The hush money trial of Donald Trump has begun — the first criminal trial ever against a former president — and Megyn Kelly is “disgusted” by it. “The United States of America DOESN’T do this,” she tells Glenn. But will Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg actually throw Trump in jail? Megyn explains why she doesn’t believe so, but she also debates whether a criminal conviction will help or hurt Trump in the November election.
TranscriptBelow is a rush transcript that may contain errors
GLENN: Megyn Kelly, welcome to the program.
How are you, Megyn?
MEGYN: Hi, Glenn. Good to see you. How are you doing?
GLENN: What's going to happen this time? Are they going to get him this time?
MEGYN: They're going to get him. And I don't know about you. You can kind of laugh at it. And kind of absurd. But now that it's -- I mean, the first criminal trial of Donald Trump has just begun. They're in the courtroom.
The witnesses will be called eventually, after they pick the jury.
And they're going to try to put this guy behind bars, potentially.
They're 100 percent taking their best shot at stopping him from winning this race. And it really, for me as a lawyer, it's been very sobering morning.
I'm just disgusted.
I cannot believe we're doing this.
I -- it's like -- it's like Princess Diana behaving like a straight whore. That's what we're doing. The United States doesn't do this. And because we're in the hands of this scummy prosecutor. Multiple. It's not just Alvin Bragg, but he's the lead on this.
We've gone down this road, pretending a payment to a porn star, who is threatening to expose an affair, is a crime that warrants 34 counts. And they're going to make it as sleazy as humanly possible.
We're going to hear about David Pecker, who ran the national inquirer, owned AMI Media, and to bury negative stories on Trump and to inflate stories on Hillary.
Great. I can't wait to hear about Fusion GPS. Was Trump the only one trying to get dirt printed on his opponent.
That's what this jury will be left with. He worked with dirty magazines to get Hillary painted as fact. And unwell.
And without talking about how his campaign was spied on. She's been trying to get him impeached or thrown in jail, along with President Obama, for years.
Politics is disgusting and dirty and underhanded. And we wish it weren't so.
But guess what, it's so. Welcome to America.
And never before, have we put somebody on trial. Antics around it. Or a man on trial, for not screaming from the rooftops, I paid off a porn star, so she didn't humiliate me with my wife.
We're embarrassing ourselves with this trial. I feel appropriately disgusted.
GLENN: What is the difference between this trial, and the trial that didn't happen, because I only lied about sex? You know, to save my marriage, to make sure I didn't humiliate my wife. That's basically why Donald Trump perjured himself. Or not Donald Trump. Bill Clinton perjured himself, and nothing happened there. Everybody just walked away. What's the difference between these two?
MEGYN: One is a Democrat. One is a Republican.
GLENN: That's what I thought. That's what I thought.
MEGYN: Yeah, if you're a Democrat, you can lie. Ask Fani Wilis, ask Nathan Wade. Fine. You can lie on the stand, under oath. Like Bill Clinton did.
It's okay. It's just -- oh, wait. That's what Trump was doing too, allegedly.
That's -- wait. He was lying to cover up an affair. In only one lane does it become a felony.
And just not to get too deep in the weeds, Glenn, but let's not forget what really is happening here is a misdemeanor bookkeeping snafu or error or just statement, that the statute of limitations has run on. They reinvigorated a dead claim, by saying, well, it was made to cover up an underlying felony, which was a campaign finance violation.
You made $130,000 donation, quote, unquote, to your own campaign by paying off Stormy Daniels to win an election.
Well, guess what, that's not a campaign finance violation. The only way you get the kind of campaign finance violation, is get the payment, who could only have been made for one purpose, and that is to help your campaign.
Well, guess what, again, hush payments have been made by men to shut women up since the dawn of time. It doesn't have to be to save one's campaign. And that is the relative legal test expect Alvin brag should know. It's the reason the feds were not interested in pursuing this claim against Donald Trump.
GLENN: Correct. So is it just a corrupt judge that is making all the -- because the judge should look at that and said, no. You can't do this?
