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Stream ABC news live weeknights wherever you stream your news, only on ABC News Live. Why do so many people start their day here? From ABC news? This is start here to be in the know and get a different take on the day's top stories. A lot of news today, so let's get into it. Listen now to the daily news podcast honored with four Edward R Murrow. Awards and see why. The New York Times calls it a news podcast worth listening to. Start here ABC news make it your daily first listen. Now that's a part of the story I bet you didn't see coming. Wherever you get your podcasts, start here.

I'm Whit Johnson, reporting from Maui. Wherever the story is, we'll take you there. You're streaming ABC News Live.

We're back with the search for two suspected vandals in Nevada. The two men are wanted for toppling ancient boulders at Lake Mead National Recreation Area. The natural rock formations at the Redstone Dunes Trail are protected and started forming when the dinosaurs roamed the Earth.

They started forming about 140 million years ago. The damage is unfortunately permanent, and people won't be able to enjoy that particular location as much as they might have before.

Those men could face felony charges, including fines and even possible jail time.

In Wisconsin, a community is coming together in the search for a woman police say was murdered after going on a first date. Here's ABC's Derek Dennis.

This morning, family and friends of 19 year old Chad Robinson of Milwaukee want closure.

I think everybody's just overwhelmed.

Robinson's cousin among those searching, saying she's too exhausted to go on camera. They're searching a local park for more of her remains after someone found a severed leg linked to Robinson through DNA evidence.

People want to get on the water because obviously he she might be in the water and we don't have the resources.

Police say Robinson was last seen on April 1st, when she was on a first date with this man, 33 year old Maxwell Anderson, who's now charged with homicide, mutilation and arson and Robinson's death.

She was gorgeous and her smile could, like, brighten anyone's day. And she just had that personality where she could cheer you up.

Anderson is held on $5 million bond. Authorities asked about potential ties to other missing women cases in the area said there's no evidence of any other victims for now. Shot. Robinson's loved ones just want to find her.

Our family needs peace and we need closure, so I don't want to stop.

Milwaukee police also found human remains at three other locations, but an ID is still pending. Rhiannon. Andrew.

Really sad story. Derek. Thank you. Coming up, what the lawyer handling O.J. Simpson's will is now revealing.

Also ahead, a slam dunk for Caitlin Clark on SNL. Why tonight's WNBA draft will be unlike any other.

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We're back with a spectacular crash, this car launching into a home near Riverside, California. The driver suffered only minor injuries. He was apparently trying to make a turn, but was going too fast.

Now to the brewing showdown over O.J. Simpson's estate. Simpson was acquitted in his criminal trial, but he was later found liable in a civil suit for the killing of his ex-wife and her friend, Ron Goldman. Simpson was ordered to pay $33 million to their families, but paid only a fraction of those damages. Simpson's lawyer tells Good Morning America the estate needs to take care of other things first, including Simpson's IRS debt.

Mr. Simpson has IRS debt. There's IRS debt that's going to be out there. They don't want to go into any more about it, but it's substantial. And then a host of other creditors, anyone there's going to be a notice to creditors. So that's a part of the process. Those judgments that you talk about, they're just not on my radar.

Simpson had his NFL pension and his actors union residuals. He reportedly made about $400,000 a year.

All right. Now to the excitement building for tonight's historic draft, not the NFL's. The NBA's. We're just hours away from one of the most anticipated drafts in sports history, Caitlin Clark, all but certain to be the number one overall pick.

You make a lot of jokes about women's sports, don't you, Michael?

On Saturday Night Live, she scolded Weekend Update host Michael Che for roasting the WNBA popularity and forced him to read jokes she had written.

The Indiana Fever have the first pick in this Monday's draft of reminder that Indiana Fever is a WNBA team, and not what Michael Che gave to dozens of women at Purdue University.

Back in December, the fever won the lottery to choose first and hit the jackpot. Clark's expected arrival sent ticket prices through the roof more than doubling, and now most of their games will be on national TV.

In terms of attention, we've never, ever, ever seen anything like this.

Clark, along with South Carolina center Camila Cardoso and UCLA guard Kiki Rice, are profiled in an upcoming ESPN docu series, This Moment, showing Clark's competitive spirit when she was a girl learning to ride a bike.

Till I got out my pink bike and I'm like, mom, take my training wheels off to school here.

Now that Blake has learned to ride and he's giving it a shot and she's doing quite well.

Another top contender in tonight's draft, Angel rice. Despite the LSU forward stardom, analysts do not expect her to be chosen in the top five due to worries about whether she can be effective in the pros. What is for certain these players are driving historic interest in women's hoops. The national title game scored bigger TV ratings than the men's Clark. And tonight's draft will be the first in nearly a decade with a live audience. Even SNL's Michael Che will acknowledge it's a slam dunk for the sport.

Thank you. I can't wait to give this to my girlfriend.

You don't have a girlfriend, Michael. Oh, right.

And you can watch the draft tonight on ESPN at 730 eastern.

Should be good. Coming up, former President Trump's trial in New York, how it's affecting Robert De Niro's wardrobe.

Plus, why an octopus may not be the best idea for a pet. One family's horror story.

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America. So what do we serving up?

Well, how about everything you need to know?

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Us afternoons for.

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Why do so many people start their day here from ABC news. This is start here to be in the know and get a different take on the day's top stories. A lot of news today, so let's get into it. Listen now to the daily news podcast honored with four Edward R Murrow Awards, and see why the New York Times calls it a news podcast worth listening to. Start here ABC news. Make it your daily first listen. Now that's a part of the story I bet you didn't see coming. Wherever you get your podcasts, start here.

Whenever, wherever news breaks. It's so important to always remember that lives are changed here in London, in Buffalo, Uvalde, Texas. Edinburgh, Scotland. Reporting from Rolling Fork, Mississippi Ukrainian refugees here in Warsaw, we're heading to a small community outside of Mexico City, getting you behind the stories as they happen. ABC News Live Prime. We'll take you there.

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Here was a story.

Where's Kate's? What's going on with Kate? Of course, the mystery of a missing woman and a royal doesn't get more fascinating than that. Then the.

Moment that silenced.

Everyone.

It's been a really difficult time.

I would argue that the royal family were already facing a crisis. This health crisis has given them probably their biggest challenge the crown in crisis.

What is the relationship like between Harry and William today? Now streaming.

On Hulu.

Reporting from the 2024 campaign trail. I'm Rachael Scott in Des Moines, Iowa. Wherever the story is, we'll take you there. You're streaming ABC News Live.

Time to check the pulse. And we begin with Robert De Niro's pants disrupting security and former President Trump's trial.

De Niro is shooting a Netflix series near that courthouse in Manhattan, and the Secret Service required his wardrobe truck be relocated for their security detail at the courthouse.

Security is tight in New York. Experts say Trump's route from his penthouse to the courthouse will likely change every day as a result.

All right. Next, Scottie Scheffler Life is changing in monumental ways.

The 27 year old just won his second green jacket at the Masters, becoming the fourth youngest player ever to have two jackets. His wife wasn't there to see it. She's pregnant with their first child, Scheffler says. After the baby arrives, golf will move down his list of priorities. Meanwhile, Tiger Woods had a masters to forget, finishing with the highest score among those who played all four rounds. Next Girl Power is fueling a brilliant group of amateur engineers in North Carolina.

The all girls robotics team is headed to the world championship in Texas. The 12 teams call themselves G-Force robotics. They built a robot. It's named Hellcat. It can respond intelligently to remote commands, and the girls have big dreams for their future.

I plan on going into game design. My plan B is going to the Naval Academy to hopefully become a pilot, but I do still want to keep up with robotics and hopefully do maybe BattleBots in the future.

Their coach says robotics also helps build leadership skills. Next, a pet saga playing out on TikTok.

Oh, it got as many twists and turns as an octopus has legs. Or are they arms? Nine year old Cal had a lifelong dream, realized when his dad bought him a pet octopus that they named Terrance. But then Terrance had 50 babies.

Dad now has spent thousands of dollars on tanks, water filters, and yes, food. His advice don't get a pet octopus unless you're ready to lose sleep and also your kid's college fund as well.

Oh scary stuff. Their top headlines next.

First thing in the morning.

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People are talking about the migrant crisis.

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Why do so many people start their day here? From ABC news. This is start here to be in the know and get a different take on the day's top stories. A lot of news today, so let's get into it. Listen now to the daily news podcast honored with four Edward R Murrow Awards, and see why the New York Times calls it a news podcast worth listening to. Start here ABC news make it your daily first. Listen. Now that's a part of the story I bet you didn't see coming. Wherever you get your podcasts, start here.

Wherever news breaks. It's so important to always remember that lives are changed, getting you behind the stories as they happen. ABC News Live Prime we'll take you there.

Streaming free on ABC News Live.

Here was a story.

Where's Kate's? What's going on with Kate? Of course, the mystery of a missing woman and a royal doesn't get more fascinating than that.

Then the moment that silenced everyone in.

It's been a really difficult time.

I would argue that the royal family were already facing a crisis. This health crisis has given them probably their biggest challenge the crown in crisis.

What is the relationship like between Harry and William today? Now streaming.

On Hulu.

Checking more top stories now. Jury selection begins today in former President Trump's historic hush money trial. He has pleaded not guilty to falsifying business records to cover up a sex scandal before the 2016 election. 12 jurors and six alternates need to be selected from hundreds of Manhattan residents.

The white House is urging restraint as Israel decides how to respond to Iran's unprecedented attacks. Most of the missiles and drones were shot down with U.S. help. Oil prices, meanwhile, were flat overnight, a sign the markets may be shrugging off the attack.

Australia is observing a day of mourning after a stabbing rampage at a mall near Sydney left six victims dead. Police believe the attacker, who had mental health issues, may have targeted women in Arizona.

Hundreds rallied for abortion rights days after the state Supreme court reinstated a law effectively banning abortion. The decision is on hold for at least one more week.

Today's weather severe storms in parts of North Carolina and Virginia and in the plains from Kansas to Omaha, damaging winds from Oklahoma City into Texas.

And finally the Boston Marathon runners ready to hit the road.

They include one man who has run a marathon in all 50 states. Every runner set to line up behind this starting line today has the story. 60 year old Scott Klein's journey to today's race started 37 years ago. When he was 25.

I ran with two friends of mine from law school in 1987, really on a lark.

But then he spent 25 years running a very different race, practicing law and raising three children with his wife, Michelle, until he turned 50 and dusted off those running shoes.

And that led to a kind of strange and amazing odyssey to run a marathon in every state.

From Alaska to North Dakota, Alabama to Vermont, telling D magazine that he even finished the marathon in Maui with a broken bone in his foot.

I am not particularly gifted or fast, but I would say that I'm pretty persevering.

And ahead of today's race in Boston, he's sharing this message.

If you have the opportunity to get off the couch and walk a little bit and then run a little bit, just keep going.

Also, keeping the spirit going, dozens of golden retrievers brought together on Boston Common over the weekend, their owners held a meetup to honor the memory of Spencer, the official Boston Marathon dog. Spencer became an iconic symbol of the Boston Marathon after holding a Boston Strong flag along the marathon route for nine years after multiple bouts with cancer. Spencer died last February at the age of 13. Sunday's meet up was a way for these golden retriever owners to take a stand against canine cancer. They're going.

Strong.

Golden, strong. A big congrats and good luck to all the runners today.

This is making news in America this morning. Right now on America. This morning, Trump goes on trial for the first time. A former US president will stand trial on criminal charges. What to expect today in court as Trump's hush money trial begins. And what we're learning about his lawyers strategy.

Happening now, Israel considers whether to retaliate for this weekend's historic attack by Iran, launching hundreds of missiles and drones directly into Israel. President Biden's message to Prime Minister Netanyahu. What officials are saying about U.S. involvement in any potential counterattack.

Developing overnight the mysterious disappearance of two mothers in Oklahoma, four suspects arrested. And now word that two bodies have been recovered in the area.

Plus, what the lawyer handling O.J. Simpson's will is now revealing about Simpson's death.

Caught on camera, the men seen damaging a protected rock formation in the West. The charges they could face.

Caitlyn Clark's.

Big night white. Tonight's WNBA draft will be like none before.

And later meet the all girls high school robotics team now heading to the world championship.

From ABC News in New York.

This is America this morning.

Good Monday morning, everyone I'm Rhiannon Ali.

I'm Andrew Dymburt. We begin with the historic trial of former President Trump in the New York hush money case involving Stormy Daniels.

Jury selection is scheduled to get underway this morning. Currently, this is the only criminal case against Trump that appears on track to wrap up before the election in November, making the stakes even higher for Trump.

So what can we expect in court today? ABC's Perry Russell is at the courthouse in lower Manhattan. Perry. Good morning.

Andrew. Good morning to you. This morning we are getting some new information on Trump's mood and his strategy as he becomes the first former US president to stand trial on criminal charges. This morning, sources describe former President Trump as angry and irritated ahead of jury selection in his New York criminal trial.

This is a fraught.

Moment for all of the people involved, not just the defendant. We've never seen.

Anything even remotely close to this in American history.

Trump faces 34 felony counts. Prosecutors say his one time lawyer, Michael Cohen, paid porn star Stormy Daniels before the 2016 election to keep her quiet about an alleged sexual encounter with Trump. They claim Trump falsified business records to hide the payment from voters. Trump has pleaded not guilty and denies the encounter with Daniels. Last night, he called the trial election interference, writing I will be fighting for myself. But much more importantly, I will be fighting for our country. Sources say Trump's legal team will argue he had nothing to do with lodging his own financial books, and that Cohen is to blame. Cohen spent just over a year in prison in 2018 for lying to Congress, among other crimes. He's expected to tell jurors that Trump directed him to pay Daniels.

The whole case falls apart if if the Trump lawyers are able to persuade the jury that Michael Cohen is not to be trusted, and it'll really come down to if he connects with the jury and you need all 12 of them. If one of them, uh, decides they're not persuaded, then the government effectively loses.

Hundreds of potential jurors have been summoned. They'll be asked 42 questions, including whether they've attended a Trump campaign event or follow him on social media. Trump has claimed too many potential jurors have been exposed to negative stories about him. The trial is expected to last up to eight weeks and Trump is required to attend, meaning he'll be in court four days a week instead of on the campaign trail. Sources also say Trump's lawyers will try to convince him not to hold news conferences in the courtroom hallway, given fears over repeated gag order violations. The judge has warned Trump not to speak about potential jurors.

We've never seen a jury selection process for a former president, and this particular president uses, you know, his social media account not only to spread misinformation, but also to bully judges, their clerks, the lawyers, the, you know, potentially the jurors.

If convicted, Trump faces up to four years in prison. And even if he's reelected to the white House in November, he won't be able to pardon himself because this is not a federal case. And here at the courthouse, there's an elaborate security plan in place to protect Trump, as well as let court operate as usual. We know at least two accused murderers have court dates today while Trump is inside. Andrew.

All right, Perry, thank you so much. And two law enforcement officers have been shot and killed in upstate New York. Officials say a Syracuse police officer and a sheriff's deputy were investigating a suspicious vehicle in the suburb of Liverpool when the shooter opened fire from a house, killing them both. The suspect also.

Died. We turn now to Israel, considering whether to retaliate against Iran for this weekend's historic attack. The white House urging restraint. Here's ABC's Alison Kosik.

This morning, new details about Iran's unprecedented attack on Israel, launching more than 100 ballistic missiles and swarms of drones, a larger attack than expected in retaliation for an airstrike that killed two Iranian generals in Syria this month. A senior U.S. official so surprised that the number of missiles in this weekend's attack that his hand was trembling as he took notes.

Three over here, you can see that rocket flying up in the sky just over Jerusalem. Here. Now it's just raining rockets with those sirens blaring out. You can hear the interceptions every few seconds here.

Overnight, ABC news confirmed at least half of those Iranian missiles either failed to launch, failed in flight, or crashed before reaching their targets in Israel. Israel says 99% of the drones and missiles ended up being intercepted by Israeli U.S. and coalition forces. Those that did hit caused minor damage at an Israeli air base and left a young girl critically wounded from missile shrapnel.

Well, Tehran's massive attack has largely been a failure, a senior official saying that Iran's intent was clearly to be highly, highly destructive, causing significant damage and death in Israel.

And now attention turns to whether Israel will respond. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meeting with his war cabinet yesterday, one member saying Israel would act in the manner and time that is appropriate for us. His war cabinet reportedly supports retaliating against Iran, but is divided over the timing and scale. U.S. officials, while emphasizing Israel's right to defend itself, say the U.S. will not participate in any counter strike. Sources say. President Biden has urged Netanyahu to slow things down and think carefully about the risk of escalation. Biden's call for restraint drawing some criticism on both sides of the aisle.

If Joe Biden, as some press reports have it, is urging the Israelis not to retaliate at all. He is an embarrassment to the United States.

