The first seven jurors were chosen Tuesday in a New York trial to decide whether former President Donald Trump criminally concealed hush money payments to a porn star around the 2016 election.
Some of the jurors looked stressed as they went into the jury box to take their oath. One of them, an Asian-American attorney from Chelsea, bit his bottom lip, while a young Black software engineer kept her eyes trained on the ground while walking across the room.
Other jurors include a male IT consultant originally from Puerto Rico, a female Black teacher from Harlem, a female oncology nurse from West Harlem and a male civil litigator from North Carolina who now lives on the Upper East Side. The foreman is a man who was born in Ireland and works in sales.
“This will be your permanent seat for the duration of the trial,” state Supreme Court Judge Juan Merchan told them.
He told them to expect opening arguments on Monday.
Judge Merchan and attorneys are vetting a massive pool of city residents to settle on 12 jurors and four alternates who will determine whether Mr. Trump, the presumptive GOP nominee, campaigns against President Biden as a convicted felon.
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At one point, Judge Merchan scolded Mr. Trump for muttering loud enough for a potential juror to hear him.
“I will not have any jurors intimidated in this courtroom,” Judge Merchan said.
The second day of jury selection delved into potential jurors’ social media posts and whether they could separate their political views from the sober responsibility of determining guilt and innocence.
One juror was dismissed for expressing anti-Trump feelings on social media, including one that celebrated a decision against Mr. Trump’s ban on persons from majority-Muslim countries and said, “Get him out, and lock him up.”
“This is a person who has expressed the desire … that Mr. Trump be locked up,” Judge Merchan said, adding that if Mr. Trump is found guilty, he faces a potential jail sentence.
One potential juror, an accountant originally from Dallas, Texas, was dismissed after he waffled on whether he could be politically unbiased.
SEE ALSO: Prosecutors call on judge to hold Trump in contempt over social media posts
“A lot of people [in accounting] tend to intellectually slant Republican … so there could be some unconscious bias,” he said, adding his Texas background could lead to implicit bias.
The dismissals underscored the arduous task of selecting a jury for a defendant who has global name recognition and is the presumptive GOP nominee for president.
The New York case is one of four criminal matters facing Mr. Trump as he campaigns for president. It might be the only one to go to trial before the November election, and there are signs it is the least impactful for the American public.
Only about a third of Americans think Mr.Trump did something illegal in the hush-money case, according to a poll released Tuesday, the second day of jury selection in New York.
However, nearly half of respondents thought Mr. Trump did something unlawful in the other three cases against him, according to the poll from AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.
“The voters understand. What you have to do is look at the polls,” Mr. Trump said as he entered the Manhattan courthouse.
Still, half of Americans would consider Mr. Trump unfit to serve as president if he is convicted of falsifying business documents.
Prosecutors allege that Mr. Trump paid $130,000 in hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels to cover up an alleged sexual encounter from nearly two decades ago, along with payments to a second woman who alleged an affair and a doorman who pushed an unproven story that Mr. Trump had a child out of wedlock.
They say Mr. Trump concealed the payments through reimbursements to his attorney-turned-accuser, Michael D. Cohen, recorded in official business ledgers on multiple dates in 2017.
Mr. Trump denies the claim of an affair with Ms. Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, and says the charges are part of a broad Democratic plot to thwart his presidential bid.
“This is a trial that should have never been brought, a trial that was being looked upon and looked at all over the world,” Mr. Trump said. “Every legal pundit, every legal scholar, said this trial is a disgrace.”
• Tom Howell Jr. can be reached at thowell@washingtontimes.com.
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