Proceedings for Trump’s criminal trial have begun, and CNN’s Jim Acosta is worried about the jury.
Acosta said during a segment that prosecutors are going to face a tough job selecting jurors, lamenting that it would only take one juror to cause a mistrial.
However, Elie Honig, legal analyst at CNN pointed out it’s the other way around. That the ejury is only comprised of jurors from Manhattan where Trump only got 12% of the vote.
“It’s gonna be a challenge both ways. First of all, from Trump’s perspective, this is not a great jury pool for him, right? This is Manhattan-only. No Bronx, no Brooklyn, no Queens, no Staten Island. Manhattan only. A borough, a county where Donald Trump got 12% of the vote in 2020. So he’s worried about that,” Hnig said.
Below is a partial transcript of the segment:
JIM ACOSTA: Guys, busy morning, busy day.
Elie, we got a look last week at the jury questionnaire. How are they looking to root out the candidates? I mean, this is gonna be a challenge, I mean, for these prosecutors. It just takes one person to, to grind this to a halt.
ELIE HONIG: It’s gonna be a challenge both ways. First of all, from Trump’s perspective, this is not a great jury pool for him, right? This is Manhattan only. No Bronx, no Brooklyn, no Queens, no Staten Island. Manhattan only. A borough, a county where Donald Trump got 12% of the vote in 2020. So he’s worried about that.
But you’re right, prosecutors—I’ve been in this situation—are terrified about one lone juror sneaking through who could hang a jury. You need all 12 in order to convict.
The questionnaire is really interesting, because what the questionnaire is trying to do is get at is, first of all, which way do you lean. It doesn’t come out and just ask it. I kinda wish it did, just say like, did you vote for A or B or are you Republican or Democrat?
But there’s all these other proxies for that. Have you ever participated in political activity for or against Trump? Have you ever contributed? That kind of thing.
But it asks a couple of important questions. It says, wherever what you lean, can you still be impartial in this case? Now, some people are going to say, I can’t be impartial. I just lean too strongly. That’s it. And they’re going to be out. But then there’s gonna be a lot of people who say, I do have feelings, but I can put those aside and still be impartial. And that’s where the instinct kicks in. That’s where the judge is going to have to ask, do I believe this person? And more importantly, the parties, who have a limited number, ten each, ten strikes each. They’re going to have to make the decision, do we use one of those ten precious strikes to remove this particular person? It’s a guessing game.
