Trump on trial: Would cameras affect the election?
New York’s rules stricter than other states
Not long into the first day of Donald Trump’s historic criminal hush money trial, observers saw the former president’s chin fall to his chest as, eyes closed, his mouth went slack in an impromptu snooze at the defense table.
There were no cameras in the Manhattan courtroom to record Trump’s April 15 power nap. Audiences had to rely on the word of reporters who watched it happen. Nor were viewers − and voters − treated to a bracing 2016 recording, played in court on May 2, of Trump and his former fixer Michael Cohen chewing over the $150,000 price tag for a Playboy model’s silence.
That wouldn’t have been the case if Trump had been on trial in camerafriendly Georgia, where he faces state election racketeering charges. There, viewers were riveted to dramatic livestreamed hearings in February as Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis fought to save her case against Trump from tawdry conflict-of-interest allegations.
A born showman, Trump has thrived in front of the camera, especially during his 14-season run as the reality TV star of “The Apprentice.”
But the strict confines of an American courtroom − where a judge runs the show and the defendant is usually a silent onlooker − is another story.
What the public gets to see of the presumptive 2024 Republican nominee as he battles four criminal indictments stretching from New York to Florida could have a big impact on November’s election, but whether a televised trial would hurt or help the former president is an open question.
Right now, many legal veterans say Trump benefits from the absence of cameras at the trial in lower Manhattan: Details of the celebrity businessman’s purported affairs, his partnership with the National Enquirer supermarket tabloid and, yes, his mid-morning nap have all escaped turning into viral clips, GIFs and memes.
“Just think of the difference it would make in New York,” said Court TV founder Steven Brill. “You have Trump going out every day and saying the case has no basis and the witnesses are all liars.”
With cameras in the courtroom, viewers could see the evidence themselves, Brill said, blunting “Trump’s spin on it.”
Others don’t think cameras would hurt Trump’s electoral prospects − even the New York trial, which hinges on his attempts to pay off adult film star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal ahead of the 2016 election after both claimed to have slept with him.
“It would help him a great deal,” said New York political consultant George Arzt. “He would dictate rhetoric to his lawyers that would be more flamboyant than ever. I think it would delay the trial.”
No cameras? ‘I would be shocked’
The clearest view of Trump on trial will come from an Atlanta courtroom − if District Attorney Fani Willis’ election racketeering case survives ongoing challenges.
“If the press is interested in a case in Georgia, they can have a camera there,” said Chris Timmons, a former Atlanta prosecutor.
Trump is also fighting federal indictments charging him with election interference in Washington, D.C., and hoarding classified documents in Florida. Cameras aren’t allowed in federal trials − and transcripts of those proceedings are only available for a fee.
In Manhattan − where Trump faces 34 charges of doctoring business records to hide a $130,000 hush money payment to Daniels − a small group of photographers are allowed into the courtroom to snap pictures of the famous defendant for one minute each morning, before the jury arrives.
“New York has clung to this very antiquated tradition of not having cameras in the courtroom,” said former Manhattan prosecutor Diana Florence. “If I was a layperson, I would be shocked that you can’t have cameras in every courtroom across the country.”
A patchwork of rules governing state and federal courts provides differing degrees of access to Trump’s numerous legal cases. Last month, visitors to the Supreme Court’s website were able to hear live arguments over Trump’s claim that he’s immune from federal charges of trying to unlawfully overturn his 2020 election defeat.
But no images or audio were available earlier this year when a federal jury found Trump civilly liable for defaming former magazine writer E. Jean Carroll. Nor were there video cameras in the courtroom at Trump’s New York civil fraud trial earlier this year, which ended in a brutal $435.5 million verdict.
Trump transcripts free to the public
In a nod to the historic nature of the hush money trial and sky-high public interest, New York’s court system has agreed to release daily transcripts of the first-ever prosecution of a former president. Previously, daily transcripts could only be obtained at great expense, usually by law firms and the press.
The move “changes the way we think about transparency,” white-collar defense attorney Ann Cortina Perry told USA TODAY. “There is a lot that can come out in a transcript.”
But that’s less transparency than in most of the country. More than 35 states routinely allow cameras in the courtroom. Georgia approved them in 2018. California has allowed cameras since 1984. New York has resisted the trend.
The OJ example
That’s thanks, in part, to the 1995 murder trial of Hollywood and NFL star O.J. Simpson in Los Angeles, some experts say. Simpson’s trial, a divisive cultural touchstone, featured “a lot of theatrics that wouldn’t have happened if cameras weren’t in the courtroom,” Florence said.
“On a daily basis, the defense would just fling stuff out there that had no basis in fact,” said Marcia Clark, a Simpson case prosecutor. “It can be really deleterious because it encourages lawyers to strut for the camera and say things that have no legal merit.”