Welcome to the online version of From the policy deskevening bulletin that brings you the latest reporting and analysis from the campaign trail, the White House and Capitol Hill from the NBC News Politics team.
In today’s edition, we take a look at Stormi Daniels’ testimony at Donald Trump’s New York trial. Plus, Steve Kornacki examines the trend at the heart of Joe Biden’s turnout struggle with black voters.
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Day 13 of Trump’s trial focuses on his affairs – personal and financial
Adam Reiss, Gary Grumbach, Jillian Frankel, and Dareh Gregorian
Adult film actress Stormi Daniels took the witness stand in front of the former president Donald TrumpNew York Criminal In a sworn statement on Tuesday, she said she had sex with Trump in 2006 and a $130,000 contract for her silence in the final days of the 2016 presidential campaign.
Daniels described parts of the 2006 encounter in detail, saying at one point she thought she “blacked out” and that Trump wasn’t using a condom. That prompted Trump’s attorney Todd Blanche to “mistrial,” saying Daniels’ testimony was “improper and unduly prejudicial” when both sides returned from a lunch break.
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“In our opinion, there’s no way to open the bell,” Blanche said during a dramatic exchange with prosecutors.
Judge Juan Mercan denied the request for a mistrial, but acknowledged that “there were things that needed to be said” and said he would strike some of her statements from the record.
Daniels was the second witness called Tuesday. He stated that he met Trump in July 2006 at a famous golf tournament in Lake Tahoe. Daniels, who described their first meeting as a “very brief encounter,” testified that she was 27 and remembered Trump as being as old as his father — about 60.
Before Daniels, prosecutors subpoenaed the longtime publishing executive to fact-check and read excerpts from some of Trump’s books.
Sally Franklin, the chief executive of Penguin Random House, read Trump: Think Like a Billionaire, a book about how closely Trump keeps track of his money — which prosecutors will use to show he knows exactly what he once paid his lawyer, Michael. Cohen is back.
“I always sign my checks so I know where my money is going,” she said.
In the meantime: Judge Eileen Cannon has indefinitely postponed Trump’s classified documents trial in Florida pending resolution of many pre-trial matters. The trial was scheduled to begin on May 20.
Generational divide divides black voters ahead of Biden-Trump rematch
By Steve Kornacki
One of the more noticeable voting shifts between the last presidential campaign and this one is among black voters.
While they are largely in line with President Joe Biden, his level of support is lower than in 2020. And Donald Trump’s Black support often exceeds that of any previous Republican candidate in the modern era.
These findings have generated understandable skepticism, fueled by red herring polls in past campaigns that have suggested surprising levels of Black GOP support that failed to materialize on Election Day. Coinciding with the 1964 presidential race, none of the Republican presidential candidates exceeded 12% black support in exit polls, and most failed to reach double digits.
But if you average the results of every high-quality, independent poll since April 1, you see how Black voters are faring now and how they fared over the same period in 2020:
It is important to note that in most individual polls the size of the electorate of black voters is generally low, as they usually make up little more than 10 percent of the electorate. This means a significant margin of error in any survey. However, multiple polling averages show a change from four years ago.
And this change is generational. The age distribution of black voters is available from several recent polls; and each shows a striking difference between young and old Black voters:
Still, these reflect relatively small sample sizes, although the NBC News and CNN numbers are from “pooled data” — data sets that combine subsamples of Black voters from two national surveys each organization sponsored this year, doubling the sample of Black voters. The age distributions here are consistent and surprising.
What is clear and consistent across polls is that young black voters are more disillusioned with Biden and more open to Trump and third-party alternatives. If Trump can turn that into historically high levels of black support, it could win him the election.
But that’s a big “if”. The same polls also show that Biden-cautious, young Black voters are less likely to turn out in November. If this generational divide that emerged in November is overwhelmingly pro-Biden, we can view the current poll as another red herring.
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- ❌FDIC faces sexual harassment reports: The Wall Street Journal reports that the investigation conducted at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. revealed the facts of sexual harassment and discrimination. More →
- 🤔Conversion is delayed: Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene said she will continue to meet with Speaker Mike Johnson and has yet to follow through on threats to oust him. More →
- 👮In prison: A Russian court has ruled that a US soldier will spend at least two months in prison on theft charges after traveling to the country to meet the woman he was romantically involved with. More →
- 🚨Baden’s speech and the war continues: Biden spoke Remembers the Holocaust and condemns anti-Semitic incidents in America, while Israel continues its operation in Rafah and delegations arrive in Egypt for ceasefire talks. More →
For now, that’s it from The Politics Desk. If you have feedback – like it or not – email us politicsnewsletter@nbcuni.com
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