Prosecutors went through Bob Costello’s emails one by one, undercutting his credibility with each painstaking moment—a fate the defense had hoped for Michael Cohen.
So, mens rea gets slightly misunderstood a lot, especially with more white-collar stuff. Generally, you don’t have to know that you were violating the law, just that were doing the action that happens to be against the law, at least for the basic fraud laws in question here.
The election interference part is murkier, and really all you have to do to avoid charges under the traditional federal interpretation of the federal statute is to claim ignorance; it’s one of the weird exceptions and has basically rendered federal criminal prosecutions for campaign finance violations as a charming hypothetical, except when committed by campaign managers with law degrees. There is a revised standard that says you don’t have to know the law inside and out, just that generally this sort of thing is not allowed, but that is untested.
There is NY election law that could be held to a lower, more traditional standard, and while itself a misdemeanor, it could be enough to trigger the felony standard. Overall, it is probably the weakest part of the prosecution’s case, but the prosecution would say that falsifying the records to make sure that Trump got elected is enough.
The issue here is that NY statute requires an intention to defraud, and for the first degree felony, an intention to conceal a crime (either one you’re about to do, will do, or have done,).
intentionally concealing a prior crime kind of requires an awareness that thing being concealed was a prior crime.
An argument that trump was unaware the prior thing was a crime could knock it down to a misdemeanor. (Or get a hung jury.)
So, mens rea gets slightly misunderstood a lot, especially with more white-collar stuff. Generally, you don’t have to know that you were violating the law, just that were doing the action that happens to be against the law, at least for the basic fraud laws in question here.
The election interference part is murkier, and really all you have to do to avoid charges under the traditional federal interpretation of the federal statute is to claim ignorance; it’s one of the weird exceptions and has basically rendered federal criminal prosecutions for campaign finance violations as a charming hypothetical, except when committed by campaign managers with law degrees. There is a revised standard that says you don’t have to know the law inside and out, just that generally this sort of thing is not allowed, but that is untested.
There is NY election law that could be held to a lower, more traditional standard, and while itself a misdemeanor, it could be enough to trigger the felony standard. Overall, it is probably the weakest part of the prosecution’s case, but the prosecution would say that falsifying the records to make sure that Trump got elected is enough.
The issue here is that NY statute requires an intention to defraud, and for the first degree felony, an intention to conceal a crime (either one you’re about to do, will do, or have done,).
intentionally concealing a prior crime kind of requires an awareness that thing being concealed was a prior crime.
An argument that trump was unaware the prior thing was a crime could knock it down to a misdemeanor. (Or get a hung jury.)