On Capitol Hill, lawmakers are now considering a new military aid package for Israel. A vote could come as soon as this week. Iran's government this weekend sent a message to the white House suggesting they were finished after their attack late Saturday, saying they consider this matter closed. The Biden administration is making the case that this was a success for Israel, suggesting retaliation may not be necessary. Rhiannon.

Andrew Allison, thank you. Today is sentencing day for Hannah Gutierrez, the former weapons supervisor on Alec Baldwin's movie rust. She was convicted of involuntary manslaughter for the death of another crew member, who was shot when a gun held by Baldwin went off. She faces up to 18 months in prison. Prosecutors say Gutierrez has shown no remorse. Alec Baldwin is also charged with involuntary manslaughter. His trial begins in July.

Now to Oklahoma and the search for two missing mothers missing since last month. Police making multiple arrests over the weekend and now a gruesome discovery. Overnight, police in Oklahoma confirmed they have recovered two bodies while investigating the suspicious disappearance of two mothers from Kansas one day earlier. Authorities arrested four people in the case. Among the charges First-Degree murder, kidnapping and conspiracy.

It's really a big deal now. It's somewhat unusual to have four people involved when two moms disappear.

27 year old Veronica Butler and 39 year old Jillian Kelly have been missing since last month, when they drove through Oklahoma's panhandle to pick up Butler's children. Their vehicle later found abandoned in a rural area near the Kansas Oklahoma border. Police say evidence in the vehicle made them suspect foul play. Veronica Butler and the father of her children were reportedly in a bitter custody battle. At least two of the suspects arrested Saturday were reportedly known to Butler, News Nation reports. One is the grandmother of Butler's children, but police have not confirmed that report.

So in every case, every homicide case, you have to be able to tie the suspects. To the victims. So in other words, can they place either the four of them or at least some of the four at the scene committed this crime?

Authorities have not confirmed the identities of the two bodies yet, or the cause of death.

It was five years ago today that a fire nearly destroyed the famed Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. The roof burst into flames, the fire swallowed up the spire and the main bell towers. The cause still hasn't officially been determined, but authorities have pointed at either a cigarette or an electrical problem. Meanwhile, today, the cathedral is nearly restored. The restoration has cost nearly $600 million and is scheduled to reopen in December.

Time now for your Monday weather. Look at this. Two men spotted this dust devil along route route 66 in Arizona. The dust and the tumbleweeds blowing around them, but then quickly moving away. And today, the nation's most severe weather will stretch from Texas all the way to the Dakotas. Tornadoes and large hail are possible as temperatures rise into the 80s. The severe weather threat shifts east tomorrow from Chicago down to Waco, Texas, checking today's high temperatures 67 for today's Boston Marathon 70s around the Great Lakes.

Coming up, the all girls robotics team heading to the world championship.

But first, more tourists behaving badly. The men who damaged a protected rock formation in the west and the charges they could face.

And what police are saying about the young woman allegedly murdered on a first date.

Whenever news breaks. We are here in Israel, a nation at war. After that brutal surprise attack by.

Hamas on the.

Ground in Ukraine.

Reporting from Lewiston, Maine.

The scene of a horrific mass.

Shooting. ABC News Live is right there every. From the scene of that deadly Mrs..

Dnipro, Ukraine.

Reporting from the earthquake in Turkey in Rolling Fork.

This tornado.

Tore through this little town.

From the most devastating disaster in Hawaii from Charleston, South.

Carolina, on the 2024 campaign trail.

In Iceland. Let's go.

Traveling with the president in Mexico City, wherever the.

In the front lines from southern Israel.

Outside the Gaza Strip in Beirut from the FBI.

Reporting from the nurses on the picket line here at ten Downing Street in London, streaming live to you.

Wherever the story is, wherever the story is, wherever.

The story is, we're going to take you there.

You're streaming ABC news.

Live, ABC News Live.

You're streaming ABC news live.

ABC news live streaming free everywhere. America's number one streaming news.

It's lunchtime in America. So what are we serving up?

Well, how about everything you need to know?

You know, that sounds pretty good. Give it to me. Your health, your money, breaking news, pop culture with the biggest stars, music trends, and of course, good food. May 3rd. What you need to know A third hour of GMA in the afternoon. So join us.

Afternoons for everything you need.

To know. I love that.

Me.

You should see me.

The strongest females fight for the survival.

Of their families. You should see me in the crowd right now.

There's just so much happening in our world, so much at stake.

At the start of every morning.

And that's why at Good Morning America.

We're right here.

And we got you, we.

Got you, we got you.

We're back with the search for two suspected vandals in Nevada. The two men are wanted for toppling ancient boulders at Lake Mead National Recreation Area. The natural rock formations at the Redstone Dunes Trail are protected and started forming when the dinosaurs roamed the Earth.

They started forming about 140 million years ago. The damage is unfortunately permanent, and people won't be able to enjoy that particular location as much as they might have before.

Those men could face felony charges, including fines and even possible jail time.

In Wisconsin, a community is coming together in the search for a woman police say was murdered after going on a first date. Here's ABC's Derek Dennis.

This morning, family and friends of 19 year old Chad Robinson of Milwaukee want closure.

I think everybody is just overwhelmed.

Robinson's cousin among those searching saying she's too exhausted to go on camera. They're searching a local park for more of her remains after someone found a severed leg linked to Robinson through DNA evidence.

People want to get on the water because obviously he she might be in the water and we don't have the resources.

Police say Robinson was last seen on April 1st, when she was on a first date with this man, 33 year old Maxwell Anderson, who's now charged with homicide, mutilation and arson in Robinson's death.

She was gorgeous and her smile could, like, brighten anyone's day. And she just had that personality where she could cheer you up.

Anderson is held on $5 million bond. Authorities asked about potential ties to other missing women cases in the area said there's no evidence of any other victims for now. Shot. Robinson's loved ones just want to find her.

Our family needs peace and we need closure, so I don't want to stop.

Milwaukee police also found human remains at three other locations, but an ID is still pending. Rhiannon. Andrew.

Really sad story. Derek. Thank you. Coming up, what the lawyer handling O.J. Simpson's will is now revealing.

Also ahead, a slam dunk for Caitlin Clark on SNL. Why tonight's WNBA draft will be unlike any other future.

Whenever news breaks.

We are here in Israel, a nation at war. After that brutal surprise attack by.

Hamas on the.

Ground in Ukraine.

Reporting from Lewiston, Maine.

The scene of a horrific mass.

Shooting, ABC News Live is right there every.

From the scene of that deadly missile strike in the Dnipro, Ukraine.

Reporting from the earthquake in Turkey in Rolling Fork.

This tornado tore through this little town.

From the most devastating disaster in Hawaii from Charleston, South.

Carolina, on the 2024 campaign trail.

In Iceland. Let's go.

Traveling with the president in Mexico City, wherever the.

From the front lines from southern Israel.

Outside the Gaza Strip in Beirut from the FBI.

Reporting from the nurses on the picket line here at ten Downing Street in London, streaming live to.

You, wherever the story is.

Wherever the story is.

Wherever the story is, we're going to take you there. You were.

Streaming ABC News.

Live, ABC News Live.

You're streaming ABC news live.

ABC news live streaming free everywhere. America's number one streaming news. It's lunchtime in.

America. So what are we serving up?

Well, how about everything you need to know?

You know, that sounds pretty good. Give it to me. Your health, your money. Breaking news, pop culture with the biggest stars, music trends, and of course, good food. Gma3 what you need to know a third hour of GMA in the afternoon. So join us.

Afternoons for.

Everything you need to know.

I love that the.

Me.

You should see me.

The strongest females fight for the survival.

Of their families. Oh, hey. But you should see me in the crowd.

We're back with a spectacular crash, this car launching into a home near Riverside, California. The driver suffered only minor injuries. He was apparently trying to make a turn, but was going too fast.

Now to the brewing showdown over O.J. Simpson's estate. Simpson was acquitted in his criminal trial, but he was later found liable in a civil suit for the killing of his ex-wife and her friend, Ron Goldman. Simpson was ordered to pay $33 million to their families, but paid only a fraction of those damages. Simpson's lawyer tells Good Morning America the estate needs to take care of other things first, including Simpson's IRS debt.

Mr. Simpson has IRS debt. There's IRS debt that's going to be out there. I don't want to go into any more about it, but it's substantial. And then a host of other creditors, anyone there's going to be a notice to creditors. So that's a part of the process. Those judgments that you talk about, they're just not on my radar.

Simpson had his NFL pension and his actors union residuals. He reportedly made about $400,000 a year.

All right. Now to the excitement building for tonight's historic draft, not the NFL's. The NBA's. We're just hours away from one of the most anticipated drafts in sports history, Caitlin Clark, all but certain to be the number one overall pick.

You make a lot of jokes about women's sports, don't you, Michael?

On Saturday Night Live, she scolded Weekend Update host Michael Che for roasting the WNBA popularity and forced him to read jokes she had written.

The Indiana Fever have the first pick in this Monday's draft of reminder that Indiana Fever is a WNBA team, and not what Michael Che gave to dozens of women at Purdue University.

Back in December. The fever won the lottery to choose first and hit the jackpot. Clark's expected arrival sent ticket prices through the roof more than doubling, and now most of their games will be on national TV.

In terms of attention, we've never, ever, ever seen anything like this.

Clark, along with South Carolina center Camila Cardoso and UCLA guard Kiki Rice, are profiled in an upcoming ESPN docu series, This Moment, showing Clark's competitive spirit when she was a girl learning to ride a bike.

While I got out my pink bike and I'm like, mom, take my training wheels off with skill, you know?

Blake's learning to ride. Katie is giving it a shot and she's doing quite well.

Another top contender in tonight's draft, Angel rice. Despite the LSU forward stardom, analysts do not expect her to be chosen in the top five due to worries about whether she can be effective in the pros. What is for certain these players are driving historic interest in women's hoops. The national title game scored bigger TV ratings than the men's Clark. And tonight's draft will be the first in nearly a decade with a live audience. Even SNL's Michael Che will acknowledge it's a slam dunk for the sport.

Thank you. I can't wait to give this to my girlfriend.

You don't have a girlfriend. All right.

And you can watch the draft tonight on ESPN at 730 eastern.

Should be good. Coming up, former President Trump's trial in New York, how it's affecting Robert De Niro's wardrobe.

Plus, why an octopus may not be the best idea for a pet. One family's horror story.

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Time to check the pulse. And we begin with Robert De Niro's pants disrupting security at former President Trump's trial.

De Niro is shooting a Netflix series near that courthouse in Manhattan, and the Secret Service required his wardrobe truck be relocated for their security detail at the courthouse.

Security is tight in New York. Experts say Trump's route from his penthouse to the courthouse will likely change every day as a result.

All right. Next, Scottie Scheffler Life is changing in monumental ways.

The 27 year old just won his second green jacket at the Masters, becoming the fourth youngest player ever to have two jackets. His wife wasn't there to see it. She's pregnant with her first child, Scheffler says. After the baby arrives, golf will move down his list of priorities. Meanwhile, Tiger Woods had a masters to forget, finishing with the highest score among those who played all four rounds. Next Girl Power is fueling a brilliant group of amateur engineers in North Carolina.

The all girls robotics team is headed to the world championship in Texas. The 12 teams call themselves G-Force robotics. They built a robot. It's named Hellcat. It can respond intelligently to remote commands, and the girls have big dreams for their future.

I plan on going into game design. My plan B is going to the Naval Academy to hopefully become a pilot, but I do still want to keep up with robotics and hopefully do maybe BattleBots in the future.

Their coach says robotics also helps build leadership skills. Next, a pet saga playing out on TikTok.

Oh, it got as many twists and turns as an octopus has legs. Or are they arms? Nine year old Cal had a lifelong dream, realized when his dad bought him a pet octopus that they named Terrance. But then Terrance had 50 babies.

Dad now has spent thousands of dollars on tanks, water filters, and yes, food. His advice don't get a pet octopus unless you're ready to lose sleep and also your kid's college fund as well.

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Checking more top stories now. Jury selection begins today in former President Trump's historic hush money trial. He has pleaded not guilty to falsifying business records to cover up a sex scandal before the 2016 election. 12 jurors and six alternates need to be selected from hundreds of Manhattan residents.

The white House is urging restraint as Israel decides how to respond to Iran's unprecedented attacks. Most of the missiles and drones were shot down with U.S. help. Oil prices, meanwhile, were flat overnight signed. The markets may be shrugging off the attack.

Australia is observing a day of mourning after a stabbing rampage at a mall near Sydney left six victims dead. Police believe the attacker, who had mental health issues, may have targeted women in Arizona.

Hundreds rallied for abortion rights days after the state Supreme court reinstated a law effectively banning abortion. The decision is on hold for at least one more week.

Today's weather severe storms in parts of North Carolina and Virginia and in the plains from Kansas to Omaha, damaging winds from Oklahoma City into Texas.

And finally the Boston Marathon runners ready to hit the road.

They include one man who has run a marathon in all 50 states. Every runner set to line up behind this starting line today has the story. 60 year old Scott Klein's journey to today's race started 37 years ago. When he was 25.

I ran with two friends of mine from law school in 1987, really on a lark.

But then he spent 25 years running a very different race, practicing law and raising three children with his wife, Michelle, until he turned 50 and dusted off those running shoes.

And that led to a kind of strange and amazing odyssey to run a marathon in every state, from.

Alaska to North Dakota, Alabama to Vermont, telling D magazine that he even finished the marathon in Maui with a broken bone in his foot.

I am not particularly gifted or fast, but I would say that I'm pretty persevering.

And ahead of today's race in Boston, he's sharing this message.

If you have the opportunity to get off the couch and walk a little bit and then run a little bit, just keep going.

Also, keeping the spirit going, dozens of golden retrievers brought together on Boston Common over the weekend, their owners held a meetup to honor the memory of Spencer, the official Boston Marathon dog. Spencer became an iconic symbol of the Boston Marathon after holding a Boston Strong flag along the marathon route for nine years after multiple bouts with cancer. Spencer died last February at the age of 13. Sunday's meet up was a way for these golden retriever owners to take a stand against canine cancer. Their goal is. Golden strong. A big congrats and good luck to all the runners.

This is making news in America this morning.

It's Monday, April 15th. If the worst case.

Scenario was Iran and Israel in open warfare, well, this is about as close as you can get. We start here. For the first time, Iran launches an aerial attack on Israeli soil.

This used to be a shadow war and now it came out into the open.

Our reporter was in Jerusalem as explosions went off overhead. Iran says they're ready to call it a day. Well, don't expect Israel to do the same.

Really see this as a terrific opening to once and for all. Punch Iran in the nose.

Now, the U.S. is desperately trying to keep this from spiraling out of control. And for the first time in history, a former U.S. president faces a criminal jury. These are 34 criminal counts of.

Falsifying business records.

We'll set you up for what's about to be an unprecedented trial in New York. From ABC news. This is start here. I'm Brad Mielke. For years now. Even before this war in Gaza began, Israel and Iran have been engaged in the type of shadow war. Maybe Israel hits Iran's cyber infrastructure, and then Iran enlists one of its proxy groups to fire rockets into Israeli territory. Or more likely, Iran might detain an Israeli owned ship while Israel responds with an attack on Iranian assets somewhere else. The key to all this is it's never the official national military going into the other countries territory. That would be open warfare, right? This is a shadow war. Well, a couple of weeks ago, an airstrike from Israel hit Iranian military officials. The key here was they weren't on Iranian soil. They were in Syria, but they were at a consular building, which are usually considered pretty off limits by diplomats. At least. Iran was furious and said it would retaliate, while on Saturday night they launched a massive airstrike aimed squarely at Israel itself.

It was quite scary. When the middle of the night we started hearing booming.

I really hope it won't.

Be a big war now. None of us in Israel wants a big war.

The war in Gaza has been devastating. It's been brutal, but it has been relatively contained. The question this morning is whether that is all just changed. ABC's foreign correspondent Jordana miller is based in Jerusalem, where some of these strikes were seen in the Air Jordan. Can you just walk us through what happened?

Well, you know, Israelis had been told for days that Iran was likely to launch a direct strike from its territory onto Israel, but then everything really went into high gear on Saturday night.

Here live Nisman, Iran.

The Israeli spokesperson gave a televised address and said Iran has launched hundreds of ballistic missiles and cruise missiles and drones, and they're headed our way.

It's really a cold machine.

He tried to calm the country by saying, you know, we have all our systems in place, our air defense systems. We've dealt with these threats before. Our allies are helping us. And, you know, then we received another update that at about between 1 and 2 a.m., some of the missiles were not shot down. Some of them might be shot down over Israeli territory. The sirens started to go off first in Israel's north, um, meaning that some had come from the Lebanese and the Syrian border. Then the sirens went off in the south, then the West Bank, and then, to many people's surprise, sirens went off here in Jerusalem. And I would say it was just before 2 a.m. when that happened. Um, you know, I have two young kids. We went to crouch in our safe room, and all of a sudden we started to hear these loud explosions. Now Israel has a multi-layered air defense system. One is the Iron Dome. The middle system is is called the arrow system using the Patriot missiles.

