what donald trump is doing was trying to break the law through evan corcoran and evan corcoran role here is he was sort of the unwitting vehicle through which donald trump misled the fbi. >> it's very specific to the obstruction piece of this investigation and the obstruction piece of the investigation the documents investigation tends to get overlooked, right? it gets the part that gets focused on is the national security secrets that trump had at mar-a-lago. but there's also this second aspect of allegedly misleading investigators and that is where m. corcoran is a big piece. >> and i should know, and this is important. the trump legal team, or the trump team is denying those. they're denying are reporting. we reached out to them before we came on they said that evan corcoran is still there on the legal team. they're arguing. but i >> get i respond to their denial. sharkey can't possibly stay on the legal team. i mean, it's almost a mathematical impossibility once you are a witness against the person which he now is, you can't stay on the rising. it took this long >> yeah. yeah. >> the

what evan corcoran apparently he did not know. is that trump had 30 some boxes moved out of that storage room before he had even corporate search the boxes. so corcoran is going to be a crucial player here for the justice department's prosecution team. and he could be a really difficult witness for the defense of cross-examine because he doesn't want to testify for the prosecution. he's a defense witness. no defense witnesses. defense lawyer is ever happy about becoming a witness against his own client. >> ellie, can you just remind us of how corporate and became one of the key prosecution witnesses because it was remarkable ruling and i'm usual ruling to get us to this its place, correct >> yeah. order narrowly an attorney would not be testifying about communications that he had with his client that is protected by the attorney-client privilege. but jack smith's team went through this extensive legal process to do what we call piercing. the attorney-client privilege, meaning to break through it and in order to do that, jack smith

first, let's talk about evan corcoran, cnn's kaitlan, poland's with us this morning. corcoran out of the fold he is indeed evan corcoran in this indictment against donald trump in the florida classified documents case. he's all over it. he's called trump attorney one multiple times because he was a witness to multiple things in this indictment. crucially, all of those allegations that donald trump was trying to obstruct the job justice department and the federal government from getting back classified records in his possession. >> trump attorney one's a pretty apt title for him >> to because he was not just part of the original team. he was the lead attorney for donald trump at a really important moment in the january 6 investigation, where the justice department was pursuing testimony from people as important as mike pence, that was evan corcoran, the man fighting those battles on the front line as the investigation board down before donald trump was charged after that, he became the person that the justice department compelled to testify. they forced him to come into

>> well, it's a long time coming for evan corcoran. he's been distancing himself for the from the legal team of donald trump because he he's had to a judge compelled him to provide information in the investigation iran classified documents, where he became a key witness in that case. he had been taking notes of his conversations with donald trump and became trump attorney one in the indictment, a key person of the witnesses who is talking or who was talking to trump around these alleged obstruction charges. so in this situation with evan corcoran, the thing that he had heard from trump and wrote down in his notes that makes him such a key witness. he witnessed trump saying to him, okay, why don't you take documents that having corcoran had found that were classified to your hotel room. and if there's anything really bad in there, you know, pluck it out and evan corcoran says trump made a plucking motion. all those documents were supposed to be given back to the justice department. not all of the documents at mar-a-lago were but evan co

but this is evan corcoran. and the reason this is such a big deal that he is quietly left trump's legal team without a lot of notice. is that he is not just a former trump attorney. he became a critical witness in the classified documents investigation. and that's because this was the attorney that was brought on to help trump tried to fend off charges in that case, but in turn, he was the one who was sent to the mar-a-lago storage room that was looking for classified documents after they got a subpoena from the justice department asking for those classified documents back. he went through all the boxes personally, he was the one who had found a few dozen of them. but what he didn't know at the time and what we didn't realize until the indictment came out was there was this orchestrated effort by trump, according to prosecutors, to move documents out of the room even before evan corcoran, this attorney, went through the room to look for them and we now, of course, later learned about that from other witnesses a

because evan corcoran is going to be a very credible witness for small. he is someone who has first-hand knowledge. he's in the room speaking to the former president and he can basically shore up that obstruction charge because president trump basically used him as a further prince of that crime. he was having him tell the doj one thing when the former president knew something else. and secondly, he's going to be someone who's adverse to the department of justice. he's going to be a hostile witness, and that only adds at his credibility because anything he says there is going to be something that he has no incentive to lie about it. but hertz's own former client and lastly, it's all going to be corroborated. the notes that he has way recorded his his recollection of what the president of the former president was telling him. that's all going to be ensuring that he stays in the box of what's truthful. because if he does say something that's not accurate, jack smith has those notes he made in real time to impeach him with so it seems like donald trump goes

a key attorney in the classified documents case, evan corcoran it's, no longer representing the former president according sources, speaking with our kaitlan collins, if the case goes to trial, prosecutors are expected to use corcoran as a key witness. corcoran became a central figure in the indictment because of his meticulous notes and memos about his interactions with trump concerning the classified documents, word of cochran to departure comes just ahead of a hearing today, for two of donald trump's co-defendants in the classified documents case, cnn's katelyn polantz is with us now just give us a sense of why coke cochran's departure from team trump is a really significa issue >> well, sarah, this is the reality fodonald trump as a criminal defendant. the lawyers he has around him taking him to trial in any of the cases. they are not the people who were shielding him or trying to shield him, protect tim worked for him as lawyers during the investigations, the federal investigations around classified documents, and january 6 evan corcoran was the lead attorney for him during those

