WITHOUT WORDS: Donald Trump repeatedly vowed that of course he would testify in his New York criminal trial and of course he did not. The defense rested yesterday after calling just two witnesses, neither of them Trump.

  The jury was dismissed through the holiday weekend. Closing arguments, jury instructions, and deliberations are set to begin next Tuesday. After the jury was gone, prosecutors and defense lawyers conferred with Judge Juan Merchan on the all-important issue of the charge to the jury, what the judge tells the 12 about the law and what might be required to convict the former president.

  Trump is charged with 34 counts of falsifying business records to cover a payment to porn actress Stormy Daniels for her silence about a sexual fling in the closing days before the 2016 election. Falsifying business records is a misdemeanor but doing it to affect the outcome of the election would be a felony.

  The final witness, Robert Costello, a lawyer brought by the defense to cast further doubt on the credibility of the prime prosecution witness, former Trump lawyer-fixer Michael Cohen. Prosecutors sought to portray Costello as having been injected into the situation as an agent for Trump, trying to keep Cohen from flipping as a witness after he was raided by the FBI in 2018.

OFF CAMERA: Newly unsealed motions in Trump’s secret documents case reveal that once the former president realized that security cameras at Mar-a-Lago could see employees moving boxes the government was attempting to retrieve, he allegedly ensured that they would avoid the cameras while working. If true, it would be evidence of obstruction and guilt.

RUDY, OH RUDY: Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani called in yesterday to an Arizona court to plead not guilty to charges of attempting to illegally overturn the results of the 2020 election in favor of Donald Trump. Ten other defendants also pleaded not guilty.

  Fellow defendants include Trump’s former chief of staff Mark Meadows, political adviser BorisEpshteyn, and lawyers Christina Bobb, who heads the Republican National Committee’s election integrity unit, John Eastman, and Jenna Ellis.

  Giuliani had dodged his court summons for weeks until he was tracked down at his 80^th birthday party Friday night in Palm Beach, Florida.  In a speech that could have been written by Trump, Giuliani said the Arizona indictment is a “complete embarrassment to the American legal systems,” that the case is “completely political,” and was filed “very, very late.”

  He went on so long the judge said, “I don’t want to mute you.”

  Amidst his legal troubles, Rudy has launched his own brand of coffee, “Rudy.” For $29.99 you get two pounds of the “finest beans imaginable” according to his promotional video. “If I put my name on something, I truly believe in it.” 

TORNADO ALLEY: It’s been a destructive spring in tornado country. At least five massive tornadoes ripped through Iowa yesterday, leaving fields of rubble where once there were homes. Several people are reported to have been killed. 

THE WAR ROOM: Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky told The NY Times that he has unsuccessfully appealed to senior US officials to allow Ukraine to use American missiles and other long range weapons against military targets inside Russia. He said the inability to do so gives Russia a “huge advantage.” 

  The Times report says Zelensky “spoke with a mix of frustration and bewilderment at the West’s reluctance to take bolder steps to ensure that Ukraine prevails.”

  Zelensky said NATO should be shooting down unmanned Russian weapons flying into Ukrainian airspace. “So my question is, what’s the problem? Why can’t we shoot them down? Is it defense? Yes,” he said. “Is it an attack on Russia? No. Are you shooting down Russian planes and killing Russian pilots? No. So what’s the issue with involving NATO countries in the war? There is no such issue.”

THE DIPLOMATIC FRONT: The governments of Spain, Norway, and Ireland all announced that they would recognize a Palestinian state, saying there would be no peace in the Middle East without it. Israel denounced the move as giving aid to it’s the Hamas militant organization that has ruled Gaza.

  Palestinians do not have a country recognized by world governments. The leaders of the three countries emphasized that peace could only come through having both a Jewish and a Palestinian state … the “two-state” solution. 

  The US says recognition of Palestine is premature. But Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Store said, “In the midst of a war, with tens of thousands killed and injured, we must keep alive the only alternative that offers a political solution for Israelis and Palestinians alike: Two states, living side by side, in peace and security.” 

THE OBIT PAGE:

THE SPIN RACK: District Attorney Fani Willis, the Georgia prosecutor driving the election interference prosecution of Donald Trump, and Judge Scott McAfee who is presiding over the case, both won re-election. With Willis in particular that means the case can keep moving. — The Biden administration has forgiven another $7.7 Billion in student loans for 160,000 federal borrowers, bringing the total student debt canceled to $167 billion. — Just days after the release of a video showing hip-hop mogul Sean “Puffy” Combs beating up a girlfriend, a former model has filed a lawsuit accusing him of forcing her to perform oral sex at his New York City recording studio in 2003. — South Carolina’s Republican governor, Henry McMaster, signed a bill barring health professionals from administering gender-transition care for minors under 18 including surgery, puberty blocking drugs, and hormone treatments.

BELOW THE FOLD: Frustrated French film star Gérard Depardieu was seen punching out the famed photographer Rino Barillari, the “king of paparazzi,” outside the also-famous Harry’s Bar on the Via Veneto in Rome. A witness said, “There was a lot of blood.”

   Harry’s Bar was a favorite hangout of Ernest Hemingway who also sometimes punched people. 

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