And then they have David Sling, which is the most advanced. We heard probably ten of these missiles or drones being intercepted right in Jerusalem's Old City, which is about a 15 minute walk from where I live. It was a historic night here, of course, because Iran has never struck Israel before. Um, as you said, this used to be a shadow war, and now it came out into the open.

Did any of these missiles and, uh, touching down, uh, like what was sort of the success rate of Israel's defenses here.

So between Israel, the United States and other allies? The Israeli army says that Israel and its partners shot down with a 99% success rate. Almost all of the 350 missiles and drones that were shot over, that includes over 100 ballistic missiles. Wow. So there were a few ballistic missiles that made it through. One hit the the Netafim airbase down in the south. That appears to be one of the main targets. That's where Israel keeps its F-35s. So it looks like the Iranians were trying to take out that air base and destroy some of the F-35s. They didn't get anywhere close to doing that. So it was a in terms of Israel and its partners, it was a spectacular success.

Well, yeah. And we've heard about now US forces scrambling to blow a lot of these ordnance out of the sky. I think it was 70 projectiles shot down by U.S. forces alone. A Navy destroyer brought down three ballistic missiles. How are the United States and Israel and the Iranians? How are they talking about this now?

So Iranian leaders are saying, we're finished.

More mature.

We avenged the killing of our top general and commanders. And if Israel attacks again, the Iranians are saying we will hit them even harder. And they're adding that if the United States takes part in any of Israel's counterstrike, then U.S. bases will also become targets. Of course, there are far right leaders in Netanyahu's government hawks who are pushing for a major attack. But there's also an element in the war cabinet here hinting that Israel doesn't need to attack immediately.

We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will defend help defend Israel, and Iran will not succeed.

But what are the most important factors here is what President Biden thinks and wants. And he's been very clear that he does not want an escalation. He doesn't want a war. He's stood by Israel, and what he wants will be a major factor.

All right. Joanna miller there in Jerusalem. So glad you're safe and your family safe. Thank you so much for for checking in.

Thanks, Brad.

Now, I'm sure a lot of you, me included, are wondering what happens next. Then what are the next steps here? Let's go to Colonel Stephen Gagnon. He's a former Marine and State Department official, now an ABC news contributor. Colonel Gagnon, we had expected Iran to do something on a scale of like 1 to 10. How how alarming did this attack end up being?

I think when the attack started, Brad, it was a ten in terms of how alarmed we were. I can't find anybody, either inside or outside of government, who actually anticipated the numbers of missiles and drones and cruise missiles that were actually shot at Israel. So that part of it, until we saw how effective the air defenses were and missile defenses were in Israel, was quite alarming. By the end of the night, when we saw how few impacts had any real damage done, it was down to about a two. So thanks to technology, started out very, very scary and ended up about as happy as an ending as it could have.

Hey, um, Iran, I'm just thinking from the Iranian perspective, they had a lot of options, right? Because they could have attacked an Israeli embassy. They could have had one of their proxy groups launch this attack. They chose to do it themselves, and they chose to do it in Israel itself. Why?

I think part of it was that when the Israelis hit the consulate, the so-called consulate in Damascus, which was really just a good source in IRGC headquarters, they took it as a direct assault on Iranian sovereignty, because most embassies and consulates are thought of as being sovereign land in whatever country that they're located. And so they saw that they saw another humiliation of another senior IRGC general and a couple of his cronies taken out. It was a huge embarrassment for Iran. And really at home, it all comes back to domestic politics. The mullahs and those running the regime in Iran could not stand losing face and not doing anything directly. What was really surprising was most people thought that they would come in with some sort of a, well, this is just for a show, you know, maybe we'll launch 30 drones at Israel to show that we did something nobody expected. The kind of attack and the magnitude of the attack that we saw.

Does that mean that Iran was essentially ready for. I just think if those missiles had all fallen and they had killed thousands of Israelis, Israel would be at a full scale war with Iran today. Am I getting that right?

I think so, you know, it's hard to understand your calculus here. You know, we have very little insight into how they think or what they're thinking or even what their intent is here. But certainly they must have known that Israel would come back at them. You know, they made all sorts of pronouncements and they told the US through back channels with this was, hey, we're done. That's it. You know, nothing, nothing further to happen here. And it's like it's not going to work that way. You know? The gloves are finally off. The shadow war between Israel and Iran that's been going on for decades is now out in the open. It's the best thing for Netanyahu that he could have ever asked for, because now he doesn't have to deal with the Iranian proxies the Houthis, Hamas, Hezbollah. He can go right at Iran.

So, like he's been saying for years, like this is all Iran's doing. And people are like, okay, fine. Well, now it clearly is right.

And they always had the cutouts. They always had the plausible deniability. They always somebody else was dying for their cause using their money and their weapons. But now there's a direct fingerprints. We know who did this. They deliberately attacked Israel even though they didn't do much military damage. It does give Israel free rein to go after Iranian military activities and installations inside of Iran. And Iran is very, very vulnerable. Israel has a much better capability to project power through air power, through submarine cruise missiles. Iran does not have anything like the air defenses that Israel has, and they will be essentially vulnerable to any kind of attack that Israel decides to undertake.

So Iran put out a statement that basically said, like, okay, we're good, this is over. I'm sure the US would probably love to think that it's over, but is that how Israel sees it? What do you see sort of playing out now with the US and with Israel and the whole thing here?

It is what the white House would like if Israel goes back in and we're hearing from the white House, they know they're going to go do something, but they want to make it something proportional, something modest, something that's not going to turn the whole region into a lake of fire. And so the the white House wants to have things continue to calm down. They don't want this to turn into a regional conflict. On the other hand, the Israelis see Iran as the source of all their problems. Iran is uses the Houthis, Hezbollah and Hamas as proxies, and they all attack Israel. And so now Israel has the chance to go back in and take out that part of the Iranian military that they believe is supplying the surrogates who attack Israel on a daily basis. So from a military perspective here, the Israelis see this as a terrific opening to once and for all, punch Iran in the nose and hopefully have Ron calmed down and not continue to use its proxies in places like Gaza and Syria and Lebanon.

But just to be clear, you see the Israelis now going into Iranian airspace doing strikes the same way that Iran just did to Israel.

I would give it a 90% chance. Wow.

Unbelievable. Here. All right. Colonel Steven Ganor, thank you so much. Thanks, Brett. Okay, next up on start here. Any other day, this would be the lead story. The criminal trial of a former U.S. president is about to get underway. We'll take you there after the break.

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It could be a job all in itself to keep up with the charges against former President Donald Trump. Altogether, Trump faces four criminal indictments in four different cities, all as election season is now in full swing. Well, today, a historic case gets underway in New York City because today, finally is the day Trump becomes the first former U.S. president to stand trial on criminal charges. It's beginning. In this case, he's accused of falsifying business records of hush money payments. Let's bring in ABC's John Santucci, our executive editorial producer covering investigations. John, you've been prepping for this for months now. Can you just sort of team up on what this case is and what's about to happen?

I mean, this is the first one, Brad, if you can believe it. It's nearly a year ago that Donald Trump was first indicted on criminal charges. And it's that case, that first indictment that now is going to trial.

All I can do is tell the truth. And the truth is that there's no case.

They have no case.

So, Brad, here's what's interesting. This case is about election interference, but it's not the 2020 election, which most people think about when they hear those words. It's actually 2016. This is about Donald Trump and his ally at the time, Michael Cohen's efforts to basically catch and kill. It's a practice we've heard now and become too familiar with the idea that a damaging story is out there. You pay somebody off to kill it, to make the story go away. And in this case, it's about a payment that was made to adult film star Stormy Daniels.

I relish the day that I get to face him and speak my truth.

Allegedly, she had an affair with Donald Trump, and it's about a payment to catch and kill that story and make it go away.

The participants scheme was illegal.

And reimbursement payments that Trump made to Michael Cohen that he wrote down as legal fees, which is what we're getting into a real issue here, Brad.

The $130,000 wire payment exceeded the federal campaign contribution cap, and the false statements in my books violated New York law.

Prosecutors say this is all about falsifying documents, right? Covering up what the actual payments were for and thus to impact the election. Now, on the flip side, Trump's team is going to say, look, this was something related to his personal life. Donald Trump didn't want to embarrass himself, and his family didn't want to cause any pain amongst the Trumps. So thus he basically made the story go away because it would have upset his personal life.

So like, no one's no one's arguing with the idea that, like, they caught this story and tried to kill this story with money, it's a question of why you did it, whether it's like, was it to help your election chances that would be bad, or just to like, help your marriage? Because that's actually not against the law?

Well, it's it's all of that. And it's also the idea because at the end of the day, these are 34 criminal counts about falsifying business records. Right? So that's really what we're getting to hear in some ways. Right. And the idea that the prosecutors are making is that, look, this is what it was for. He lied, etc.. And what Trump's team is saying, look, it's a personal matter. Had nothing to do with the campaign. Nothing to do with the Trump Organization. So thus who cares?

I see. Okay. And we should add, Trump is denied having an affair. He's also said things like the stormy nonsense happened many years ago. So I guess you can make it that what you will. He also says all of his criminal charges are politically motivated. John, what happens today like before they even make the opening arguments or something, they have to impanel a jury, right?

What's going to happen, Brad, is that hundreds of New Yorkers are going to pile into this small courtroom in downtown Manhattan for jury selection, which is a process all of us have had. We've all gone to jury duty at one point in our lives or we've avoided it. That's a whole nother issue. But if you are a juror that's up for jury duty in Manhattan, you could be on the Trump case and they've already sent out questionnaires. Brad, asking potential jurors if they're a supporter of Donald Trump's they're familiar with him. Do they subscribe to any conspiracy theories like QAnon? That's going to be something that prosecutors and Trump's legal team are going to ask as they try to whittle this group down?

The most important question is going to be who is on that jury?

Brad, if you can find 12 people, they don't know who Donald Trump is. Man, I think we should you know, I don't know who they are, but God, they're they're something else.

Right. But we should do a better job.

Exactly right. Definitely not you, me and anybody else we work with. But listen, at the end of the day, it's not so much about that, right? It's. Do you have a strong opinion on Donald Trump? And we've all met people that have strong opinions on Donald Trump. Whether you like them, love him or hate him. Right. That's something that they're going to try to whittle out as people that are a bit more agnostic to who Donald Trump is now, that's going to be difficult, certainly, but nevertheless, that's the goal that eventually, once they have this jury, a jury of 12 plus alternates, they'll be the ones to hear this case that will go on for several weeks. Brad, in that Manhattan courtroom.

Regardless of even what the verdict is, what will be the effect of this? Just the ongoing trial on. On the election.

What's interesting about that, Brad, is that it affects the election immediately, because Donald Trump can't campaign as much. I don't know how.

You're going to have a trial that's going on right in the middle of an election. Not fair, not fair.

Most courts sit on a five day schedule, or a four day schedule is more typical. Judges usually take Fridays off. This actually is kind of interesting. The judge here does local service, community service on Wednesdays. So that's going to be the off day. So Donald Trump's going to be in a courtroom Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday. When you talk to his campaign staff, it's endlessly frustrating because usually they'll go off and start doing events later in the week because most people are around later in the week. Wednesdays are kind of complicated. So one of the things team Trump has talked about is that they'll do campaign events around the New York area, some of which could be in New York, because they're going to try to find a way to reach their supporters. I don't think they're going to find a way to flip New York red, but you never know. That's something that they haven't awarded a dream somewhere. But this is going to make a complicated to actually get out the message, get out the vote.

And as Donald Trump certainly is the presumptive Republican nominee at this rate, Brad, he still has work to do. There's still a lot of fundraising that needs to happen, a lot of hands that need to be shaken, and a lot of things that need to be worked towards the convention, the debates and really get us into the fall. So when his schedule is so caught up, because for several hours during the days in a courtroom, it makes the other business just a little bit more complicated.

Yeah, especially when we consider how many there could be more trials down the road. But for right now, it's this one. This is the first time that former US president stands trial criminally. John Santucci, thank you so much.

Thank you Brad.

All right. One more quick break. When we come back, it's tough to keep the streets squeaky clean, but you don't want to welcome everyone to a house warming party. One last thing is next.

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And one last thing. Oh, rats. We try to trap them, trick them and kill them. But could there be a better option? You probably heard that Flacco, the beloved Eurasian owl that escaped the Central Park Zoo, died last month after more than a year of flying free around Manhattan. It was thought he met his demise hitting a window. But further examination revealed a host of health issues, including that Flaco had ingested rat poison and have to die. But those laws will let birds fly. So last week in New York City, a city councilor proposed a new bill instead of putting rat poison out on the streets, which is a risk to dogs, cats and squirrels who prowl the sidewalks along then with the birds of prey that chased them. What if we gave the rats birth control? This is a real idea and actually not a novel one. For years, sanitation departments have experimented with contraceptives that would prevent female rats from giving birth. You just stick them in some bait and let the rats eat them up.

The idea is that this would be a more effective long term plan than killing them. After all, a single pair of rats can theoretically produce 15,000 offspring in the course of a year, but it would also relieve the sanitation workers of what's become a pretty uncomfortable question of animal cruelty. Zoologists say death by poison is extremely painful for rats and mice. Even worse are glue traps, which have now been banned in several American cities. There's a federal bill floating around Congress that would ban them nationwide. Some exterminators prefer carbon monoxide, the gas which can lull animals to sleep. But that's tough to pull off on the scale of a whole housing community or subway stop. And that's really the issue here. We've got lots of methods in this country for battling rats, but the rats keep winning even against this birth control plan that's been tried before. So why would it work this time? Well, New York Mayor Eric Adams has made trash a cornerstone of his first term in office. He's commanded local businesses to place their trash in big containers rather than just in bags they toss on the street.

He's finding homeowners who put their trash out too early. He's even created a city government position known as just the Rat Czar.

I will bring a science and systems based approach to reducing New York City's rat population.

And it's starting to work. Rat sightings are down significantly. The hope is now that rats have fewer opportunities to scavenge food, they'll snap up this bait even more readily, one researcher said. These salty treats taste even better than pizza, which means you also got to make sure this contraception only works on rats, because every creature from New York likes the taste of pizza. My apartment had a mouse in it earlier this year, and our solution ended up being not to kill it, but just wait until it went inside a hole in the wall. Seal all the gaps and cracks in our house. And then when our neighbors started freaking out about mouse sightings, that's when we knew we had succeeded. Very inhumane to our neighbors. But otherwise I felt like we had all of our bases covered. More on all these stories at ABCNews.com or the ABC news app. I'm Brad Mielke. See you tomorrow.

With so much at stake, so much on the line, more Americans turn here than any other newscast. ABC News World News Tonight with David Muir. America's number one most watched newscast across all of television.

First thing in the morning. There's a lot going on.

Yet another avalanche warning that's up.

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Right now on America this morning, Trump goes on trial for the first time. A former US president will stand trial on criminal charges. What to expect today in court as Trump's hush money trial begins. And what we're learning about his lawyers strategy.

Happening now, Israel considers whether to retaliate for this weekend's historic attack by Iran, launching hundreds of missiles and drones directly into Israel. President Biden's message to Prime Minister Netanyahu, what officials are saying about U.S. involvement in any potential counter attack.

Developing overnight the mysterious disappearance of two mothers in Oklahoma, four suspects arrested. And now word that two bodies have been recovered in the area.

Plus, what the lawyer handling O.J. Simpson's will is now revealing about Simpson's death.

Caught on camera, the men seen damaging a protected rock formation in the West. The charges they could face.

Caitlyn Clark's.

Big night white. Tonight's WNBA draft will be like none before.

And later meet the all girls high school robotics team now heading to the world championship.

From ABC News in New York. This is America this morning.

Good Monday morning, everyone I'm Rhiannon Ali.

I'm Andrew Dymburt. We begin with the historic trial of former President Trump in the New York hush money case involving Stormy Daniels.

Jury selection is scheduled to get underway this morning. Currently, this is the only criminal case against Trump that appears on track to wrap up before the election in November, making the stakes even higher for Trump.

So what can we expect in court today? ABC's Perry Rossum is at the courthouse in lower Manhattan. Perry. Good morning.

Andrew, good morning to you. This morning. We are getting some new information on Trump's mood and his strategy as he becomes the first former US president to stand trial on criminal charges this morning. Sources describe former President Trump as angry and irritated ahead of jury selection in his New York criminal trial.

This is a fraught moment for all of the people involved, not just the defendant. We've never seen anything even remotely close to this in American history.

Trump faces 34 felony counts. Prosecutors say his one time lawyer, Michael Cohen, paid porn star Stormy Daniels before the 2016 election to keep her quiet about an alleged sexual encounter with Trump. They claimed Trump falsified business records to hide the payment from voters. Trump has pleaded not guilty and denies the encounter with Daniels. Last night, he called the trial election interference, writing I will be fighting for myself. But much more importantly, I will be fighting for our country. Sources say Trump's legal team will argue he had nothing to do with lodging his own financial books, and that Cohen is to blame. Cohen spent just over a year in prison in 2018 for lying to Congress, among other crimes. He's expected to tell jurors that Trump directed him to pay Daniels.

