking and i have seen it, we have all seen this version of a trial where you are not going to present a defense. so, you don't present the defense. you don't call anyone and you have the boldness to be suggesting to the jury in effect, they did not prove anything. i have a burden only when they prove something and they proved nothing so i am presenting nothing. so what the trump team did instead was presented no defense but they called two witnesses in the presenting of no defense which is not as bold. it is messy. >> look, i think it is even worse than that. just remember what the witness, i mean, the paralegal was only there to say what todd blanche was representing to you and michael cohen is misleading because he tried to get him to say there were 75 calls and the paralegal was like i am not

down with that. it is not 75, there is less, a lot of double counting. small point but not good. the second one, specifically bad. it was an exhibit for why michael cohen is credible, exhibit for why trump is a leader of an obstruction claim. it is going to be sort of front and center of it. just terrible, terrible way. sort of solved the, one of the issues, ending your prosecution case with michael cohen, bold move, very unusual. it did not actually, it did not happen because the prosecution case ended with costello. >> so, it is just a terrible strategy. i can not believe, lawrence, that susan was thinking this is a really good idea. i can not, i don't think todd blanche with all of the things

that we picked at or anything thought it was a good idea. this is donald trump, i know better than anyone. it is why i am going to do better in the second carroll case, i don't need you, i know better $85 million later. and, so, he has gotten what he deserved by presenting somebody who is such a reflection of himself. we will see what the jury does. to me spectacular backfire. >> we will squeeze in a quick break and when we come back we will have more later in the day on this crucial issue of what will the instructions to the jury be. we'll be right back. ons to the jury be. we'll be right back. okay everyone, our mission is to provide complete, balanced nutrition for strength and energy. yay - woo hoo! ensure, with 27 vitamins and minerals, nutrients for immune health. and ensure complete with 30 grams of protein. (♪♪) i have moderate to severe plaque psoriasis. thanks to skyrizi i'm playing with clearer skin. 3 out of 4 people achieved 90% clearer skin

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. andrew, during the break we were discussing why not, the prosecution, there are three big witnesses that were identified that did not testify and the jury would love to hear from. donald trump, alan weisselberg and keith schiller, they could of called keith schiller and alan weisselberg. what is the decision on the prosecution side when we have the picture, we have the phone records y don't we call schiller to say, did you walk stormy daniels to the hotel room? did you take a phone call to michael cohen and hand the phone to donald trump? i can imagine on the phone call

thing, schiller could have a easy i don't remember, what is the calculation? are they going to hope that the defense calls so they can do cross instead of direct? >> if you have a witness like schiller and it is somebody that you think. >> former nypd. long time personal bodyguard to trump, as loyal as they get. >> oh, yes. and let's just say there is substantial issues beyond this case they would be aware of. so, here is the issue, one, they may have been spoken to his lawyer and said we want to speak to him and not necessarily put him in the grand jury. you don't have to come in for an interview but respond to a grand jury and he may of taken the fifth >> in the grand jury. >> or said i will so they don't bothtory bring it >> exactly. that is just a normal courtesy.

just to be clear, if amendment he would have a valid 5th amendment, we all it, the way a defendant has the right not to testify. the second issue if he has done that, because i suspect he did not just say hey, i am happy to come and talk to you. guesswork i don't think he would do that. he could decide immunize him that is a complicated decision. one . >> you give him immunity so he can safely answer the question without getting in legal trouble. >> unless he lies >> there is that. >> exactly. >> so, you are immunized but not for future crimes, one of them would be lying to them. future crimes. >> complicated issue. do you decide, what do i have to hold him to tell me the truth. do i have enough evidence so he does not just, i am buying the

taking the pope. i am not a funny person so i have to say when i am telling you a joke. [ laughter ] >> you don't want to do that if you don't really know what the person is going to say or you don't have enough to hold them to the truth. now, sometimes you would say to the witness' lawyer, lawrence, i am willing to give your client immunity, can you give me a proper of what he would say? then, if the person is relatively friendly and they want to tell the truth and there is not sort of this loyalty bond with a target the person might be like this is great i would love to do it and let me tell you what he would say and immunize a person. if someone has substantial liability the idea of giving them a complete pass for what they have done in the past it is something that sticks in the

crawl of a prosecutor and even this former prosecutor where you think long and hard about what you are, who you are immunizing and what you are doing. >> you have seen alan weisselberg in court. >> i have. >> you know what the prosecutor would be weighing in, in this case, calling weisselberg to testify against trump >> it is a no-brainer. no, literally. no-brainer. remember why is he at rikers? because at the last trial he was caught lying there is the civil fraud trial which he is a defendant and held liable. the da's office prosecuted him for that. pled to it. now serving a sentence for purging himself in literally the second to last manhattan trial that trump was involved in. knowing that history and