MEGYN: Yeah. Yes. I mean, it's not just. Because we have Mr. Bragg. But, yeah. The judge say serious problem.
A nonpartisan judge would you have thrown this out in the papers. Pretty easily.
And I do believe there's a very good chance, this will ultimately, no matter what happens with the area. Get thrown out on appeal.
Like most of the prosecutions against Trump. Not the obstruction case. But the J6 case could get thrown out soon, actually. The Supreme Court throws out the obstruction charges. Other cases involve J6 defendants not Trump.
If the Supreme Court does anything on presidential immunity. And then if he loses that J6 case. If there's a trial. I think it can get thrown out on appeal.
But he has to go through the humiliation.
We -- we -- America have to go through the humiliation of this criminal trial first.
We just saw our former president dragged into a criminal courtroom today.
And in typical Trumpian fashion, he said, I'm proud to be here. I'm very proud to be here.
That's smart. Trump is smart. He always does it. Positive spin for anything that happens to him. Let's be honest. This is not a proud moment.
Not for him. Not for us.
GLENN: Not for his family.
MEGYN: I'm ashamed of us for doing this.
GLENN: So what do you say about Donald Trump, this is, you know, something that, you know, we would be disgusted by, if it was something that was happening on the other side? Bill Clinton comes to mind. That we as conservatives, would say, this guy, he shouldn't be doing this as president. But in the Clinton case, it was illegal. He perjured himself. But there -- there really isn't anything illegal here. And if it was, it's past the statute of limitations.
MEGYN: There's a difference between those two cases. Let me tell you, Glenn. No one is allowed to lie under oath. It's a felony. It's a felony. It's perjury.
GLENN: Correct.
MEGYN: And a lawyer really isn't allowed to lie under oath. You have additional duties of candor to a court, before they admit you into the bar. You swear not to do things like that. So there are additional obligations on a lawyer, which Clinton was.
And on top of that, there are additional obligations as president. He violated them all. He committed a felony. Donald Trump made a bookkeeping misstatement. That's what he did. And for that, he's being hauled into court.
There's just no comparison between the legal scent -- and, look, I don't have any doubt, Trump will be convicted.
And to be honest, I don't have any doubt that Trump did this. I'm not -- I don't really doubt, that Trump didn't write down the hush money, to Stormy Daniels. Porn star. Who is threatening to go to my wife and the media about an affair, I may have had. He probably did do that.
GLENN: Right. Well, there was another one he paid off, that it wasn't true.
So I mean we don't know. Right?
MEGYN: The doorman? Yeah. Well, that's another piece of the AMI media piece of this case, which hasn't gotten much attention. But it's going to, when I think you hear, David Pecker will take the stand. The guy who ran, and I owned it. He will take a stand. And say, yeah. We caught and killed stories, including from this Karen McDougal who was the 1998 playmate of the year, who allegedly had an affair with Trump.
And also took a payout from AMI, to write health columns, instead of take the story to a publication that would run with it. This is what the allegation is, that if you're a friend with Pecker, like Trump was, you could get this kind of thing done for you.
And that's what he was doing for Trump. And we will have with this testimony, to that effect. And that's -- okay.
Is anyone shocked, that Trump didn't want all his affairs come out? I don't care. I'm sure he has had affairs. I'm sure, you know what, I'm sure Obama did too. The sainted Obama. And I'm sure Bill Clinton did. And the only reason the Clinton thing became a story is because Linda Tripp cited it -- and go public with the story. Neither pair of the lovers wanted that public.
Linda Tripp brought it public, and then Bill Clinton, rather than being a man and owning up to it, lied under oath. We're back to that problem.
But this is just -- we shouldn't be knowing about any of this. We shouldn't be humiliating ourselves, and getting neck deep into the gory details of it. But the Democrats are going to be awash in -- in seedy Trump affair details, for the next six weeks.
And it's anything, but accidental.
GLENN: How do you think this plays with the American people?
MEGYN: I think they will be disgusted like him.
