Trump buries himself even deeper in CNN town hall: Kirschner

Former President Donald Trump compounded his legal woes by making ill-advised comments during his CNN town hall event on Wednesday, according to former federal prosecutor Glenn Kirschner.

During an episode of his Justice Matters podcast on Thursday, the legal analyst and MSNBC contributor maintained that the former president had made “directly incriminating” statements while appearing alongside CNN host Kaitlan Collins during the town hall in New Hampshire.

Kirschner also echoed criticism of the event. He argued that CNN had acted irresponsibly by “giving a microphone and a platform to a man” who “tried to end American democracy,” while saying that “some good did come out of it” due to Trump’s allegedly incriminating statements.

“Somebody probably should have pulled Donald Trump aside and said, ‘you know, sport, you have the right to remain silent,'” said Kirschner. “Donald Trump gave prosecutors and plaintiffs some directly incriminating and actionable evidence.”

Kirschner went on to say that Trump was digging “his own legal grave deeper” after highlighting several of the former president’s comments during the town hall.

During one moment in the broadcast, Collins asked Trump if he had shown the classified documents that he kept after his presidency “to anyone.”

Trump responded by saying “not really” and “not that I can think of,” while wrongly claiming that he would have had “the absolute right to do whatever I want with them.”

“I predict those incriminating statements will be introduced into evidence at the future trial of the United States of America versus Donald Trump,” Kirschner said.

The former prosecutor then turned his attention to Trump incorrectly claiming that he never asked Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” votes that would help him overturn his 2020 election loss to President Joe Biden.

“We’ve all heard that recorded phone call on an endless loop—when Trump is pressuring Brad Raffensperger to find 11,780 votes,” said Kirschner. “I predict this incriminating statement will be introduced in the future criminal trial captioned Georgia versus Donald J. Trump.”

Kirschner continued his analysis by arguing that Trump’s “determination to continue to directly incriminate himself” had also led to him telling “more defamatory lies about E. Jean Carroll” during the town hall.

Trump was ordered to pay Carroll, a former Elle columnist who accuses him of rape, $5 million on Tuesday after a New York jury found him liable for sexually abusing and defaming her. The jury did not find Trump liable for the alleged rape.

Kirschner noted that the jury’s award was intended to be punitive. He suggested that justice would only be served if the former president were sent to jail, although the Carroll case was not criminal.

“Punitive damages are designed to deter Donald Trump from telling defamatory lies in the future,” Kirschner said. “Within days of that jury verdict, Donald Trump goes right out and he does it all over again.”

“Donald Trump will not be deterred by a jury’s verdict or punitive damages,” he continued. “You know what will deter Donald Trump? A jail cell. And that is precisely where our federal prosecutors and our state prosecutors should work their level best to try to put him.”

Kirschner concluded by saying that, despite the CNN town hall producing the “byproduct” of the former president continuing “to incriminate himself,” Trump should not be given a “platform to continue to spew his lies to our nation’s most gullible.”

Newsweek has reached out via email to the office of Trump for comment.

In a previous statement to Newsweek, Trump spokesperson Steven Cheung denounced Kirschner as a “clout-chasing MSNBC contributor” and “a notorious trafficker of wild conspiracy theories and dubious legal analysis” who had “been shunned by the legal community at large.”