The whole case falls apart if if the Trump lawyers are able to persuade the jury that Michael Cohen is not to be trusted, and it'll really come down to if he connects with the jury and you need all 12 of them. If one of them, uh, decides they're not persuaded, then the government effectively loses.

Hundreds of potential jurors have been summoned. They'll be asked 42 questions, including whether they've attended a Trump campaign event or follow him on social media. Trump has claimed too many potential jurors have been exposed to negative stories about him. The trial is expected to last up to eight weeks and Trump is required to attend, meaning he'll be in court four days a week instead of on the campaign trail. Sources also say Trump's lawyers will try to convince him not to hold news conferences in the courtroom hallway, given fears over repeated gag order violations. The judge has warned Trump not to speak about potential jurors.

We've never seen a jury selection process for a former president, and this particular president uses, you know, his social media account not only to spread misinformation, but also to bully judges, their clerks, the lawyers, the, you know, potentially the jurors.

If convicted, Trump faces up to four years in prison. And even if he's reelected to the white House in November, he won't be able to pardon himself because this is not a federal case. And here at the courthouse, there's an elaborate security plan in place to protect Trump, as well as let court operate as usual. We know at least two accused murderers have court dates today while Trump is inside. Andrew.

All right, Perry, thank you so much. And two law enforcement officers have been shot and killed in upstate New York. Officials say a Syracuse police officer and a sheriff's deputy were investigating a suspicious vehicle in the suburb of Liverpool when the shooter opened fire from a house, killing them both. The suspect also.

Died. We turn now to Israel, considering whether to retaliate against Iran for this weekend's historic attack. The white House urging restraint. Here's ABC's Alison Kosik.

This morning, new details about Iran's unprecedented attack on Israel, launching more than 100 ballistic missiles and swarms of drones, a larger attack than expected in retaliation for an airstrike that killed two Iranian generals in Syria this month. A senior US official so surprised that the number of missiles in this weekend's attack that his hand was trembling as he took notes.

Three over here you can see that rocket flying up in the sky just over Jerusalem. Here. Now it's just raining rockets with those sirens blaring out. You can hear the interceptions every few seconds here.

Overnight, ABC news confirmed at least half of those Iranian missiles either failed to launch, failed in flight, or crashed before reaching their targets in Israel. Israel says 99% of the drones and missiles ended up being intercepted by Israeli, U.S. and coalition forces. Those that did hit caused minor damage at an Israeli air base and left a young girl critically wounded from missile shrapnel.

Well, Tehran's massive attack has largely been a failure, a senior official saying that Iran's intent was clearly to be highly, highly destructive, causing significant damage and death in Israel.

And now attention turns to whether Israel will respond. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meeting with his war cabinet yesterday, one member saying Israel would act in the manner and time that is appropriate for us. His war cabinet reportedly supports retaliating against Iran, but is divided over the timing and scale. U.S. officials, while emphasizing Israel's right to defend itself, say the U.S. will not participate in any counter strike. Sources say. President Biden has urged Netanyahu to slow things down and think carefully about the risk of escalation. Biden's call for restraint drawing some criticism on both sides of the aisle.

If Joe Biden, as some press reports have it, is urging the Israelis not to retaliate at all. He is an embarrassment to the United States.

On Capitol Hill, lawmakers are now considering a new military aid package for Israel. A vote could come as soon as this week. Iran's government this weekend sent a message to the white House suggesting they were finished after their attack late Saturday, saying they consider this matter closed. The Biden administration is making the case that this was a success for Israel, suggesting retaliation may not be necessary. Rhiannon. Andrew Allison, thank you.

Today is sentencing day for Hannah Gutierrez, the former weapons supervisor on Alec Baldwin's movie rust. She was convicted of involuntary manslaughter for the death of another crew member, who was shot when a gun held by Baldwin went off. She faces up to 18 months in prison. Prosecutors say Gutierrez has shown no remorse. Alec Baldwin is also charged with involuntary manslaughter. His trial begins in July.

Now to Oklahoma and the search for two missing mothers missing since last month. Police making multiple arrests over the weekend and now a gruesome discovery. Overnight, police in Oklahoma confirmed they have recovered two bodies while investigating the suspicious disappearance of two mothers from Kansas one day earlier. Authorities arrested four people in the case. Among the charges First-Degree murder, kidnapping and conspiracy.

It's really a big deal now. It's somewhat unusual to have four people involved when two moms disappear.

27 year old Veronica Butler and 39 year old Jillian Kelly have been missing since last month, when they drove through Oklahoma's panhandle to pick up Butler's children. Their vehicle later found abandoned in a rural area near the Kansas Oklahoma border. Police say evidence in the vehicle made them suspect foul play. Veronica Butler and the father of her children were reportedly in a bitter custody battle. At least two of the suspects arrested Saturday were reportedly known to Butler, News Nation reports. One is the grandmother of Butler's children, but police have not confirmed that report.

So in every case, every homicide case, you have to be able to tie the suspects to the victims. So, in other words, can they place either the four of them or at least some of the four at the scene committed this crime?

Authorities have not confirmed the identities of the two bodies yet, or the cause of death.

It was five years ago today that a fire nearly destroyed the famed Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. The roof burst into flames. The fire swallowed up the spire and the main bell towers. The cause still hasn't officially been determined, but authorities have pointed at either a cigarette or an electrical problem. Meanwhile, today, the cathedral is nearly restored. The restoration has cost nearly $600 million and is scheduled to reopen in December.

Time now for your Monday weather. Look at this. Two men spotted this dust devil along route route 66 in Arizona. The dust and the tumbleweeds blowing around them, but then quickly moving away. And today, the nation's most severe weather will stretch from Texas all the way to the Dakotas. Tornadoes and large hail are possible as temperatures rise into the 80s. The severe weather threat shifts east tomorrow from Chicago down to Waco, Texas, checking today's high temperatures 67 for today's Boston Marathon 70s around the Great Lakes.

Coming up, the all girls robotics team heading to the world Championship.

But first, more tourists behaving badly. The men who damaged a protected rock formation in the west and the charges they could face.

And what police are saying about the young woman allegedly murdered on a first date.

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We're back with the search for two suspected vandals in Nevada. The two men are wanted for toppling ancient boulders at Lake Mead National Recreation Area. The natural rock formations at the Redstone Dunes Trail are protected and started forming when the dinosaurs roamed the Earth.

They started forming about 140 million years ago. The damage is unfortunately permanent, and people won't be able to enjoy that particular location as much as they might have before.

Those men could face felony charges, including fines and even possible jail time.

In Wisconsin, a community is coming together in the search for a woman police say was murdered after going on a first date. Here's ABC's Derek Dennis.

This morning, family and friends of 19 year old Shad Robinson of Milwaukee want closure.

I think everybody's just overwhelmed.

Robinson's cousin among those searching, saying she's too exhausted to go on camera. They're searching a local park for more of her remains after someone found a severed leg linked to Robinson through DNA evidence.

People want to get on the water because obviously he she might be in the water and we don't have the resources.

Police say Robinson was last seen on April 1st, when she was on a first date with this man, 33 year old Maxwell Anderson, who's now charged with homicide, mutilation and arson in Robinson's death.

She was gorgeous and her smile could, like, brighten anyone's day. And she just had that personality where she could cheer you up.

Anderson is held on $5 million bond. Authorities asked about potential ties to other missing women cases in the area, said there's no evidence of any other victims for now. Shot. Robinson's loved ones just want to find her.

Our family needs peace and we need closure, so I don't want to stop.

Milwaukee police also found human remains at three other locations, but an ID is still pending. Rhiannon. Andrew.

Really sad story. Derek. Thank you. Coming up, what the lawyer handling O.J. Simpson's will is now revealing.

Also ahead, a slam dunk for Caitlin Clark on SNL. Why? Tonight's WNBA draft will be unlike any other future.

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We're back with a spectacular crash, this car launching into a home near Riverside, California. The driver suffered only minor injuries. He was apparently trying to make a turn, but was going too fast.

Now to the brewing showdown over O.J. Simpson's estate. Simpson was acquitted in his criminal trial, but he was later found liable in a civil suit for the killing of his ex-wife and her friend, Ron Goldman. Simpson was ordered to pay $33 million to their families, but paid only a fraction of those damages. Simpson's lawyer tells Good Morning America the estate needs to take care of other things first, including Simpson's IRS debt.

Mr. Simpson has IRS debt. There's IRS debt that's going to be out there. I don't want to go into any more about it, but it's substantial. And then a host of other creditors, anyone there's going to be a notice to creditors. So that's a part of the process. Those judgments that you talk about, they're just not on my radar.

Simpson had his NFL pension and his actors union residuals. He reportedly made about $400,000 a year.

All right. Now to the excitement building for tonight's historic draft. Not the NFL's. The NBA's. We're just hours away from one of the most anticipated drafts in sports history, Caitlin Clark, all but certain to be the number one overall pick.

You make a lot of jokes about women's sports, don't you, Michael?

On Saturday Night Live, she scolded Weekend Update host Michael Che for roasting the WNBA popularity and forced him to read jokes she had written.

The Indiana Fever have the first pick in this Monday's draft, a reminder that Indiana Fever is a WNBA team and not what Michael Che gave to dozens of women at Purdue University.

Back in December. The fever won the lottery to choose first and hit the jackpot. Clark's expected arrival sent ticket prices through the roof more than doubling, and now most of their games will be on national TV.

In terms of attention, we've never, ever, ever seen anything like this.

Clark, along with South Carolina center Camila Cardoso and UCLA guard Kiki Rice, are profiled in an upcoming ESPN docu series, This Moment, showing Clark's competitive spirit when she was a girl learning to ride a bike.

While I got out my pink bike and I'm like, mom, take my training wheels off to school here.

Now that Blake has learned to ride, Katy is giving it a shot and she's doing quite well.

Another top contender in tonight's draft, Angel Reese. Despite the LSU forward stardom, analysts do not expect her to be chosen in the top five due to worries about whether she can be effective in the pros. What is for certain these players are driving historic interest in women's hoops. The national title game scored bigger TV ratings than the men's Clark. Oh, and tonight's draft will be the first in nearly a decade with a live audience. Even SNL's Michael Che will acknowledge it's a slam dunk for the sport.

Thank you. I can't wait to give this to my girlfriend.

You don't have a girlfriend, Michael, all right.

And you can watch the draft tonight on ESPN at 730 eastern.

Should be good. Coming up, former President Trump's trial in New York, how it's affecting Robert De Niro's wardrobe.

Plus, why an octopus may not be the best idea for a pet. One family's horror story.

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Reporting from the Oscars red carpet I'm Melissa Don. Wherever the story is will take you there. You're streaming ABC news live.

Time to check the pulse. And we begin with Robert De Niro's pants disrupting security at former President Trump's trial.

De Niro is shooting a Netflix series near that courthouse in Manhattan, and the Secret Service required his wardrobe truck be relocated for their security detail at the courthouse.

Security is tight in New York. Experts say Trump's route from his penthouse to the courthouse will likely change every day as a result.

All right. Next, Scottie Scheffler Life is changing in monumental ways.

The 27 year old just won his second green jacket at the Masters, becoming the fourth youngest player ever to have two jackets. His wife wasn't there to see it. She's pregnant with their first child, Scheffler says. After the baby arrives, golf will move down his list of priorities. Meanwhile, Tiger Woods had a masters to forget, finishing with the highest score among those who played all four rounds. Next Girl Power is fueling a brilliant group of amateur engineers in North Carolina.

The all girls robotics team is headed to the World Championship in Texas. The 12 teams call themselves G-Force robotics. They built a robot. It's named Hellcat. It can respond intelligently to remote commands, and the girls have big dreams for their future.

I plan on going into game design. My plan B is going to the Naval Academy to hopefully become a pilot, but I do still want to keep up with robotics and hopefully do maybe BattleBots in the future.

Their coach says robotics also helps build leadership skills. Next, a pet saga playing out on TikTok.

Oh, it got as many twists and turns as an octopus has legs. Or are they arms? Nine year old Cal had a lifelong dream, realized when his dad bought him a pet octopus that they named Terrance. But then Terrance had 50 babies.

Dad now has spent thousands of dollars on tanks, water filters, and yes, food. His advice don't get a pet octopus unless you're ready to lose sleep and also your kid's college fund as well.

Oh scary stuff there. The top headlines next.

This is ABC News Live.

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Well, how about everything you need to know?

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Checking more top stories now. Jury selection begins today in former President Trump's historic hush money trial. He has pleaded not guilty to falsifying business records to cover up a sex scandal before the 2016 election. 12 jurors and six alternates need to be selected from hundreds of Manhattan residents.

The white House is urging restraint as Israel decides how to respond to Iran's unprecedented attacks. Most of the missiles and drones were shot down with U.S. help. Oil prices, meanwhile, were flat overnight, a sign the markets may be shrugging off the attack.

Australia is observing a day of mourning after a stabbing rampage at a mall near Sydney left six victims dead. Police believe the attacker, who had mental health issues, may have targeted women in Arizona.

Hundreds rallied for abortion rights days after the state Supreme court reinstated a law effectively banning abortion. The decision is on hold for at least one more week.

Today's weather severe storms in parts of North Carolina and Virginia and in the plains from Kansas to Omaha, damaging winds from Oklahoma City into Texas.

And finally, the Boston Marathon runners ready to hit the road.

They include one man who has run a marathon in all 50 states. Every runner set to line up behind this starting line today. Has the story. 60 year old Scott Klein's journey to today's race started 37 years ago. When he was 25.

I ran with two friends of mine from law school in 1987, really on a lark.

But then he spent 25 years running a very different race, practicing law and raising three children with his wife, Michelle, until he turned 50 and dusted off those running shoes.

And that led to a kind of strange and amazing odyssey to run a marathon in every state, from.

Alaska to North Dakota, Alabama to Vermont, telling D magazine that he even finished the marathon in Maui with a broken bone in his foot.

I am not particularly gifted or fast, but I would say that I'm pretty persevering. And ahead of.

Today's race in Boston, he's sharing this message.

If you have the opportunity to get off the couch and walk a little bit and then run a little bit, just keep going.

Also keeping the spirit going, dozens of golden retrievers brought together on Boston Common over the weekend. Their owners held a meetup to honor the memory of Spencer, the official Boston Marathon dog. Spencer became an iconic symbol of the Boston Marathon after holding a Boston Strong flag along the marathon route for nine years after multiple bouts with cancer. Spencer died last February at the age of 13. Sunday's meet up was a way for these golden retriever owners to take a stand against canine cancer. They're going strong. Golden, strong. A big congrats and good luck to all the runners.

This is making news in America this morning.

More Americans choose ABC news America's number one news source.

Good morning. Welcome to ABC News Live. I'm Stephanie Ramos. Let's get right to our top story this morning, the historic first ever trial of a former president set to begin today. Former President Trump is expected in court in New York City in lower Manhattan for jury selection. In the hush money case against him, the Manhattan district attorney charged Trump with falsifying business records to conceal payments he allegedly made to Stormy Daniels through his then attorney, Michael Cohen. Trump pleaded not guilty to the 34 charges last year, calling the case election interference and a witch hunt. The judge has imposed a limited gag order, keeping Trump from making comments about jurors, witnesses, individual prosecutors and the families of the judge and the district attorney. But Trump has pushed the boundaries of that order, targeting some witnesses and the judge's daughter on social media. The former president has campaigned on his legal battles, telling his supporters he wears the indictments as a badge of honor. Most of the Republican Party has rallied behind him, even as some privately admit the allegations make them deeply uncomfortable.

We have full team coverage this morning, as the former president is expected to make his way to court right here in Manhattan, starting with our senior investigative correspondent, Aaron Katersky, who has the latest from New York.

Docket number 71543. The people of the State of New York versus Donald J. Trump will be called for jury selection. Lawyers will begin choosing 12 jurors and six alternates to hear this unprecedented case.

And I'm proud to do it for you. Have a good time watching.

Trump may be wearing his indictment like a badge of honor, but he has repeatedly tried to delay this trial, an appeals court rejecting him each time. So for the next couple of months, Trump will be running to reclaim the white House while spending most of his time on the 15th floor of the courthouse. Thank you very much, everybody. Trump has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records in a case involving a former president, a publisher and an adult film actress.

I relish the day that I get to face him and speak my truth.

Prosecutors allege Trump feared for his electoral prospects in 2016 if the public were to learn about Stormy Daniels, who claims she had sex with Trump, which he denied, the Access Hollywood tape had just surfaced. Trump heard boasting of grabbing women.

When you started, they let you do it.

You can do anything.

