Necheles pulls up a list of contacts for Trump prior to his time at the White House. Trump's executive assistant, Rhona Graff, sent that list to Westerhout when Trump transitioned to the White House.
Katie’s Sidebar: don’t expect any scathing cross by Susan Necheles of Westerhout. It’s a stark contrast between the way she questioned Stormy Daniels yesterday as compared to the kid gloves she has used thus far with Westerhout.
On Thursday, Westerhout said the RNC considered plans to replace Trump after the "Access Hollywood" tape landed.
"It's my recollection that there were conversations about how to, if it was needed, how it would be possible to replace him as the candidate if it came to that."
It seemed that cross-examination was headed toward mitigating the blow of that testimony, but Necheles quickly pivoted to another subject following her questions about the RNC.
Necheles: Would the RNC create a travel schedule for presumptive nominee Trump?
Westerhout: Yes.
Necheles: I want to show you L-8 and L-9. Oh, when they're ready. So People's 69 [the Trump contact list]
9/ McBrien is off today, Bower is reporting today:
That list of contacts was for people Trump spoke to a lot before he was in office? Yes.
Many of those people are people Trump never called while he was in the Oval Office? Correct.
Now Necheles displays the newspaper clipping that Trump had Westerhout send to Allen Weisselberg.
He sent newspaper clippings to lots of people? Yes.
And you don't recall any other time that Trump sent a clipping to Weisselberg? Yes.
And you don't have any specific recollection of Trump and Weisselberg speaking about a check? No.
In fact you don't recall any specific phone calls between Trump and Weisselberg during his time in the White House? No, he spoke to lots of people.
Trump's lawyer Necheles: You sent out this photo of the first time President Trump boarded Air Force One - he was proud, right?
Westerhout: Yes, he was proud.
Necheles: He often sent newspaper clippings to people?
Westerhout: He did.
Necheles: But only once to Allen Weisselberg?
Westerhout: It could have been.
Necheles: And he barely spoke to Allen Weisselberg in that first year, right?
Westerhout: Right
Necheles: I want to show you-
Prosecutor: Objection! Can we approach?
Yes
Prosecutors are fighting the admission of the travel schedules.
Westerhout says she didn't receive them, and asked whether she remembered the one she was shown, she said only since her lawyer showed it to her this morning. Not contemporaneously.
Effective lawyering from the DA's office. Necheles tries to bring up Trump's 2016 GOP candidate travel schedule, but prosecutor Becky Mangold interjects & questions Westerhout.
Turns out her lawyer just showed them to her this morning. Judge stops it from entering evidence.
👉🏼Justice Merchan: The motion to introduce this into evidence is denied.
Trump's lawyer Necheles: You were asked about how checks were sent, right?
Westerhout: Yes.
Now Necheles asks Westerhout about the process of getting the checks to Trump.
Sending things to the White House were slow, right? Yes.
There was lots of security? Yes.
You found out that some of his personal items sent to the White House were never received? Yes.
With this line of questioning, Necheles is trying to tell the jurors that there are other reasons why Trump's personal mail--the checks--would be sent to Keith Schiller or John McEntee instead of the White House.
So it was a way to get items quickly to Trump? Yes.
Was it your understanding that getting items promptly to the president of the United States was a problem for previous administrations? I don't have knowledge of that, but I can't imagine it would be any different.
Other presidents didn't have this problem because other presidents weren't leveraging their office to benefit their private companies, so 'getting things' to them wasn't an issue.