“After the Republican debates, I would receive a call from [Trump’s fixer] Michael Cohen,” and depending on who did well that night, “he would direct me which candidate to target,” Pecker testified Tuesday.
Texas Senator Ted Cruz responded to testimony from former National Enquirer publisher, David Pecker, who admitted he worked with Donald Trump to create fake stories about his rivals for the 2016 Republican nomination.
“After the Republican debates, I would receive a call from [Trump’s fixer] Michael Cohen,” and depending on who did well that night, “he would direct me which candidate to target,” Pecker testified.
The notorious National Enquirer story about Ted Cruz’s father, Rafael Cruz, conspiring with John F. Kennedy’s assassin Lee Harvey Oswald was false. The image used in the story of Cruz's father with Oswald was photoshopped.
Trump emphasized the fake story on television. “What was he doing with Lee Harvey Oswald shortly before his death? Before the shooting? It’s horrible,” Trump told Fox News.
Ted Cruz was asked Wednesday about his thoughts on the revelation. He responded he was “not interested in revisiting ancient history.”
Pecker is to return to the witness stand Thursday where he is expected to give more detail about his role in keeping Trump’s affair with Stormy Daniels out of the National Enquirer days before the 2016 election.
As jurors in Donald Trump’s hush money trial have Wednesday off, questions have risen from observers of the case about whether the former president would welcome a jail sentence for political gain.
Trump faces a $10,000 fine or up to 30 days in jail for, prosecutors say, repeatedly violating the gag order. The possible punishments have not seemed to stop the former president from speaking out.
“I’m not allowed to defend myself but other people are able to say what they want about me, very very unfair,” Trump said.
Trump used the threat of jail in fundraising emails, writing, “If things don’t go our way, I could be thrown in jail.”
Trump’s allies have also thrown around conspiracy theories.
“They want to lock him up in jail for the rest of his life so that he dies in jail and they want to take away his Secret Service protection so that he is murdered somewhere in jail,” Marjorie Taylor-Greene said.