Prosecutors put Trump at the center of an alleged scheme to bury damaging stories before the 2016 election, with the help of David Pecker at the National Enquirer. He now has an immunity agreement with prosecutors. The indictment said pecker arranged a $130,000 hush payment to Daniels. Michael Cohen wired the money, and Trump falsely recorded monthly reimbursements to Cohen as legal services.

For nine straight months. The defendant held documents in his hand containing this key lie.

Once jury selection is complete, ex Playboy model Karen McDougal is expected to testify. So is Trump's longtime trusted aide, Hope Hicks. Trump has said he might testify to.

I would testify, absolutely.

Senior investigative correspondent Aaron Katersky, executive editorial producer John Santucci, and legal contributor Brian Meier joined me. Now for more on this. Aaron, I want to start with you. You have been following this case since the very beginning. This is a significant day. Talk to us how we got here exactly.

It's an unheard of day. A former American president standing trial as a criminal defendant. Donald Trump was the first former president to be charged, now the first former president to stand trial. And he tried feverishly to avoid this day with repeated requests to an appeals court to delay each time his attorneys were turned aside. And now he's preparing to arrive here, go up to the 15th floor of the courthouse for jury selection and perhaps a hearing about his potential testimony in the case. And we got here because, according to Stormy Daniels, the two of them had sex in 2006. He has long denied that. But when he was close to the 2016 campaign, he decided that he didn't want the public to learn about anything. Stormy Daniels had to say true or false, and so he paid $130,000 in hush money arranged through the publisher of the National Enquirer. And according to prosecutors, when he reimbursed his then attorney, Michael Cohen in monthly installments, he logged those payments illegally as legal services, when in fact, prosecutors say it was really campaign related meant to conceal this potential sex scandal from voters.

It has been a roller coaster ride for, for for so many years now. John, I want to bring you in on this. Uh, what are you hearing from Trump's inner circle about his mindset going into this trial? You know, it's interesting.

It's almost like, um, you know, I've covered Donald Trump for nearly a decade for ABC. It's always this idea that there are multiple Donald Trumps. And speaking to sources along with our colleagues over the weekend, there are two Donald Trumps right now in the sense that Donald Trump, the candidate, and Donald Trump the defendant, and in the form of the candidate, Donald Trump was on the campaign trail all weekend, was in a good mood. Apparently the weather where he was campaigning on Saturday was horrible, one aide said. Everybody was miserable but him. He was totally in the zone in his moment. Then you pivot to Donald Trump, who's now become a visiting New Yorker because of this trial. Stephanie and everything I hear angry, livid, can't stop talking about it. One person said to me. It's a rare moment where the public, facing bravado we see of Donald Trump is exactly what we are. The closed circle of aides around him are seeing behind those closed doors. He cannot get over the fact this is happening.

He is angry at the fact that every delay tactic they have tried to pull out of their box has failed. So the reality is that this is going to be a very livid and frustrated Donald Trump. The other thing that I hear, which is actually really interesting, is that Donald Trump is finding a way to bring more and more of his team around him into the courtroom, right? Having people there to support him, having not only the campaign staff, but members of the Trump Organization, because this is a case where it's been frustrating for him because of what it comes down to. Right? It is about, though, money and payments. It is about his personal life and the idea that so much of that is going to be broadcast out to the public, even though there's no cameras. But we're going to be talking about, as one person said, at the end of the day, it's really just embarrassing to him.

It'd be interesting to see if he takes a stand at any point. Well, and.

He's indicated he would. I mean, you know, our Olivia Rubin and Rachel Scott asked him this repeatedly over the last couple of weeks. Um, Rachel, just the last couple of days, he has said he wants to. And one of the things that Aaron and our colleague Katherine Faulders are hearing is that that's going to come up this morning, potentially ahead of jury selection, because it has been raised as a possibility. So I do think knowing Donald Trump and again, don't take my word for it, look at what we've already seen in the last couple of months in the New York attorney general civil case, Donald Trump believes he is his best spokesperson, his best advocate. At the end of the day, the best person to testify about him. So I do think despite everybody saying don't do it, if Donald Trump thinks that there is a modicum possibility, he, in his words, can make this go away, I bet he takes this.

And we'll see. Brian, I want to bring you into this. Trump's team calls this all a fantasy. How do you expect for them to make their case here?

I think this case is going to be about who are the best witnesses for the prosecution and for the defense team. They're going to say, hey, you've got a person who is lied under oath in court to law enforcement, to Congress, and this is your star witness, Michael Cohen, and try to paint him as a person that no juror can trust. And if you can find some cracks in that kind of argument, and also pointing to Stormy Daniels saying she's got a financial gain here, and there's a story to be told and a story to be sold. And if the defense can create any kind of doubt in their testimony going forward, that's enough for them. And I think as Donald Trump and as most defense attorneys and most defendants would say, I just need one, and jury selection here is going to be starting to kind of understand that landscape of who is a potential juror, who will take the information as the defense wants to present it and say, you know what, you can't really trust a liar.

Why would I trust them now? And I think that's the Army they're going to make going forward, in this case.

Hundreds and hundreds of people basically auditioning for this role of juror. And it will be so hard to find someone who hasn't been kind of affected by what's been in the news, the rallies and all, and the rhetoric that. We've heard from the former president.

That anybody that doesn't know the defendant. Right. I mean, that's so many often the thing when we've all at one point probably gone through is sad for jury selection. Right. That's one question. Do you know the defendant who in New York, who in the United States would be able to say, no, I don't know who Donald Trump is exactly.

It'll be very difficult. All right. Let's take a live look. Now we're looking at live pictures at Trump Tower of Trump Tower, where former President Trump is expected to depart for court any minute. Erin, this morning may start with a hearing over what prosecutors can ask for the former president during cross-examination whether he should take the stand. We just talked about it. Uh, what do you think? Can we expect the former president to testify? And what can we expect to hear if he does? What are your thoughts on that?

This is called a Sandoval hearing, and it's common when a defendant is thinking about taking the witness stand in his own defense. And here the defense is asking the judge to set limits on the kinds of questions that prosecutors can ask on cross-examination, because prosecutors would want to ask Trump about a lot of things potentially embarrassing about a sex life, given what some of this case is actually about. And the defense doesn't want the jury to hear any of that. They also would like to ask Trump about prior civil cases involving Eugene Carroll, the writer who twice has won a civil case against Donald Trump, and about the civil case involving business fraud that the former president just paid $125 million bond to to to cover a civil fraud judgment. And the defense doesn't want any of that before the jury. So this hearing that could potentially take place before jury selection begins would be to set the bounds of the kinds of things Trump could ask. And if the judge says everything's fair game, well, then that may make Trump think twice, potentially about about taking the witness stand.

Absolutely. All right. I want to turn it over to Trevor. All this historic trial against the former president is, of course, bringing a lot of attention to the New York courthouse, where jury selection is set to begin, as we mentioned. ABC's Trevor Ault is monitoring potential protests there for us. Trevor, what are you seeing?

Well, we're starting to see the first people kind of.

File in here. Stephanie. We are in a park that.

Is literally in the shadow of the.

Courthouse. This is the courthouse here.

You see all the media.

Lined up on the sidewalk, and they're going to be broadcasting throughout the day. Here we have just over my left shoulder, some of those first demonstrators. So this is where the pro-Trump demonstrators tend to gather. We've seen this in the past when the former president has been here before. It's been a number of flags flying.

And thank you, Trevor, I'm sorry. Going to have to interrupt for just one second. We are seeing the former president exiting Trump Tower right now here in New York City. You saw him there. He walked out, kind of gave like a fist pump, right? Is that what you saw, John?

I saw a fist pump. Also see Trump's lead counsel, Todd Blanch walking out with him. And again, that is something that and speaking to sources close to the former president, every day the legal team is expected to take that commute. Stephanie, with Donald Trump to court, probably, you know, in knowing Donald Trump this morning, surrounded by the campaign and the legal staff getting like a last minute briefing, sort of a rundown of what today is going to be. And now he's going to take that ride. It's interesting. I'm curious, and I'll know hopefully shortly. Every time Donald Trump has gone to court, though, many people join him in the motorcade, most often he actually goes in the car by himself just with his Secret Service detail. Usually a little bit of time. Oddly, for Donald Trump, who likes to be surrounded by people just to sort of have a moment right by himself, so we'll know for sure, certainly, if that is the case for this ride.

But, you know, it's also a ride that you have to think about. Donald Trump, right? This is a guy that wanted to make it in Manhattan. He is often said that Fifth Avenue and 725 Fifth Avenue, which is the address of Trump Tower, is the most famous address in New York. It's something that he always wanted to be as a kid who grew up in Queens living on Fifth Avenue, this is a very different trip for Donald Trump. It is amazing to think one year ago this time, he was heading to this courtroom to be arraigned on an indictment of criminal charges. And now for this trial, just the weight of that has got to be hitting him this morning.

It's it's also absolutely I agree with you, John. And also, this is the, as you said, famous Fifth Avenue where he said many, many years ago where he could shoot someone and probably get away with.

It and never lose a supporter. I mean, and that's something that Donald Trump is hoping that this trial will help him with, right? Just to build support, play into the idea it is a rigged system out to get him. And that is where Donald Trump is hoping, though personally and criminally, this is not good for him politically. It could benefit him.

And we are watching that convoy right now, making its way through Manhattan, headed to lower Manhattan. It'll probably take a little bit of time with traffic. And of course, people who are aware that this is happening in New York City, probably stopping to to watch and take pictures. I want to bring in ABC's contributor and former Georgia prosecutor, Chris Timmons to talk a little bit about this. Trump is charged, of course, with falsifying business records to conceal criminal conduct. For those that are just joining us, Chris, what does the district attorney need to prove here?

Wow. So they've got to prove a few different things when they've got to prove that he falsified the records. That's the most obvious thing. The second thing, though, that they've got to prove, is that he falsified those records as a part of a campaign scheme. So it's not just that the records were false, but also that the purpose behind it or his intent when he was, uh, issuing those records, when he was falsifying those records, the intent was to win the election, to keep this information that would be potentially damaging to him out of the spotlight. And so that's one of the things that a lot of people don't remember is that, you know, they think now a big deal. Everybody knows about Stormy Daniels. It's it's nothing huge. But back then you know the Access Hollywood tape hadn't come out. He was still trying to protect his reputation. And back then the Republican Party was known as, you know, the kind of the family values party. So to have something come out like that at the front of the campaign, they thought would be extremely damaging.

And we are watching live images of the former president making his way through Manhattan there to the courthouse. I want to bring Aaron and Aaron. What is the security protocol there for Trump's appearance? We heard from Trevor saying that there are already people gathered there near the courthouse. What are you seeing and what is that protocol?

A number of streets will be blocked to traffic, and then pedestrians will be halted in their tracks as the motorcade approaches, until former President Trump is safely inside the courthouse and brought up to the 15th floor for today's proceedings. Stephanie, because he is effectively the Republican nominee that increased the security protocol beyond what he would ordinarily be afforded from the Secret Service as a former American president. And so there's a plan outside by the NYPD, the court security officers are handling inside the building and the immediate perimeter, and then the Secret Service right around right around the president. This is, by the way, a criminal courthouse that's still functioning. At least two murder suspects are scheduled to have hearings today. A guy who shot a couple of people allegedly in Tompkins Square Park. He's being brought in for arraignment. So there are bad people that are being brought into this courthouse at the same time that Trump is here to begin his criminal trial.

And that's certainly going to be a stark image there for those who are just joining us, we are watching the historic criminal trial of President Trump that is now set to get underway. Any moment now, we're seeing live images here of the former president's car and his convoy making his way down to that courthouse there where our Aaron Katersky and Trevor Alt are located. Brian, I want to bring you in. Trump's lawyers have argued that the entire process cannot fairly take place in Manhattan, where they argue that too many potential jurors have negative opinions about the former president. We spoke about this just a few moments ago. What is your take on that?

I think that's the ability of any defense attorney to say, hey, I can see what county is not going to be beneficial for me. And I think what Donald Trump's attorneys are looking at are probably elections. Uh, the way elections are results from the different counties. Manhattan probably not the greatest place for you. Brooklyn. Probably not the greatest. Staten Island. I probably sure he would want to go there. Orange County he tried a few a few counties north of Westchester. He would love to go there. A lot of times when people look at New York State, they say it's a blue state through and through. No, there are a lot of red pockets, and I think that Donald Trump is probably looking towards that area. But this standard I think John has kind of touched on, it's not a matter of whether you know who Donald Trump is. You like him, you don't like him because he's a very polarizing figure. I don't think there's many people on the on the middle in terms of how you feel about Donald Trump.

The idea is, can you take that information, put it aside, and only weigh the evidence as you see it in the courtroom? And I think there are enough New Yorkers and enough Manhattanites to do that here. But of course, as a defense attorney, you always want to get the best for your client.

And John, you mentioned this earlier, how Trump tried to delay this several times just last week. If we saw another delay, what would this mean for him as he tries to run for president?

Well, listen, at the end of the day, they feel that the further they can delay this, they hope to get everything passed November now so far that of all the cases they have. Because remember, this is one of four, as we were talking a little earlier, as of all of them right now, this is the only one that has an actual trial date. What I mean by that is the other case that has a date as of now for late May is the documents case, the special counsel's case brought by Jack Smith. That one is obviously not reality because they still haven't firmed that up. So we're waiting to see. But they really want to get these passed the election hoping Donald Trump gets reelected. It all goes away and then we move on with life. That is just going to be super complicated, right? Because now the fact of the matter is we are heading down there for jury selection with this one. The other cases, though, if we do a quick status report, if you'll indulge me, documents, we're waiting to find an actual trial date, the January 6th efforts to overturn the election on the federal level.

The Supreme Court is going to hear arguments on that next week. Donald Trump trying to say he had presidential immunity. The court has to weigh in. If they buy it, that case goes to limbo. If they don't, the judge has already said she would try to get that back on track for maybe a July summer trial. The other case they were waiting to find out another state case is Georgia, the Fulton County case, the efforts to overturn the election. There. We were here. The two of us were here almost how many days a week? Something like that. Going through the efforts to disqualify district Attorney Fani Willis, Trump failed in the efforts there. So now the question is Willis wants to get that case up and going in August, but that would be a months long proceeding which would drive right into November. So all of that super complicated for the former president and his team. The one big thing that is the reality of this happening now. Right. And I do think it's important Donald Trump has to be in this courtroom four days a week for the next several weeks.

That means he's not campaigning. He's not fundraising. As one aide said to a colleague of ours, Olivia Rubin, overnight, it sucks. That was literally their words, because this is the critical time to build up the campaign coffers, to build the cash on hand, because they've got to be ready in arm to get into the fall with Joe Biden.

Absolutely. And a gag order has been put in place. Let's talk about that. Chris, I want to bring you in. The judge imposed that limited gag order against Trump last month. How careful does he need to be to avoid violating that order? And and what happens if he does?

I mean, so that's the great question. The best question here is what happens if he does. Typically if somebody is found in contempt, they end up going into a jail cell that's, you know, kind of a nightmare. I don't know if you can imagine Donald Trump in any sort of cell anywhere, even if it was inside the courthouse, that would just be be beyond imagination. So I think he's going to try to be a little bit careful, Alicia. Hope he's going to try to be a little bit careful. It's not an extensive gag order. It's one where he can't talk about certain individuals and that shouldn't be too hard. And you figured that he's probably not going to want to press that particular issue since, you know, it's not a difficult gag order to follow. Don't talk about the families. Don't talk about, you know, the court staff things along those lines. Um, should shouldn't be a problem for him. And certainly the danger there is if he violates it.

What do you do if you're a judge? Do you put him in a jail cell? Do you force him to write a check? What happened? So I think everybody involved doesn't want to see us past that line. But of course, it's Donald Trump. And John Santucci can tell you better than anybody whether or not he's going to respect that gag order.

I'll tell you. I'll tell you the answer. No, I mean, he has no self-control at the end of the day, right? I mean, this is Donald Trump who feels that he is a victim here. So any chance he can to fight back, the only thing that will hang over him jail or fines. And if those start to rack up or actually become real, and we've seen that this judge is not messing around, that could dissuade him.

And he'll be able to pull in the reins just a bit. Totally.

I've seen some defendants have to write essays. That would be an interesting one. If he was held in contempt of court, that would be stunning. Yeah, I don't think jail is going to happen because just the logistics of it. But an essay or a fine.

That could be like typing essay yourself saying I didn't mean to, or.

I've had many clients have to write essays for showing up late to court and being held in contempt. And yeah, I wonder if essay could be one of them.

Just have somebody else write it. All right, let's check in with ABC's Trevor Alt, who is downtown there in Manhattan waiting for the former president to arrive. And Trevor, you mentioned earlier there were people there gathering already. What are we seeing? What are we seeing? Both sides here, Trump supporters and those who are against the former president.

