Slate: "How to Build a Campaign Finance Case against DT & MC"
This is a few days old--I didn't see it posted previously but apologize in advance if it was. As a non-attorney, I found it very helpful.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/04/how-to-build-a-campaign-finance-case-against-donald-trump-and-michael-cohen.html
How to Build a Campaign Finance Case Against Donald Trump and Michael Cohen
Lessons from the prosecutions of John Edwards and John Rowland.
By Liam Brennan
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"The president’s defenders may take solace in the fact that the Department of Justice failed to convict Edwards. But there’s another precedent that Potter didn’t mention: the conviction of former Connecticut Gov. John Rowland, which I secured as a federal prosecutor. Taken together, the Edwards and Rowland prosecutions hold important lessons for building a campaign finance case against Trump and his associates...
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"...Finally, while the prosecution’s main role is to prove up its own story, disproving the defense’s theory of the case is almost as important. Defense attorneys must only raise reasonable doubt in one juror’s mind to trigger a mistrial, and telling a coherent story can be enough to raise that doubt. From the prosecution’s perspective, it appeared self-evident that Mellon’s payments to Hunter were intended to help Edwards’ campaign. But the defense argued that payments to conceal Hunter were intended to spare Edwards’ family, particularly his sick wife, personal embarrassment and shame. The claim apparently had some sway with at least one juror. In Rowland’s case, disproving his parallel assertion that Foley was paying him for consulting became vital to the government’s efforts.
While Trump may try to follow Edwards’ lead, the same defense isn’t really available to him. Edwards and his wife, Elizabeth, made their partnership a central aspect of his public persona. They had raised four children together, suffered through the death of one of them, and persevered through Elizabeth’s battles with cancer. Trump, on the other hand, has never been beholden to notions of family values or fidelity. Alleging that the payments to Daniels and McDougal were intended to protect him from personal embarrassment gives the government a free pass to show how he has always been a man without shame."
