NEW YORK — Jury selection in Donald Trump’s hush money trial is entering a crucial phase as the former president returns to court Thursday morning. Lawyers still have to choose 11 jurors for the panel that will decide the first-ever criminal case against a former US commander in chief.
Seven jurors went to work Tuesday after hours of questioning by attorneys about everything from their hobbies to social media posts and their opinions on the presumptive Republican nominee in this year’s closely contested presidential race.
Tuesdays selected include an IT worker, an English teacher, an oncology nurse, a sales professional, a software engineer and two lawyers.
The first day of Trump’s trial ended Monday with no one choosing to serve on the jury or as one of the six alternates. Dozens of potential jurors were dismissed both days after saying they could not be impartial or had other obligations that would conflict with the trial, which is expected to last several weeks.
Trump has pleaded not guilty to 34 felony counts of falsifying corporate records as part of an alleged scheme to bury stories he feared could harm his 2016 campaign.
The allegations focus on payouts to two women, porn actor Stormy Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal, who said they had extramarital sexual encounters with Trump years earlier, as well as to a Trump Tower doorman who claimed to have a story about a child he claimed to have. Trump had been illegitimate. Trump says none of these alleged sexual encounters took place.
The case is the first of four charges against Trump to go to trial.
Currently:
— The jury selection process follows a familiar pattern with an unpredictable outcome
– Trump lawyers say Stormy Daniels denied a subpoena outside a Brooklyn bar
– After seven jurors were seated in Trump’s trial on Tuesday, he went to a bodega in New York to campaign
– Only 1 in 3 American adults think Trump acted illegally in the New York hush money case, an AP-NORC poll shows
– Trump Trial: Why Can’t Americans See or Hear What Happens in Court?
Here’s the latest:
The jury session in Manhattan will be a defining moment in the case, paving the way for a trial that will put the former president’s legal danger at the center of the campaign against Democrat Joe Biden. years before he became president.
The process of choosing a jury is a crucial stage in any criminal trial, but especially when the suspect is a former president and the presumptive Republican nominee.
There is widespread recognition within the court of the futility of seeking jurors without knowledge of Trump. A prosecutor said this week that lawyers were not looking for people who had been “living under a rock for the past eight years.”