Yes. Although, to be clear, we're not seeing gigantic numbers. There's not really huge demonstrations going on, at least so far. You can see over my shoulder here a lot of the pro-Trump demonstrators waving their flags. This is where they've gathered for previous appearances of the former president. At this courthouse. You also notice the barricades that have been set up by police. What tends to happen, at least in my experience here, is that naturally, these groups of demonstrators separate on either side. And while there's not a lot of demonstrators so far, and we don't know how big these demonstrations are going to be today, at least some of these people do appear to potentially be seeking out conflict, not necessarily violence. But we have seen a few shouting matches play out already, some between pro-Trump demonstrators and anti-Trump demonstrators, a few that was just a little bit ago. There was a man wearing a Latinos for Trump hoodie who was arguing with a man who was holding up an anti-Semitic sign to refer to that man as trash.

Uh, and so, you know, while it is generally safe so far, generally calm, there is a bit of a heavy tension that is hanging in the air. We've been watching as some of the anti-Trump demonstrators have been kind of filing up here towards the park, too. It's still very early in the morning, Stephanie, so we know that it could definitely get a lot more crowded here before we know that police have been taking steps to prepare for those possibility, Steph.

Absolutely. And we'll check in with you throughout the morning. Let's check in with Erin now. Erin, what can you tell us about what's going on? Uh, just right out there where you're positioned and also what's going to happen inside the courtroom once Trump arrives?

You know, I was struck just noticing the people that are lined up to go through security. And they are, in all likelihood, the potential jurors here. I see a number of them carrying their jury summons. And can you imagine walking into the 15th floor courtroom and seeing the former president of the United States seated there, knowing that you could well be chosen to sit in judgment of him in this historic first criminal trial of a former American president? Once that jury selection does get underway, the potential jurors are going to be asked a series of 42 questions to try and weed out bias. The judge, the prosecutors, the defense attorneys. No, everybody's heard of Donald Trump, but they want to make sure they can set aside that view and not have it impact their ability to be fair and impartial. So they'll be asked things like, have you ever attended a Trump rally? Have you ever attended an anti-Trump rally? Do you follow him on social media? Where do you get your news? That was an important question for the defense, because they'd like to know how people ordinarily filter their information, if at all.

And so these questions are going to be put to each one of the potential jurors. This process the court is prepared to have last two weeks if necessary.

And of course, we know those potential jurors can't really talk to the media about this. But I would imagine that there's there's some sort of an excitement there because as as we've all said, this is a historic trial. So to be a part of that jury pool, that would be just astonishing. Uh, John, I want to bring you in. We're talking about the jury. Oh, sorry. Go ahead. Aaron.

You know, it's good to say, you know, people may be excited for it. In fact, they may beforehand watch a video narrated by ABC's Byron Pitts, who some years ago put together the sort of promotional video for what jury selection is all about. Of course, this is going to be a most unusual voir dire given the nature of the case, but I think, and Brian and Chris may tell you this, that the lawyers on the case probably do not want a potential jurors seated if that person is eager to be on the jury, because that may be a sign that they have a view one way or another, or could potentially want to to benefit from their service somehow. But that's one of the things that the lawyers will try to discern what people's level of interest is and why they may be so keen to serve if they signal that they do.

That is a really good point, Erin, because, of course, it probably be difficult for them to contain their excitement. I will say I have always wanted to serve on jury duty, but as a military active duty reservist, I cannot. I have not been asked to. But John, hard to find a juror without an opinion about the former president. Well, and it's interesting.

Do you mean jumping off what Erin and Brian were talking about earlier? First of all, we didn't get a chance to talk some outing that we both said we needed to talk before this, but you said something that I actually wanted to talk to you about off air, which is did they go through the voter rolls in New York to see how it turned out? They did. We didn't talk. So you were you're good. You're good. Yeah. Listen, at least you're better at this for me.

I think I'm.

Here because of my legal expertise.

No, but it's interesting because one of the things they did do, the Trump team went through all of the polling results, the exit polling results and whatnot from previous races. And what they found is that in the last election, 15% of Manhattan residents voted for Donald Trump. So when they looked at all of the boroughs of Manhattan, they said Staten Island would be great for us. Manhattan is the worst for us. And obviously they lost their efforts to try to move the case to a different borough here. Stephanie. But what I do think is interesting, if you look through the 42 questions that have come out of this juror questionnaire, you know, it's questions that are pretty typical, if you will, you know, opinion about crimes, etc. but then things that are just interesting, right? They ask about different ways people consume news and information. They talk about, you know, major publications, New York Times, USA today, but they also mention social media. And they write in here.

Do you, you know, subscribe to Truth Social, which is the platform, of course, by the former president. They go through several books that have been written about this case, one of which is revenge, written by Michael Cohen. Obviously, he's going to be a star witness for prosecutors here. So I do think just the way that they've spent 42 questions in this question that went out to thousands of New Yorkers to try to pull people in to this potential case, I think it does just show how many different issues they're trying to mitigate. Right. For any potential juror that's going to be coming into these proceedings to.

Find a 12 jurors and six alternates. Yeah, correct.

And that's going to be the goal. And it's going to be tough.

It certainly is. Chris I want to check in with you. Walk us through the nuances of this historic case.

Sure. So, I mean, I think one of the bigger things and we don't want to lose this when we're talking about jury selection, is looking for leaders that are in this particular case. I mean, because everybody sort of falls on a spectrum of are they a follower or are they a leader? And so the strikes that you're going to use, they're peremptory strikes, the ten strikes that each side has. A lot of times when you're thinking about how to exercise that bias is one factor. But the other factor in it is how big a leader is this particular person going to be? Are they going to be talking in the jury room? Are they going to be creating their own faction? And so a lot of those questions on there that seem fairly innocuous, like, you know, what is your employment? What do you do? They're looking for things like, is this person a supervisor at work? Do they have the power to hire and fire? And if they do, have they ever fired anyone before?

When I was a prosecutor, if there was somebody in a jury room or in a jury pool that had the ability to hire and fire, and they'd fired somebody in the past, I realized that that was somebody who would not hesitate at all to find somebody guilty if the evidence was in that particular direction. Stephanie, that is very interesting.

All right, John, prosecutors are also expected to outline two other alleged payments. So what can you tell us about those.

So the goal here is to show that catch and kill right. Which is this idea of finding a story, catching it, and then killing it by paying it off was common practice for Donald Trump and his one time close friend David Pecker, the publisher of the National Enquirer. What they're going to show is that in two separate instances, Karen McDougal being another woman, a former Playboy model that Donald Trump allegedly had a months long affair with, was paid $150,000 to make her story of Trump go away leading up to the 2016 election. There's another case involving a former doorman similar circumstances. It involves Trump's personal life, less money. But again, this idea that it would be damaging to Donald Trump, it could impact the election, it could impact his personal life. So thus he paid it and made it go away. The case about Stormy Daniels, though, and why this is the one that's criminal, is that it gets into the method by which Donald Trump, pecker, Michael Cohen and others covered it up.

Right. The falsifying of records, right. Saying that it was expenses for legal expenses, coming back to Michael Cohen in ten separate payments that happened after the 2016 election. And, of course, that the goal in part, was that the payment was made in the fall of 2016 because, in Trump's eyes, according to prosecutors, it would impact Donald Trump's efforts or chances to win the 2016 election. So it is election interference. I know that's really confusing for our viewers because so many times, Stephanie, as you well know, when we say the words election interference and Donald Trump, we think of the 2020 election because of how vocal he has been about rigged and stolen. But nevertheless, the term applies to 2016. Given this payment was made to in prosecutors theory and what there are going to argue to make it go away to help the election before.

The election took place. All right. We are. Let's take a look at these live images here. The former president arriving at the courthouse here in New York City, in lower Manhattan. We saw him as he walked out of Trump Tower earlier this morning, waving to those who are outside. We saw him get into his vehicle, and there he is now, stepping out of the vehicle in lower Manhattan heading into court for this historic trial. Chris, we're talking about these payments here. They were that were allegedly made before the election. How do you expect prosecutors to use those other payments to build their case?

Sure. So what, you know, you're allowed to use what's called similar transactions or for or for B evidence or evidence of other acts to prove your existing case if the court allows you to do it. And so what they're going to want to do is talk about those additional payments as further evidence, even though they're not charged here. They want to suggest that, look, this shows that the intent behind these payments that he was making to Stormy Daniels through Michael Cohen was to cover this up for the election. I mean, I think that the defense here and Brian can tell you better than anybody what how to raise a great defense in a Manhattan courtroom. But the defense wants to say, no, no, no, no, no, this was catching kill because he didn't want to embarrass his family, which wouldn't be a crime even if those business records were fraudulent. It would, however, be a crime or to cover up the crime if it was for the purpose of the election. Stephanie.

So, I mean, that's really the difficult part that the prosecutors have to prove is exactly why he was making those payments. And so there's additional acts that you're talking about. Those additional acts are going to come in to show that, no, this was election related. This wasn't about his family. Stephanie.

Thank you for that, Chris. All right. We are now going to switch over to our network coverage here in just a few moments right now. Live images. First, before we get to that of the former president, they're arriving in lower Manhattan for this historic trial. John, what do you think is going through his mind right now?

I think Donald Trump, in part, is saying to himself right now, how did I get here? How did this happen? You know, and it's funny you talk about that image of Donald Trump walking out waving. Donald Trump had a habit back in the day before he was a candidate, Trump, of walking out of that Fifth Avenue apartment, his fifth. Building and sometimes walking around the building. Stephanie needed it because Donald Trump just wanted to see if he was recognized. He would do a little spin. He talks about this. He'd walk out the side door, walk around Gucci just to see if somebody would catch his eyes. Somebody would recognize that he was Donald Trump. Obviously, that was a long time ago. Every New Yorker at this point, I would argue, knows who Donald Trump is and what he looks like. But I do think there's a difference of walking out of that building to be noticed, and a difference of heading to a day that's going to be so hard for him.

I think everything for Donald Trump's bravado of I'm ready to take this, I'm curious to see what those images show. I mean, our colleague Peter Columbus did a fascinating piece talking about Donald Trump from the sketch artist perspective, right? As people sat there and capture an image of him. We'll obviously see an image soon enough of him walking into court. There's no cameras in New York state court, unfortunately, but we will have some still images of him sitting there. And I do think the demeanor of Donald Trump is important, right? As our colleagues who have been in the room have described it over time, Donald Trump is often muttering to himself. He's looking around. He's very sunken. Right. This is not the the brash bravado of Donald Trump that we see on the campaign trail. This weighs on him. This annoys him. He doesn't want to be here. I do think that's critical.

Absolutely. We're going to switch over to the network. They are coming on the air right now with special coverage of this historic trial.

This is an ABC news special report.

Good morning everyone I'm Linsey Davis. We are coming on the air for a moment. Never before witnessed in American history. A former president on criminal trial, Donald Trump, just arrived at the courthouse in lower Manhattan for the start of his criminal trial. Here in New York City. Trump is charged with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records, which include allegedly concealing a hush payment to adult film actress Stormy Daniels just days before the 2016 election. He is the first president, past or present, to ever stand trial, and this is the first of four cases for Trump and his legal team. Trump is trying to juggle his legal battles at the same time he is running for president. I want to get right to ABC's Aaron Katersky, who is outside of the courthouse for us in lower Manhattan. And Erin, of course, we've been talking about how this is unprecedented, but just give us a sense of what you're seeing out there, what you're witnessing on the streets in Manhattan.

Traffic was briefly halted. Lindsay Pedestrian stopped in their tracks on the sidewalk as former President Trump's motorcade pulled up, and he entered this courthouse to both cheers and boos from a small group of protesters gathered outside, helicopters flying overhead. He is, after all, a former president and the Republican nominee in 2024. So the security is extra. Everything about this is extra. On one hand, a criminal defendant going inside this courthouse to stand trial is nothing new. This courthouse has seen all manner of mobsters and murderers, but the country has never seen anything like this. A former American president on trial as a criminal defendant, Trump is now headed up to the 15th floor of the courthouse, where he's going to enter a rather drab, dreary room. And that's where he's going to be spending most of his time, potentially for the next couple of months, seeking the white House from the 15th floor of this courthouse that he has used to his political advantage. Although the consequences here are certainly potentially dire because Lindsay, these charges, if he's convicted of them and he denies them, could land him in prison for up to four years.

And of course, we just saw moments ago him leaving Trump Tower before making that trek downtown to the courthouse. I know you've talked about before prospective jurors are even brought in today. The judge may start with a brief hearing. What would that be about?

This would be about the potential former president. Trump decides to testify if that happens and he said he's thinking about it, the prosecutors would want to ask him all manner of potentially embarrassing questions about his sex life, about civil cases where he's been held liable for sexual assault and defamation of Jean Carroll of civil business fraud. And the defense wants the judge to set limits on what prosecutors could ask. This is called a send of all hearing. It's common in New York state court when a defendant is thinking of taking the stand in his own defense, and it may precede the start of jury selection. But once that gets underway, prospective jurors carrying their jury summons who have been through security are going to walk into that courtroom, see the former president and wonder whether they'll be picked to sit in judgment of him.

And Aaron, before we let you go, jury selection expected to last how long?

Could be up to two weeks if necessary. The potential jurors are being asked 42 questions to weed out any potential bias. The lawyers here know everybody in that room has heard of Donald Trump. The question is whether their view of him can get in the way or not. If being fair and impartial.

Linsey Aaron Katersky for us I want to now bring in our trial attorney and ABC legal contributor Mr. Brian Beyer. Brian give us a sense of how difficult it's going to be to select a jury in this case extremely difficult.

But the judge has created some parameters to try to make that easier. Ultimately, we're going to find someone who doesn't have a bias one way or another. But they may know about the president about this case, but they're willing to put that aside, to listen to only the evidence and information that both sides present, to ultimately give a verdict, whether it be guilty, not guilty, or, worst case scenario, potentially a hung jury.

So many people will be watching. Brian Beyer, we appreciate your expertise here. And our coverage continues on ABC News Live and abcnews.com. We'll have complete details on World News Tonight with David Muir. For now I'm Linsey Davis in New York. Have a good day.

This has been a special report from ABC news.

You're watching ABC News Live special coverage of this historic first ever trial of a former president, set to begin in just a few moments. Former President Trump has arrived in court in New York City for jury selection in the hush money case against him. There is an image there as he walked out of Trump Tower earlier this morning, the Manhattan district attorney charged Trump with falsifying business records to conceal payments he allegedly made to Stormy Daniels through his then attorney, Michael Cohen. Trump pleaded not guilty to the 34 charges last year, calling the case election interference and a witch hunt. The judge has imposed a limited gag order, keeping Trump from making comments about jurors, witnesses, individual prosecutors and the families of the judge and the district attorney. But Trump has pushed the boundaries of that order, targeting some witnesses and the judge's daughter on social media. The former president has campaigned on his legal battles, telling his supporters he wears the indictments as a badge of honor. Most of the Republican Party has rallied behind him, even as some privately admit the allegations make them deeply uncomfortable.

We have full team coverage as jury selection is set to begin shortly. I want to bring in executive editorial producer John Santucci. John, we are learning the proceedings today may start with a hearing over what prosecutors can ask Trump during cross-examination. Should he take the stand? What are your thoughts on that? Will that even happen?

Well, listen, Donald Trump has said now twice when asked by ABC news in the last several weeks, Stephanie, that he will indeed take the stand. He's not against it. He said at one point. You know, listen, I think Donald Trump himself believes he is his own best messenger, defense lawyer, etc.. And look, go back just a couple of weeks when we were in the New York attorney general civil case, Donald Trump did take the stand. He was up there for quite some time and believe that he did a good job. So in this case, which Donald Trump adamantly, as we know, is angry about livid feels it is all a witch hunt, a prosecution. If Donald Trump, in his view, believes he can do something to help this go away, or if he feels that others have not done a good job. Because remember, we often use this phrase with Donald Trump playing to the audience of one right when others are on TV defending him. He's the first person to call with an instant review.

If Donald Trump is not satisfied by the team of lawyers that are representing him to have done the job, Donald Trump will take the stand and do it all on his own.

We will watch for that. We saw him walk out of Trump Tower this morning. He seemed to be walking alone. He waved to the crowd. What are your thoughts on his travels down there? Did he do you think he has a team with him? Do you know he has a team with him?

He absolutely has a team with him. And I would divide it actually into three buckets. First, you saw in that image when he emerged as he was pumping his fist in the air, Todd Blanch, who has become, frankly, Donald Trump's busiest attorney, Blanche is leading this case. He is also leading the two criminal probes brought by special counsel Jack Smith, other attorneys, a part of his legal team going with him. And we're told, Stephanie, that legal team is going to be making this commute with Donald Trump every day as these proceedings in New York continue. The second group is the campaign staff. We know that several of his top aides are going to be rotating in and out over the course of the proceedings, because they are still running the Trump 2024 campaign. But I do know of several aides, including his lead spokesperson and senior adviser, Jason Miller is with him today, along with others. The third camp, which is interesting, this is going to be a rotating cast, if you will, right?

