"He was hunched over at the defense table, his arms crossed, sour expression on his face. What we saw from Trump in court." - Scott MacFarlane CBS News Reporters reveal the bizarre scene inside the Miami courtroom with Donald Trump
MSNBC's Lisa Rubin was among those reporters that made it into the courtroom ahead of Donald Trump's plea, which means she had a lot of colorful details about the quick arraignment.
She posted a thread online before appearing on air, saying that his close aide Walt Nauta went from being a co-conspirator to a body man, to a defendant and then back to being a body man again.
"If Walt is the new [Allen] Weisselberg, as I have posited before, Molly Michael, who was Trump’s Oval Office executive assistant before moving down to FL with him, just might be the new Cassidy Hutchinson," she tweeted. "The indictment is doused with her texts with Nauta about the location and movement of boxes containing classified documents; she is the one who deemed them the 'beautiful mind boxes,' reflecting how well she understood his intermingling of the mundane and highly sensitive."
Appearing on "Deadline White House," Rubin said that she watched as Trump stared down the audience.
"Trump stood up. All the secret service agents in his protective detail also stood up and flanked him, and they sort of made a formation as they headed to the exit of the courtroom where criminal defendants who are in detention usually enter and exit," she recalled. "I definitely saw Trump. He could have made a beeline for the exit and not looked at anybody in the gallery. Instead, what he did was turn around and stare down all of the reporters on my side of the courtroom as if to scan for a familiar face and maybe some comfort there. But turned toward us with a scowl and very slowly walked along that line of the benches in the courtroom before finally, at the end, turning around, Walt Nauta right behind him, and heading for that defense exit. It was really chilling, you know, from my point of view, never having been in a room with Donald Trump before, to have him sort of stare us all down."
While Rubin was watching that, CBS News reporter Graham Kates told Scott MacFarlane that, from his vantage point, he was watching special counsel Jack Smith.
Smith wasn't behind the bench with the prosecutors. Instead, he was in the audience with the reporters.
Kates also noted that the Justice Department didn't ask for any restrictions for travel either nationally or internationally. Trump was also forced to sign a bond document that says he won't commit any other crimes and that he won't talk to any other witnesses about the case. The bond could be revoked if he breaches the agreement.
Kates said that special counsel Jack Smith "closely watched Trump as Trump exited slowly at the end. He watched Trump glance at reporters sitting in the back. Smith never broke his stare at Trump."
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