During his brief time on the stand, Mr. Costello sparred with the prosecutor, Susan Hoffinger, as his testimony focused on his relationship with Michael D. Cohen, including being an informal adviser to Cohen who made hush-money payments for Trump.
Michael Cohen testified that Mr. Trump had instructed him to make hush-money payments, suspecting that Mr. Costello was ensuring he would not cooperate with prosecutors after the deals surfaced. The prosecutor accused Costello of being an agent for Trump in this regard.
Susan Hoffinger presented emails in court where Costello discussed strategies to handle Cohen, mentioning the need to align Cohen 'on the right page' without appearing to take directions from Giuliani or Trump. This created doubts about Costello's impartiality.
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