Who Are Key Players in the Trump Manhattan Criminal Trial?
Donald J. Trump has become the first former U.S. president to face a criminal trial. Manhattan prosecutors charged him last year with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records, accusing Mr. Trump of covering up a sex scandal with the porn star Stormy Daniels around the 2016 presidential election. Mr. Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for president, has pleaded not guilty.
Follow our live coverage of the Trump hush-money trial.
The Court
Justice Juan M. Merchan
Presiding Judge
Justice Merchan presided over the 2022 criminal trial and conviction of the Trump Organization and some of its executives, fining the company the maximum penalty of $1.6 million. A 17-year veteran of the court, Justice Merchan has been subject to verbal attacks by Mr. Trump, who has also targeted the judge's family.
Central Figures
Stormy Daniels
Porn Director, Producer and Actress
Just before the 2016 election, Ms. Daniels received a $130,000 hush-money payment from Mr. Trump’s attorney, Michael Cohen, in exchange for her silence about her story of a 2006 sexual encounter with Mr. Trump. The former president has denied the encounter, and has frequently attacked Ms. Daniels since the payment became public in 2018.
Michael Cohen
Former Trump Lawyer and Fixer
Mr. Cohen has said that the hush-money payment he made to Ms. Daniels was paid at Mr. Trump's direction. He has also said that Mr. Trump covered up the deal through a series of reimbursements to Mr. Cohen, in order to avoid a sex scandal during and after the 2016 election. Mr. Cohen later served time in prison after pleading guilty in 2018 to federal campaign finance charges related to the hush-money scheme. Mr. Trump has called Mr. Cohen a liar and tried to block his testimony in this case by accusing him of perjury.
David Pecker
Former Publisher of The National Enquirer
Leading up to the 2016 election, Mr. Pecker, who was the publisher at the time, agreed to work with Mr. Cohen to suppress negative stories about Mr. Trump, a practice known in the tabloid world as “catch and kill.” Mr. Pecker, a longtime Trump friend, helped broker the hush-money deals with Ms. Daniels and a former Playboy model, Karen McDougal, who said she had an affair with Mr. Trump.
Dylan Howard
Former Editor of The National Enquirer
In the effort to bury negative stories about Mr. Trump before the 2016 election, Mr. Howard, who was the editor at the time, connected Mr. Cohen with a lawyer for Ms. Daniels, setting the hush-money deal in motion.
Karen McDougal
Former Playboy Model
As part of the scheme to suppress negative stories about Mr. Trump before the 2016 election, American Media Inc., the parent company to the National Enquirer, paid Ms. McDougal $150,000 for the rights to her story of an affair with Mr. Trump in order to bury it. Mr. Trump denies the affair.
Keith Davidson
Stormy Daniels's Lawyer
In October 2016, Mr. Davidson negotiated the hush-money deal with Mr. Cohen to buy Ms. Daniels’s silence about the sexual encounter she said she had with Mr. Trump.
Hope Hicks
Former Trump Spokeswoman
Ms. Hicks, who worked on Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign and served in the White House until 2018, spoke with Mr. Trump and Mr. Cohen in 2016 on the day they learned that Ms. Daniels wanted money for her story, and again with Mr. Cohen on the day after he wired the $130,000 payment to Ms. Daniels’s lawyer.
Jeffrey McConney
Former Trump Organization Controller
Mr. McConney facilitated payments to Mr. Cohen – which served as reimbursement for the $130,000 paid to Ms. Daniels – that were falsely described as “legal expenses” in Trump Organization payment records.
Alan Garten
Trump Organization Chief Legal Officer
Mr. Garten previously told a federal judge that payments by the Trump Organization to Mr. Cohen in 2017 were to reimburse him for a settlement payment to Ms. Daniels, and to compensate him for private counsel services for Mr. Trump.
Rhona Graff
Trump’s Former Personal Assistant at the Trump Organization
She served as Mr. Trump’s gatekeeper at Trump Tower, and acted as his media liaison, scheduler, sometimes spokeswoman, fund-raising planner, co-star on “The Apprentice” and as a Miss Teen USA judge. She continued her service during his 2016 presidential campaign and after Mr. Trump moved into the White House.
Prosecution Team at Manhattan District Attorney’s Office
Alvin Bragg
District Attorney
Out of various Trump investigations he inherited when he took office in 2022, Mr. Bragg zeroed in on the hush-money deal and resurrected the case, leading last year to Mr. Trump’s first criminal indictment. Now Mr. Bragg is the first criminal prosecutor to put Mr. Trump on trial, which has made him a frequent target of the former president’s attacks.
Matthew Colangelo
Senior Counsel
A former high-ranking official at the New York attorney general’s office, Mr. Colangelo previously led a civil inquiry into Mr. Trump and oversaw an investigation into the Donald J. Trump Foundation, which led to its dissolution.
Susan Hoffinger
Investigations Division Chief
Now one of the senior prosecutors on the trial team, Ms. Hoffinger also prosecuted the Trump Organization on tax charges, after her long career as a white-collar defense attorney.
Joshua Steinglass
Senior Trial Counsel
After helping to lead the effort to convict the Trump Organization in 2022, Mr. Steinglass was recently added to the prosecution team. He typically prosecutes significant violent crime and secured a conviction against two Proud Boy extremists for a violent brawl in 2019.
Christopher Conroy
Investigations Division Senior Adviser
Mr. Conroy, who has been at the Manhattan district attorney’s office since 1996 and previously led the major economic crimes unit, has worked on the investigations into Mr. Trump longer than any other member of the team.
Becky Mangold
Assistant District Attorney
Before joining the office’s major economic crimes unit in 2022, Ms. Mangold worked in private practice for over 10 years, where she focused on criminal and regulatory investigations related to financial misconduct.
Katherine Ellis
Assistant District Attorney
Ms. Ellis joined the office in 2018 after working as an associate at a law firm. Before becoming a lawyer, Ms. Ellis worked as a legal analyst at Goldman Sachs.
Defense Team
Todd Blanche
Trump Lawyer
A former federal prosecutor, Mr. Blanche left a large law firm to defend Mr. Trump in this case. He is also representing Mr. Trump in the federal classified documents case and the federal election interference case.
Susan Necheles
Trump Lawyer
A lawyer for Mr. Trump since 2021, Ms. Necheles also represented the Trump Organization in the criminal tax fraud trial in Manhattan, which resulted in a conviction and $1.6 million fine. She previously represented defendants in major organized-crime and public-corruption cases.
Gedalia M. Stern
Trump Lawyer
As a law partner to Ms. Necheles, Mr. Stern also defended the Trump Organization in its criminal tax fraud trial and has previously represented clients charged with bribery, fraud and conspiracy.
Emil Bove
Trump Lawyer
The newest addition to Mr. Trump’s trial team, Mr. Bove served as a federal prosecutor in New York before turning to private practice where he has represented defendants charged with white-collar crimes.