Loyal aides, Trump Organization employees, others that have been around with Donald Trump and others that have really been close to him. And one person that we did see are Katherine Faulders, who is always eagle eyed on these things, pointed out to me, Walt. Nada. Walt nada is that aide. You'll recall Stephanie that was indicted along with Donald Trump in the documents case brought by special counsel Jack Smith. Nada was with Donald Trump when he went to all of these arraignments, all of these hearings right by his side today, no exception.

Still there. John, thank you. I want to bring in Chief Washington correspondent Jon Karl. Big picture. This is clearly significant. This is a historic trial. What are you watching for today?

Well, it's a big moment. I mean, it's this is the first time we've seen a former president of the United States go on a trial. Criminal trial? It's the first time we've seen a major party presumptive nominee for president go on trial in the middle of a presidential campaign. And I think what's significant here, among many things, is that Donald Trump is there today. He doesn't need to be there. This is jury selection. The the defendant does not need to be there while jury selection is underway. But he has chosen to do this. He is clearly irritated and angry. You can just check in on his true social feed in any moment of the day or night, to see how he is lashing out at the very notion that he is under trial, but he is also making the fact that he is under trial essentially the centerpiece of his presidential campaign. There is no real distinction between the campaign and the trial. And of course, the larger context here is this is the first trial, but it is certainly not the last trial.

This is, uh, on virtually every measure, by every measure, the least significant of the legal jeopardy that Trump faces. Uh, he, uh, this is a case where even if he is found guilty, uh, it is unlikely to result in actual jail time. The other cases, the classified documents case, the the federal case alleging he attempted to overturn the presidential election illegally. Uh, and, of course, the case in Georgia, all, uh, faces are all much more significant and serious allegations that could result in serious years of of jail time, but still significant because it's first, it's something we just haven't seen in American history.

We certainly have it. And as you said, John, the first, but certainly not the last. This is the first of four criminal prosecutions Trump is facing and may be the only one before the election. John, thank you so much. I want to bring in senior investigative correspondent Aaron Katersky. Aaron, what's at stake for former President Trump in this case and what consequences could he face if convicted? I know John touched on it just a bit there with possible jail time, possibly no jail time. What are your thoughts?

It's certainly possible if the Manhattan District Attorney's Office is successful here, that the D.A., Alvin Bragg, could ask for prison time as part of the sentence. I'm not sure how likely that is, given Trump does not have a criminal record. This is a nonviolent offense, and he's a former president. Like, what is that arrangement even look like? But but politically, and I think this has played out in some of the opinion polls around the primaries, Americans may look at a conviction a little bit more consequentially. So there are both political and legal consequences at stake here. But we're a ways from that because jury selection is just now getting underway. And one of the things jurors will be reminded is that they're not to think about the potential outcome of their verdict. They just want to listen to the evidence and make a call without thinking of the consequences for Trump himself.

I want to bring in our senior congressional correspondent, Rachel Scott, in just a moment. But before we do that, let's take a live look inside the courthouse where former President Trump is attending jury selection in the this criminal hush money case. We saw him walk in just a few moments ago. Rachel, thank you so much for joining us. Trump's court appearances, of course, have become unofficial campaign events. He often uses them as, you know, as an opportunity to air his grievances and rally his supporters. What are you watching for there and what impact could this have on his campaign? Look, it could have a big impact. We are just six months out from the November election and just take a moment. We really cannot underscore here just how unprecedented and striking this is to have the presumptive Republican nominee not in a battleground state right now, six months out from Election Day, but inside of a courtroom. I mean, we have never seen this before. To have the presumptive party nominee, who is also now a criminal defendant, John talked about his campaign staff rotating in and out, again, not of a critical battleground state that they need to win back in order to get the white House.

They'll be rotating in and out of New York City as the former president stands trial. And when we zoom out here and look at this politically, yes, we know that the former president has used these legal charges to really supercharge and energize his campaign. His campaign is already fundraising off of this trial. Today, the former president is firing off one Truth Social post after another. But when we look at the long term, what does this mean? Until the November election, when we look at polls, we dig in through those crosstabs. We see that even Trump's own supporters 13%, according to a recent Ipsos poll, would not vote for the former president if he were to be convicted of a crime as a whole. According to that same poll, 24% of Republicans say they would not support him if he were to be convicted of a crime. That is a huge, major red flag for the former president. When we're looking at these battleground states and seeing just how tight this election could be, Stephanie.

And it's certainly something that his teams who are with him there this morning are thinking about. Thank you. Rachel, I want to bring in ABC's legal contributor Brian Meyer. Brian, we've spoken about this. Hundreds of potential jurors are being questioned. Walk us through how exactly this selection process is going to work.

So I'll just do it really quickly. First, the judge will invite everyone to come in. Depending on what the judge wants, you may see anything from 40, 50 or 60 people coming at a time. He'll just give a brief summary of what the case is about. It's about falsification of records. This is what the prosecutor is alleging. Probably will not give much about what the defense is arguing at that point, but both sides have decided what is appropriate for the judge to introduce this case on. Do you know the parties who are here? Do you know anything about the case? And then from there, he will allow the jurors to kind of self-select in terms of saying, I can't do this because I don't understand the English language well enough, because I am truly biased about this, because whatever myriad of reasons and typically the way that works out, the judge would say, you know, okay, you recognize Brian Meyer, the defense attorney from ABC, come up here and we'll see whether or not this is a reason to disqualify you.

The judge says, you know what? The chaos of this case, we're just going to release everyone off the bat from going from there. Then as as Aaron has talked about those 42 questions, people who survived that first round will get those 42 questions, and then we'll start to whittle away and whittle away. And each side would have an opportunity to give their own questions to some degree to see who they're going to select. And we were.

Talking about this earlier, how hard it will be to find a juror that doesn't have an opinion of the former president. Of course, the judge most likely insisting that this needs to be done fairly. I want to bring in ABC's contributor and former Georgia prosecutor Chris Timmons. Trump is, of course, charged with falsifying business records to conceal criminal conduct. What does the district attorney need to prove here?

So they've got to prove two things. I mean, first of all, it's kind of obvious, but you've got to prove that those are false records. But probably more important, I don't think that's going to be much of an issue in the trial. But probably the bigger issue is why was he falsifying those records? Was he doing it to cover up an illegal campaign, uh, expense, or was he doing that to protect? His family. I mean, that's the argument that the defense is going to make. And Brian Buck Meyer can tell you, you know what, the defenses are here better than anybody. But from a prosecution side, what I'm worried about is can I make that final point? Can I prove that the purpose behind those payments was to cover up some, or to assist with the campaign expenditure that was going to help them get elected? And so, you know, intent is always a tricky thing to prove because you don't have a scanner where you can go in and look at exactly what somebody is thinking.

So you have to look at the evidence around it. And part of what we talked about a little earlier was those those other acts that were going on in the case, but also the timing of all of this was, you know, right before the 2016 election. And so that sort of makes it a little obvious. But still, when jurors get back there and they're making their decisions on intent, it's always one of the things that the prosecution's worried about, Stephanie.

And we also know that the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, plans to introduce evidence about two other payments that he alleges Michael Cohen and Trump coordinated to suppress that negative information. We will hear more about that throughout the day, I'm sure. Jon, I want to check in with you. We could hear from some witnesses who were very close to the former president. How critical is that testimony?

I think this will be remarkable. You're going to see some people who have known Trump for a long time and have been extremely close to him, people, uh, uh, in a couple of cases who have been with Trump since long before he was a presidential campaign, uh, candidate, uh, Hope Hicks is who you recall as the, uh, the spokesperson for the Trump campaign in the very early days, an employee of the Trump Organization before Trump was a candidate and one of the, you know, very closest advisers in those early days who served all four years in the Trump White House, uh, will be testifying, I assume that the, uh, the line of questioning with her is, is how concerned the campaign was about the allegations of Trump paying off a porn star, or the allegation of having an affair with a porn star coming out in the midst of the campaign. Also, Rhona Graff, uh, a long time, uh, Trump, essentially executive secretary in the Trump Organization, uh, could be taking the stand.

And we also, uh, may likely hear from, uh, Stormy Daniels herself, uh, maybe even Karen McDougal, the, uh, the former Playboy model who Trump allegedly had an affair with and, uh, who, um, uh, you know, her story was killed by the National Enquirer. And we'll hear, you know, I think finally from David Pecker, who was the the top executive at the National Enquirer and a close Trump ally who it assured allegedly the the former president, the then candidate, that he would work to do so-called catch and kill, uh, get stories that were being shopped around that would impact Trump negatively during the presidential campaign and allegedly killed those stories with payments. So hearing the testimony, it's one thing, you know, to to read the stories to, to, uh, look through what's been investigated on this, but to actually see people on the stand, uh, speaking under oath, um, and answering questions about the about this whole episode, uh, is an entirely different thing.

And of course, the star witness of it all is going to be, uh, Michael Cohen. Michael Cohen, who I knew again well before Trump announced he was a presidential campaign, he was, uh, his attorney. He was his fixer. There was nobody more fervently loyal to Donald Trump than Michael Cohen. I mean, he had at one point and said he would take a bullet for the Donald. Uh, this was somebody who was extremely close to him, but is now, uh, an avowed enemy of Donald Trump, seen as a traitor. He is the one at the heart of this case, because he is the one who physically made the payments to Stormy Daniels, uh, to to not speak about her affair, alleged affair with Donald Trump.

So many key players. A real life reality show playing out today. John, as you know, this historic trial against the former president is, of course, bringing a lot of attention to the New York courthouse where jury selection is happening this morning. We want to check in with ABC's Trevor Ault. Now, who is downtown outside of the courthouse. Trevor, how is it looking now? Some time has passed. I know you said there was a small group that had gathered earlier this morning, but what are you saying?

Yeah, there's been a few more people that have been pouring in here, Stephanie. And there was a little bit of a fervor, as the former president did pull up to the courthouse. You can see a lot of pro-Trump demonstrators here on the other side of the barricade. So we're in a park across the street from the courthouse. And what they actually tend to do, they have these barricades. They have two different ones that work their way right through the middle of the park here. Now, it's very easy to walk around them, but we have found in the past is that people kind of tend to naturally separate themselves based on the political camps that they tend to fall in. Obviously, on the far side over here you have the pro-Trump demonstrators. So far, there have been a small handful of anti-Trump demonstrators, not a whole lot. But it also it can be a little bit difficult to gage just how many people are here demonstrating, given the amount of cameras that we're seeing here. In fact, earlier this morning, we saw a pro-Trump demonstrator and an anti-Trump demonstrator having an argument.

Just those two people. But surrounding them was about two dozen people who were filming the whole thing. That's kind of representative of what we're seeing here so far this morning. We do know that the police are prepared for larger demonstrations. We're expecting to hear a press conference from an anti-Trump group a little bit later. In terms of the people that we're seeing right now, I mean, you see all of the flags that are flying on the right here. You have a flagpole with two flags. Interestingly, Stephanie, it's not just Trump 2024, it's also Trump 2028, indicating that they don't want just Donald Trump to win again. They want him to then go further and have a third presidential term. These are kind of the Trump supporters that are here today, the Trump or no one else. Or I believe the sign says Keep America Trump, not Make America Great again. Uh, we are expecting also a few members of the fringe, members of the Republican Party to show up walking around here. So far this morning, we've seen Rudy Giuliani's son, Andrew, kind of walking about, floating between groups.

And we've also heard that potentially the disgraced former congressman George Santos may be coming by here as well. Not huge demonstrations, at least so far. But there is a little bit of a tension in the air, as you might imagine. And the NYPD says they are prepared for that.

Thank you so much, Trevor. And for those who are just joining us, I just want to recap where we are right now. Jury selection in Donald Trump's New York hush money case is about to begin, marking the beginning of the first criminal trial of a former president. You're looking at a live image there inside the courthouse, right here in New York City, in downtown Manhattan. We saw the former president walk in through those doors. We saw him walk out this morning out of Trump Tower as he was making his way downtown outside Trump Tower, waving to those who were outside and jumping in that vehicle that was waiting for him. We saw him walking through these doors, and we may be seeing him here shortly, and he'll most likely we'll have something to say about what is taking place today, a historic trial. I want to check in with Aaron Katersky, who is there downtown Manhattan. Trump's lawyers, of course, Aaron, have sought several delays in this case. We were speaking about this earlier.

They argue that the entire process cannot fairly take place in Manhattan, where they also argue that too many potential jurors have negative opinions about the former president. What's the latest on Trump's attempts to delay this trial?

He tried three times last week, making three different arguments, and the appeals court turned him down each time. Stephanie, at one point, as you say, he argued that too many potential jurors in Manhattan had been exposed to negative stories about him. But Trump is a is a national, even international figure. So prosecutors said people in Manhattan have no more exposure to pretrial publicity than anybody else in the country. And the judge said a lot of the pretrial publicity was of Trump's own making because he speaks so often in the hallway at court on social media about the criminal charges and the case that he's making. He also argued the judge's bias that the gag order imposed on him is unfair. But the appellate court turned him down in his emergency request for a delay, though some of those items are still pending, even though the trial itself is about to get underway. What you're looking at behind those tinted glass doors is the private elevator that judges use. But here, given who Trump is, the courtesy is being afforded to him.

And so he'll come up to the 15th floor, he'll walk through those doors and the courtroom is just next door, a few steps away. But he does have the opportunity to step toward the camera, make remarks, as he often has wanted to do when he's in these courthouse settings. Stephanie.

Thank you so much, Erin and Chris, I know you're still with us. Uh, what's your take on that? Do his lawyers have an argument that he can't get a fair trial? Before we hear your answer, we are looking at a live picture there. The former president walking through those doors that Erin was just describing, and he is about to speak. We're going to listen in when he does start to speak. The former president, part of this historic trial marking this today, marking the beginning of the first criminal trial of a former president. Let's listen in.

Nothing like this has ever happened before has never been anything like it. Every legal scholar said this case is nonsense. It should never have been brought. He doesn't deserve anything like this. There is no case and they've said it. People that don't necessarily follow or like. Well said. This is an outrage at this case was brought. This is political persecution. This is a persecution like never before. Nobody's ever seen anything like it. And again, it's a case that should have never been brought. It's an assault on America. And that's why I'm very proud to be here. This is an assault on our country. And it's a country that's failing. It's a country that's run by an incompetent man who's very much involved in this case. This is really an attack on a political opponent. That's all it is. So I'm very honored to be here. Thank you very much for.

Joining us. How are you?

As you just heard there, the former president speaking there at the courthouse saying he's nothing like this has happened before, which is accurate. This is the first trial of this nature. There's the former president saying there is no case, calling it an outrage. Political persecution, and saying no one has ever seen anything like this. Also adding this is an assault on our country. I want to bring in Jonathan. Karl, what do you make of this? What do you make of those statements by the former president?

Well, he also said that this is the current president, although he didn't mention Joe Biden by name until he was referring to. Obviously, uh, is very much involved in this case. That's not true. It's something he says all the time. This is the Manhattan district attorney, uh, obviously the federal government, the the white House, the president. Nothing to do whatsoever with this case. But look, largely what you see. There is a man who is facing the first of several criminal trials and saying it's an honor to be there. And the case that he is making is one he makes directly to his supporters in each and every rally that he does in this campaign and through most of his statements on these issues, on his own social media platform, he is trying to say that they this this broad sense of they from the president on down, his opponents in the government, uh, are prosecuting him, are persecuting him because their real target is Donald Trump's supporters. That's the case he is making.

I am here because their real target is you. I am going to trial on your behalf. Uh, we'll see if that's an argument that plays in a general election. A lot of his core supporters within the Republican Party, the people who go to his rallies over and over again, have, uh, largely come to in some way believe that, uh, that Trump is basically going there on their behalf, taking the slings and arrows, because, again, this broad sense of they the deep state, um, the, the president, you know, the sense that there's a much bigger thing than just, uh, a specific criminal case that they're going after Trump because their real target is their supporters. What's interesting is just look at the basics of this case. This is a case that a man allegedly had an affair with a porn star and then paid her allegedly $130,000 to stay silent about that affair and funneled those payments through his lawyers and then falsified business records, uh, to to to cover up the fact that he had paid for, uh, you know, that that so-called hush money.

Um, it's hard to see how on, on a factual basis you would make the case that this is really an effort to go after Trump's supporters, that the real target is Trump supporters. Um, how many of of of those people out there, uh, attending his rallies, have ever had an affair with a porn star or allegedly paid $130,000 to cover it up?

Absolutely. And as you mentioned, those payments which comprise the of the 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree. John. Here we are. The day has come. He was indicted a year ago. He's now in court. As expected, Trump made statements that sound more like he's at a rally. Not not in court. So was it surprising? I guess not.

So much surprising to hear.

Him say, this is an outrage. And this is, as John mentioned, more of an attack on his supporters as opposed to himself. Yeah, it's.