But unfortunately, I think the very group Trump is struggling with, women, former Republicans, in the suburbs, like where I live. They're not going to like this. You know, because most of our husbands don't cheat on us with porn stars and playmates of the years. And --
GLENN: Well, I would hope -- I would hope that it doesn't just -- we don't. Yeah. We're all cheating. But not necessarily with porn stars. And play boys.
STU: There's also so many playmates of the year. They would be way too busy if everybody were cheating.
GLENN: Yeah. Way too busy. I don't think most husbands cheat on their wives.
MEGYN: I don't think they do. So they're not going to like this. You can't forget MAGA. Those guys who are out in front of the White House now, amazing.
The pro-Trump guys with all their pro-Trump gear. And they're like the anti-Trump guys. Did you see the guy with the flute?
He hates Trump! Like liar. Narcissist. Felon. And then he's playing the lovely flute. Saying God bless America.
Anyway, the hard-core MAGA, they're not going to care. We all know. Nothing is going to change their mind. And most Republicans are on Team Trump, and realize it's a political persecution.
But there is a group of independents now, center right independents. Who used to be Republicans. Who don't like Trump. And it would be helpful to the Republican Party and to Trump. If those people could be more disgusted with Biden than with Trump.
GLENN: Right.
MEGYN: And they might yet be. And I don't mean the conviction. The conviction won't help either.
Six weeks of Trump is a shitty husband. That won't help.
GLENN: Remember.
STU: Broadcast.
GLENN: Broadcast. That's all right. That's all right.
So, Megyn, does he go to jail? You said he will be convicted. Does he go to jail? And what would that mean? How much time would he be facing on this?
MEGYN: He's not going to jail on this case. He's not.
But you have lunatics like Andrew Weissmann, who honestly, he's not a -- like, this guy has done a very legitimate legal resume. I realize he left the FBI and all that.
But he was general council of the FBI, was a US attorney, and he's out there saying nonsense like, well, Trump is a recidivist. A recidivist is someone who continues to commit crime after he's served time or been convicted. You know, like you can't stop yourself from selling the heroin.
That's not Trump! So it is true, that there's some potential for jail time, if this judge somehow turns him into a repeat offender because he is facing three other criminal trials.
That's not happening. So I don't think he will go to jail for this one. I think it will be a matter of fines. But if -- that doesn't change much. I mean, jail time would be far, far worse.
But they still have their conviction.
And the thing is, guys, half of independents and still one-third of the Republicans, are saying they like Trump. But they can't vote for a convicted felon.
And I had this conviction -- I think it was with you guys, Stu. You and Dave Marcus were on my show this week. What if they mean it.
I know we don't think they mean it. What if they do mean it.
I look at this. Huh. What if we're wrong?
What if we're downplaying this, like, everyone knows this is BS, but we're wrong? When we misread the polls. And we do often. Because who the heck knows what to believe on polls anymore.
GLENN: Yep.
MEGYN: We get burned.
And so today really could be day one, in Trump losing this election. It could be.
GLENN: My gosh.
MEGYN: I don't think it will be.
But I recognize the danger of what they're doing here. And, of course, we all know, that's why they're doing it.
GLENN: I was hoping that it would backfire on them. I think it has to some degree.
I don't know when you add the actual felony. You know, to this.
MEGYN: That's the thing. That's the question.
Is the backfire bounce, already baked in.
GLENN: Hmm.
MEGYN: Right?
Have they already gotten all the bounce there is to get, from the outrage, over resetting norms that have been in place for almost 250 years.
And that, of course, would be the Democrat's plan, to boost him in the primaries.
He'll get whatever bounce he gets in the backlash.
And then it waned over the course of what they hoped would be four criminal trials. Now it looks like just this one.
But this is their best shot. Six weeks. Disgusting man. Horrid husband. And now convicted felony.
They don't need to hurt him much. You know, Joe Biden only one by 45,000 votes. They don't need to hurt him much.
GLENN: I know.
Megyn Kelly, host of the Megyn Kelly Show. Follows this program on SiriusXM. As always, Megyn, good to talk to you. Thank you.