Jury Selection in Trump’s Hush Money Trial Faces Key Stretch as Former President Returns to Court

WASHINGTON (AP) —Jury selection in Donald Trump’s hush money trial begins a critical and likely last stretch Thursday, as lawyers seek to fill out the panel of New Yorkers who will determine the first-ever criminal prosecution against a former president.

Seven jurors have been selected thus far, including an oncology nurse, a software engineer, an information technology specialist, a sales professional, an English teacher, and two lawyers. Eleven more people must be sworn in, and the court expects opening statements in the landmark case as early as next week.

The Manhattan jury’s selection, whenever it occurs, will be a watershed moment in the case, laying the groundwork for a trial that will place the former president’s legal troubles at the center of the campaign against Democrat Joe Biden and feature potentially unflattering testimony about Trump’s private life in the years before he became president.

The procedure of selecting a jury is crucial in any criminal trial, especially when the defendant is a former president and the presumed Republican nominee. Prospective jurors have been questioned about their social media posts, personal life, and political beliefs as the lawyers and court look for biases that would prohibit them from being fair. Inside the court, there is widespread recognition of the futility of trying to find jurors who are unaware of Trump, with a prosecutor this week stating that lawyers were not searching for people who had been “living under a rock for the past eight years.”

To that end, at least some of the jurors admitted to having personal feelings about Trump.

“I find him fascinating and mysterious,” one juror chosen for the case, an IT worker, stated during questioning. “He enters into a room and sets people off in one way or another. That interests me much. ‘Really? Could this one individual do it all? Wow.’ That’s what I believe.

The procedure has gone faster than anticipated, causing Trump to complain to reporters outside the courthouse on Tuesday that the judge, Juan Merchan, was “rushing” the trial.

The case revolves around a $130,000 payment made by Trump’s lawyer and personal fixer, Michael Cohen, to porn actor Stormy Daniels shortly before the 2016 election to keep her claims of a sexual encounter with Trump from becoming public during the race’s final days.

Prosecutors claim Trump hid the true nature of the payments in internal records when his company reimbursed Cohen, who pled guilty to federal charges in 2018 and is likely to be a key witness in the case.

Trump has denied having a physical encounter with Daniels, and his attorneys claim the payments to Cohen were necessary legal expenditures.

Trump faces 34 felony counts for falsifying company records. If convicted, he faces up to four years in prison, however, it is unclear if the judge will do so. Trump would almost probably appeal a conviction.

The hush money case is one of four criminal prosecutions Trump faces as he seeks to recapture the White House, but it will likely be the only one to go to trial before the November presidential election. Appeals and other legal wrangling have caused delays in instances accusing Trump of attempting to change the 2020 election results and illegally retaining confidential documents.