and that's the part that evan corcoran would be best positioned to be able to testify if it comes to that because the fact that he would hadn't information that the president was trying to obstruct the former present with trying to obstruct the investigation and his knowledge, it takes a really high standard brake the attorney-client privilege, but even attorneys, if they are witness to evidence of a crime have to comply with the justice system. >> as you don't. this coming monday. so only when a few days away will be the start of the first criminal trial ever in american history against a former president of the united states trial in new york. hush, hush money. trial as it's being called. give us some context right now, how significant potentially this is. this is a historic moment well, it's a >> historic case in that it is of a former president of the many cases that have been brought against the former president. in my judgment, this new york case is on the weaker end of the cases against him. if we compare them to the charges in the january 6 federal case or in the obstruction

records, he didn't move to quash the subpoena saying these are personal, he had his attorney, evan corcoraner 37 more documents to the department of justice. when there was a search warrant, right, that was executed finding all of the boxes, like you indicated, including the bathroom area, he didn't say these are personal. he, this is a made-up argument after the fact, after the former head of judicial watch tweeted about you should argue these are personal. this is one of the things chuck smith sets out. the other point i think it's important based on what you just said is the definition of personal and presidential records is so clear that classified documents could never be personal because personal has to be purely personal and not related to the president's duties to carry out his constitutional, statutory, official or ceremonial duties. classified documents, by their very nature, that the disclosure of which could cause danger, serious danger or exceptionally grave danger to the national security, how could that ever be anything other than documents that are provided to the president

pointed toward a true trial date, if these motions get thrown out, if statements from people, like evan corcoran don't get suppressed, if it looks like we are legitimately going to trial, carlos is the weak link. he has the least amount of stick and this is and has no reason to throw himself under the bus. he is the one i expect to cut a deal. does that sink trump? no, but it will certainly hurt, and it will look bad from an optics standpoint, particularly in the media, particularly with the public, that one of his opponents are cutting a deal. that is what we are all waiting to see once judge cannon finally issues rulings. ul >> i don't mean to rain on our parade, but she also has about five substantive motions she hasn't ruled on that done donald trump's file. perry stein and bradley moss, thank you so much for bringing us the latest from ft. pierce, i appreciate it. >> have a good day. >>> coming up, vice president,, lane harris, went to arizona today, where she champions reproductive rights after the arizona supreme court upheld an 1864 law banning all abortions. arizona state senator, ewa b

in this case, one of the start witnesses is his own lawyer, evan corcoran, criminal defense attorney.t stops jack smith or what has stopped him from -- from charging part of it somewhere where he doesn't have to deal with a judge who isn't interested in an aggressive pursuit of the facts? >> it's a good question, and prosecutors make venue choices based on a lot of factors. there may have been conduct here that took place in other jurisdictions. there's been reporting about documents he may have maintained in new jersey, maybe you could argue washington is the place because that's where the information originated. but the default, nicolle, is to charge the case where the majority of the conduct occurred. that is florida. and again, you don't get to choose the judge that you draw. there are several judges in that federal district in florida. so i think jack smith has been hoping all along that for all the reasons you've said because of the strength of this case, the relatively straightforward theory, it doesn't matter where it's tried. it's just so strong and so compelling that he coul

these facts are not disputed by donald trump, they're not disputed by bill barr, not disputed by evan corcorankey witness in this who was one of trump's lawyers while he committed the crimes of obstructing this very investigation. this one is a perfect one to it shall frankly doesn't dispute any of the facts of the insurrection case either. but, where are we, if even before we get to what you just laid out, it's simply delayed to a point where there won't be a trial before the election. >> yeah, look, so donald trump's strategy, when it comes to judgeships, aided and abetted by mitch mcconnell and senate republicans is working. on policy he got the dobbs decision, we've heard him talk about his judges on the supreme court, you better believe that donald trump thinks that this judge cannon has been put in place to decide the right way. and done so as part of the coordinated republican effort around jungles. what does it mean in terms of the overall strategy to return to the white house? it is a strategy of delay, or in this case, and this is why this is so severe compared to the others, this ca

caitlin, you're reporting from mar-a-lago and the classified documents case, what they did with evan corcoran, the lawyer who has now left the team, is they gave him very careful information, but they withheld other information for him. he in turn, unknowingly made incomplete representations to the fbi. that's why doj christina bobb was indicted and arizona because she signed it, but she made clear in that to say to the best of my knowledge, because as attorneys around don't know that they don't always know where i got snake and a quick break coming up more from inside the courtroom rome as prosecutors get one last chance to question david pecker great. >> he makes trust each other. we're gonna do a trust falls, stand up, you close your eyes. i'll see before trust what the summary up doc i told you. my name is susie loftus and i'm the head of trust and safety for us data security, tiktok. i'm a former prosecutor and it's my job to keep american tiktok users safe a big part of that is making sure that their data is protected. we're spending $2 billion to make sure that we're keeping tiktok saf