knowing that he very narrowly escaped a similar accusation in the trump organization trial where he was also already pled out and testified. i don't think you take your chances on that. you are not going to get that proper, you don't want to give him immunity you just watched him perjure himself in a civil trial. and therefore the only thing that you could do is subpoena him and then see what he says and you don't want to take that chance because you have seen him lie before. there were representatives at the da's office in the civil fraud trial at in a moments that were noticeable to people, watched michael cohen for example. no doubt they were present when weisselberg was there. >> the lawyers argued for the judge's benefit, i mean benefit today. he wanted the arguments to hear the best points of view of what should be in the judge's instructions. the judge suggested we will see

a written version of his questions this week. >> yes. some of the arguments really suggest where the judge is leaning. i will get to that in a moment. i want to add one thing to what lisa said about weisselberg testimony during the civil fraud trial. we were in the same courtroom. i remember running with the headline that his memory failed him more than 90 times before lunch all of the, i do not recalls, we counted the variations, but, to your question, lawrence, there was a key victory by the prosecution during this charge conference on the question of unlawful means and if the jury needs to have the same theory of what the unlawful means of the conspiracy was and what happened during the exchange is telling. i will point to the transcript here.

trump's lawyer bove said we have a motion coming from yesterday. assuming it is going to jury in the way the statutes are being used in this case which there is not much, if any, precedent, we submit the jury should make specific findings as specific as your honor would permit so it is clear what happened at this trial. the judge, do you agree it is not ordinarily required? bove, certainly. and i think that was a key instruction point. >> that should be the end of it. >> it was but the judge let him continue. we think it is important under the circumstances bove says and it is in your honor's discretion to make clear the record here. the importance of law is not deviating from the law it is to apply the law as consistently as possible as the court would do in every other case. that is, there is no reason to rewrite the law for this case.

judge merchan, i agree. i think i understand what you're saying what you mean when you're saying it's an important case. what you are asking me to do is change the law and i am not going to do that. it was this moment that bove shifted his argument. he had some successes today. but where he failed is when he shifted from the law to rhetoric about how important the case is and how this is all unprecedented. that did not fly with the judge. >> we are going to squeeze in a break. >> by important case he meant important defendant >> right. >> taking a quick break. we will be right back quick bre. we will be right back fred... fuel up to 7 brain health indicators, including your memory. join the neuriva brain health challenge.

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we're back with the courtroom crowd. andrew, what's at stake for each side and the judge's instructions to the jury? do people overrate how important judge's instructions are and how it is very important and others not so much? >> yeah, that's right. i think with two lawyers on the jury, i think it's going to be quite important because you can't just sort of say oh, is he guilty or not? it is highly scrutinized. and non-lawyers might do the exact same thing where there is a lot at stake. and one thing i want to make sure they keep their eye on is there are things like you have talked about that i'm not

allowing you to argue this and i've made my ruling and you cannot do it. and the judge and the prosecutors are going to be watching like a hawk. where they made a ruling and said you cannot do it and it is over and over and over. >> they've got nothing to lose? >> well, there is a bit. >> but they would have to go pretty far? >> yes, they would stop and then they try to slip it. >> i have had experienced judges and throw the jury out, and bring the defense lawyers over, and say if you do that one more time, i'm going to cut your knees off in front of the jury and there will be costs to you, but i think that it will

happen once. that they will have some theory and they need to have something to say to the judge when he will come down with them and that is what will happen. and oh, the judge ruled against them and they will did deciding which battle they will pick and which will define that. >> and is there a particular instruction of the jury that you're looking for that could be among the most important or the most important? >> yes, that it will concern what it means to cause the business records. >> it seems pretty clear? >> and everything does. >> it depends on what that definition of the cause is. and right now, it is not to use language that the prosecution very much wants, that essentially says they will cause false entries when they set the scheme into motion and

the false entries are for the consequence of that action. and it is far more concrete that i actually have to direct you to do it and that there is communication. so you can see why tay believe it is something else and they fought very hard today to try to preserve that language and there are others where they would say it is not that much because of liability. and if you act with someone, you are still responsible for their action if you're part of the same scheme. and would they prefer this language in there? absolutely. >> and adam, what will you be looking for? >> exactly what lisa said and that is the first thing i'm looking for. after that, liability, that was something that they started to volunteer and it was important enough to the prosecution to

ask the juries if they could follow the concept of that liability. and to your point, lawrence, i do think that it was in federal court and one of the u.s. embassy bombing, and that it is the point that they will pay attention to the instructions in that case were avoidance and that they didn't know. and the jury sent a note saying to the judge and the judge said i've been thinking about this before they began. and that is the type of perceptiveness that they will have. >> andrew weissmann, thank you very much for covering what happened in that courtroom. we'll be right back.

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ruhle starts now. tonight, the defense rests. donald trump's lawyers wrap up their case as the former trial declines to take a witness stand. and my interview with benjamin netanyahu as a war crimes prosecutor now seeks a warrant for his arrest. and what is going on with the economy? inflation may be slowing, but prices remain high in this country. i'll ask ahead of the federal reserve bank of chicago as the 11th hour gets underway on this tuesday night. good evening once again, i'm stephanie ruhle. and we are now 168 days away from the election. about one week from now, a jury of 12 new yorkers will start deliberating the fate of the first former president charged with a crime. donald trump's defense team rested their new york criminal case today after calling just two witnesses.