From what I've read, Todd Blanche and Susan Necheles are well thought-of attorneys. Yet, both have come in for considerable criticism in how they've handled the case. I'm not a lawyer, but I thought Necheles did a poor job cross examining Stormy Daniels yesterday. And, IIRC, in the defense's opening statement, it was claimed that Daniels lied about having sex with Trump. Why do that?Part of my closing argument will be:
”ladies and gentlemen, we know there are three situations where the Defendant paid out in order to hide stories that he felt would hurt his candidacy. We have the doorman story, the McDougall story, and the Stormy Daniels story. Everyone agrees the doorman story was false. But, afraid it would hurt his candidacy, the Defendant paid $30,000 to keep it quiet.
How much did McDougall get? $150,000. And Ms. Daniels? $130,000. So there’s at least $100,000 difference between the false doorman story and the other two. Why? You can infer, from the evidence, that the price to quash a false story was $30,000, and the price to quash a true story was a lot more.
And, if the evidence tells you that Mr. Trump’s lawyers aren’t telling the truth when they tell you that nothing happened in that hotel room, can you believe anything else they tell you?”
I think it's because Trump tells his attorneys what to say, and they comply within the limits of acceptable procedure. Heck, it even happens outside the courtroom. The other day, when Trump claimed the gag order prevented him from testifying, Blanche stood in the background nodding. I wouldn't have expected him to correct his client in the moment, but by suggesting he agreed with Trump's assertion, I believe he was just doing what Trump would have wanted.
I suppose Trump's attorneys will be vindicated to an extent if he's found not guilty or if there's a mistrial or something like that, but I have to think their reputations will have suffered nonetheless.