Funny, you know, we all have different ways we take notes. I now have my shorthand. I know what PGP is, political persecution. That's a phrase that Donald Trump has used repeatedly. Stephanie, over the last year since this first indictment in the Manhattan case happened last March. Look, I do think Donald Trump knows what the next couple of weeks are going to be. He can say it's an honor for him to be there all he wants. The reality is, as we see, he's angry, he's frustrated. He's panicked about this in one way because the reality is this takes him away from where he wants to be. Should be with the campaign trail. And a conviction is not good. Look. Look at the exit polling data we saw from some of the early states that voted at least 9%. In some cases, different voters said that a conviction could change the way they view this race, that they could move away from supporting Donald Trump if he was convicted in any of the four criminal cases.

That is now going to get tested once this case gets underway. If Donald Trump is convicted, that's part one. Part two. I do think the other thing we have to remember here is that everything that Donald Trump's campaign is built around right now, it's not build a wall, it's not lower your taxes. It's I'm a victim. Right. Look at last year alone, $50 million of Donald Trump's campaign cash in superPAC went towards legal fees. That is what Donald Trump has been raising money for, is to make all of these cases go away and pay the people that are helping them there. And I do think just that image of Todd Blanche standing next to him, right. This is the guy leading the Trump legal team, the lawyers behind him, a part of that as well that has changed so much. I mean, you know, Jon Karl and I, I think, Jon, we've talked about this a couple of times over the years. I think we've lost count how many lawyers Donald Trump has gone through since he went down that escalator in 2015.

Donald Trump has had so many legal problems, but none of them, none of them have come to where today is trial.

And the defense, of course, saying that this case is a fantasy unsupported by evidence and testimony. We shall see. Brian, I will ask you how you would defend this case in just a moment. I want to check in with senior congressional correspondent Rachel Scott. Rachel Trump has put his legal battles front and center in his campaign. He has not shied away from that. How is that playing with his supporters, supporters that you've spoken with?

Yeah. You know.

On one hand it is energizing a lot of his base. And we see that when we go to these rallies, of course, the former president really blazed through this Republican primary, which was very crowded at one point. He is the presumptive Republican nominee. His takeover of the RNC is now complete. Lara Trump, his daughter in law, is serving as co-chair. Michael Whatley, who is someone who is fiercely defended his false claims about the 2020 election, also serving as co-chair. One of his senior advisers is now working with the RNC as well. And the former president, we were told, felt really supercharged after a weekend out on the campaign trail. He loved the big crowds that he got in Pennsylvania, but all of that now takes a back seat. And when I was watching the former president sort of deliver these remarks, it reminded me of some of the reporting that John Santucci, Katherine Faulders and Olivia Rubin and I have had within the last 24 hours about sort of how his legal team and his campaign team were on two opposite ends.

When it comes to this, the legal team does not want to see the former president out there in front of the microphones making these sort of statements. The campaign team does, though, because at the end of the day, this is time that the former president is not spending out on the campaign trail. And so they do want to be able to drive home the message. They know that the former president is the best communicator for his campaign. Directly, we talked a little about some of the delays. You were talking to Aaron Katersky about that, and it reminded me, Stephanie, of just how many voters I've talked to when I asked them if they could support the former president. Still, if he is convicted of a crime, they take a pause and they go, I'll cross that bridge when we get to it. And so this is exactly what the former president will have to contend with if he is possibly convicted in this trial. What that will mean, the political implications of that could be very big for his campaign, especially in those battleground states, that he has to win back in order to clinch the white House.

Steph, certainly could be consequential. Rachel. Thank you. Brian, I want to bring you in. Donald Trump's lawyers have argued that Braggs case is a deluded fantasy that relies on the testimony of a convicted felon. Of course they're referring to Michael Cohen. You're a defense attorney. How how would you defend this case?

Very carefully. I think it boils down to two different categories. It's about credibility and about preserving an issue for potential appeal. And I'll start with the second one. This is just as much about the first case as it is about the second case. What do I mean by that? Whether or not Donald Trump loses in this case, there is going to be an appeal. And what issues flow from this case are going to be the battlegrounds that I think are ultimately going to decide this case. Is this a situation of a prosecutor trying to put a square peg into a circular hole, where this type of law has never been used for campaign issues? The other issue I'll go back to the first one now would be about credibility. Ultimately, the prosecutor is building their case on a man that was convicted of five counts of tax evasion, a count to making false statements, a count of lying to Congress, making financial false statements. All of this. And the prosecutor is saying, you know what?

He did three years in a federal prison for lying to everyone he's been before. Now, believe him today. And the defense is going to make the argument is how can you we have an actual phrase in court that they're going to try to move. I think this judge was called false and false as an omnibus. If you're false in one thing, you can be false in all things. And if they can catch Michael Cohen in a lie, they're going to try to throw out his testimony altogether and say, you can't build a case on a liar.

We'll see how that plays out. I just want to remind our viewers, from the start of jury selection to a verdict, this trial could run from 6 to 8 weeks. I want to bring in Katherine Faulders this morning. May start with a hearing over what prosecutors can ask Trump during cross-examination. Should he take the stand? We spoke about this earlier, but Catherine, can we expect Trump to testify? And what can we expect to hear if he does more of the same, more of what we just heard a few moments ago?

Look, probably more of the same if I were Trump's lawyers. And we know from talking to sources close to his legal team that they probably don't want him to take the stand, however, he has made clear that he will likely testify. So what's happening this morning is a hearing that's typically a standard practice before jury selection. It's essentially a hearing to determine what prosecutors can cross-examine Trump on, should he take the stand. And of course, they do this with defendants who have indicated that they want to testify. And Trump has told ABC news that he would be willing to. So that is likely something that will happen this morning. There could be some fireworks from that. We can expect Trump's attorneys will push back on what prosecutors will ultimately want to question him on. But again, that is likely to happen this morning, later in the morning, moving into jury selection.

Thank you so much for that. Catherine. And I want to bring in Chris Timmons. Trump is charged with falsifying business records to conceal criminal conduct. Do you think prosecutors have a strong case here?

Idea, but I think Brian sort of hit the nail on the head in that, you know, it's a little bit of a technical case here, I think, in terms of proving the underlying facts. Look, they've got documents, you know, they're going to be able to show that the payments occurred. They're going to be able to show that they went to her. I mean, it's just unusual. And to even think about that, you know, you've got a presumptive nominee at that point or actually the nominee at that point making payments to a porn star to cover up an alleged affair. I mean, that's just, you know, kind of kind of craziness. Certainly something that we've seen, certainly that something that's unprecedented. But I think the, you know, the prosecutors have got the documents that they're going to be relying on heavily. So they're not as worried. I would think, as far as some of the credibility points that Brian brought up earlier, although that is the way that that you're going to hit this case.

He's absolutely right. But from a prosecutorial standpoint, Brian's talking about that, that, you know, square peg and a round hole type thing where you are sort of crafting this statute in a way that it's never been done before. And the jurors might have a problem with that. And that's, you know, in part where the credibility could play in if they don't like the witnesses, if they don't like the charges, they may acquit.

And again, this should take about 6 to 8 weeks. Prosecutors are expected to present a lengthy case to demonstrate how Trump uses power and wealth. Chris, thank you so much. Also, our thanks to Aaron Katersky, Jonathan Karl, Rachel Scott, John Santucci, and Brian Meyer. Thank you all very much for your time. We will have continuing coverage of the former president's trial all day long, but we're also following another major story fallout over Iran's assault on Israel, unleashing hundreds of missiles and drones, most of them shot down or failing to reach their target. Israel's war Cabinet weighing a response as President Biden and other world leaders try to prevent further escalation. We have team coverage on the tensions in the Middle East that's coming up next.

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Welcome back to ABC News Live. First, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is meeting with his war cabinet today to discuss potential responses to Iran's attack. The cabinet met yesterday but ended their meeting without making a final decision about a response. This after Iran launched a massive missile and drone barrage at Israel over the weekend, two U.S. officials confirmed to ABC news that at least half of them failed before reaching their targets. Centcom says 99% of the others were intercepted. Chief national correspondent Matt Gutman has the latest from Tel Aviv in Israel.

Are the world on edge, as Israel weighs its response to that swarm of more than 300 Iranian missiles and drones early Sunday, targeting military installations in Israel, some of them streaking right over the Al-Aqsa mosque compound. Israel's war cabinet convening overnight but announcing no decisions. It was one of the largest salvos of ballistic and cruise missiles ever fired. But Israel's missile defense system, along with a combined international effort led by the U.S. intercepting 99% of those threats, including more than 100 ballistic missiles, according to the IDF. U.S. forces alone taking out nearly 90 drones and missiles long before they reached Israel's borders. President Biden on the phone with those airmen Sunday.

It made enormous difference, potentially saving a lot of lives.

There was global condemnation of the attack and the G7, with an emergency meeting late Sunday to coordinate a response. Some of the missiles did make it past the defenses in a video circulating online, verified by ABC news, you can see missiles striking Israel's never team air base. The aftermath seen here debris from a rocket booster found in southern Israel. Israel saying a seven year old girl, severely wounded, was the only casualty. Key to Israel's success its multi-layered aerial defense system, including the Iron Dome, which specializes in short range rockets. David's sling, meant to intercept medium range projectiles, and the arrow designed for long range missiles. Iran has made it clear that it considers the matter closed. An Israeli official tells me that Israel will likely choose the time and place of its retaliation, and there is concern here that a tit for tat style.

Response.

Would permanently change the rules of the game. And the US has been very blunt. If Israel chooses to retaliate against Iran, it will be doing so alone.

Matt Gutman for us here in Israel Matt. Thank you. And earlier on Good Morning America, George Stephanopoulos spoke to top white House national security spokesman John Kirby about Iran's attack on Israel, saying Iran is not the power it purports to be, despite its military and ballistic missile capability. Here's a portion of that conversation.

Iran's and missiles did not get through. Are they a paper tiger?

I think this show not.

Not in addition to Israel's military superiority. I think it did show. It did demonstrate that Iran is not the power that it purports to be, that it doesn't have that same military superiority.

Want to bring in senior Pentagon reporter Louie Martinez, ABC news contributor General Robert Abrams, and foreign correspondent Tom Swift, who is in Tel Aviv, Israel, for us this morning. Thank you all for joining us, Louis. A senior US official says that the Biden administration believes that Israel will strike Iran, saying most of the world thinks this is over. It is not. But Iran has made clear it considers the matter closed. So how significant is that?

Well, Stephanie, it's going to be exactly what does Israel do next. And we know that the Israeli war Cabinet has been meeting. But as you said, U.S. officials.

Anticipate that.

Israel will likely retaliate. Now, what happens next if Israel does retaliate? And how much will they retaliate against Iran? Will it be against proxies? Will it be directly inside Iran? One of the things that I think officials are looking at is if there are Iranian casualties, does that mean that Iran retaliates yet again, as you heard from John Kirby there, Iran maintains a large stock hold of weapons, particularly ballistic missiles. What we saw there being launched this weekend, those 115 to 135 missiles from inside Iran, while nearly half of them may have failed to reach their targets, they still have a very large inventory inside of Iran. They've been working on those programs for years, and so there is still a threat that there could be if one retaliation could lead to another.

And certainly an escalation if that does happen. General Abrams, I want to bring you in. According to Centcom, U.S. forces destroyed 80 drones and at least six ballistic missiles out of the more than 300 launched by Iran. But many didn't have to be shot down. At least 50% of them either failed to launch or failed in flight, or crashed before reaching their targets in Israel. What do you make of that? And was this just a show of force by Iran?

Well first on the on, you know, not engaging every inbound missile. Um, this is.

The integrated air and missile defense by Israel and all of their partners in the region, led by the United States and Central Command. Um, you know, this is a sensor electromagnetic sensor program that expands far beyond just Israel. And it gives us absolute clarity on the trajectory of inbound missiles. So you get to save a lot of money and save a lot of missiles by not having to shoot down every one if it's going to land in the middle of the desert. So that's point number one. I think that this is, uh, the display that we saw on Saturday from Iran. Uh, poorly synchronized, poorly executed, and well defended by a well-trained, well equipped Israeli Air force as well as the other partners in the region. Um, so I think that the outcome, the very minimal damage, um, was, you know, likely to happen based on all of those factors. But, um, there's still more to come, and we'll just have to wait and see what Israel responds with.

And in general, we. Overnight, U.S. officials said it would not participate in any Israeli counterattack. But could that change if this all escalates?

I don't, uh, I would take the white House and others at their word. I don't see, um, this in vital national interest of the United States to participate in any follow on attack by Israel into Iran. But having said that, there are there are we have lots of U.S. forces in the region, and there is a chance that our U.S. forces could become targets. Um, you know, today, tomorrow, later this week, again, as they have been over the last few months. Uh, so we'll just have to wait and see what the U.S. response will be.

Yeah, we certainly will. Thank you. Tom, I want to bring you in. The president met with the G-7. How are world leaders reacting to this? What have you heard?

Well, I think, you know, similar to the US, allies like the UK and France are lining up behind the white House and calling on Israel for a restrained response. But I think, you know, one element of this, which is fascinating, it's sensitive and significant, is the role that Arab nations, neighbors of Israel played in this. We know that Arab nations allowed Israeli jets and other Allied jets to operate in their airspace. Jordan, Saudi Arabia A US official telling us that Arab nations radar were also key in detecting targets as they fly towards Israel. But Israeli officials are being coy about other elements of that collective defense from Arab nations because, of course, at any time it would be a sensitive matter for those governments. But of course, after six months of war in Gaza and a very high level of suffering in the Gaza Strip, it's an incredibly sensitive matter, of course. Israeli officials in a briefing, I was just on really talking up the role the United States played in coordinating that overall response involving France, the U.K., even Germany, in terms of refueling aircraft, saying that, you know, that US General Michael Carella, who was here in Israel just a day before the attack, was vital in setting up that collective defense.

And that defense came over months and months of training and coordination and planning. And of course, critical was also the warning the Intel Israel got before that attack.

Thank you so much. We will certainly keep a close eye on how this situation progresses. Our thanks to Louis Martinez, General Robert Abrams, and of course, Tom Sophie Berg. Thank you all. Coming up, Hannah Gutierrez, the armorer on the fatal set of Alec Baldwin's movie rust, is set to learn her fate today. What the maximum penalty is. Plus the day's other top stories right after this break.

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Welcome back to ABC News Live. It is a historic day for former President Trump as jury selection is underway in his criminal trial. In his hush money case, prosecutors put Trump at the center of an alleged scheme to bury damaging stories of an affair before the 2016 election. He has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records. And that image you're seeing there, that was video of the former president walking through that there in the courtroom, walking to the courtroom in downtown Manhattan. We, of course, will have team coverage all day on ABC News Live. Now to some of the day's other top stories. The weapons supervisor for Alec Baldwin's film rust will learn her prison sentence today. Hannah Gutierrez was convicted of involuntary manslaughter last month for the death of another crew member, who was shot when a gun held by Baldwin went off. She faces up to 18 months in prison. Baldwin is also charged with involuntary manslaughter. His trial is scheduled to start in July. ABC news has learned the FBI is now investigating whether criminal wrongdoing led to the crash that brought down the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore, sources say.

Agents are now on the cargo ship, looking into whether the crew left port with the knowledge something could be wrong with the ship. Six people were killed when the container ship Dolly struck the piers of the bridge on March 26th, and the highly anticipated WNBA draft tips off tonight. Caitlin Clark is expected to be the number one pick, with Angel Reese and Camila Cardoso not too far behind. The excitement comes after the women's NCAA championship game drew more viewers than the men's final. For the first time ever. You can see the WNBA draft live tonight at 730 eastern on ESPN. Thank you so much for streaming with us on This Morning. I'm Stephanie Ramos. ABC News Live is here for you anytime with the latest news, context and analysis. You can always find us on various streaming services as well the ABC news app and of course ABC news.com. News never stops. We'll be right back.

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Good morning, I'm Stephanie Ramos. You're watching ABC News Live first. We are following breaking news this morning. On this Monday morning, the historic first ever trial of a former president getting under way. Former President Trump is now in court in New York for jury selection in the hush money case against him earlier, he addressed reporters in these images here just coming into us of the former president sitting in that courtroom. But we heard from the former president earlier today calling this all an outrage and saying he is proud to be there.

This is an outrage at this case was brought. This is political persecution. This is a persecution like never before. Nobody's ever seen anything like it. And again, it's a case that should have never been brought. It's an assault on America.

The district attorney charged Trump with falsifying business records to conceal payments he allegedly made to Stormy Daniels through his then attorney, Michael Cohen. Trump pleaded not guilty to the 34 charges last year, calling the case election interference and a witch hunt. We have full team coverage as jury selection gets underway, starting with ABC news investigative reporter Olivia Rubin and a look at what's at stake.

I never thought anything like this could happen.

For the first time in American history. A former president of the United States standing trial on criminal charges.

These are felony crimes in New York state. No matter who you are.

Former President Donald Trump fought repeatedly to delay the case beginning today, accusing him of illegally hiding payments he orchestrated to porn star Stormy Daniels to silence her affair allegations during his 2016 white House bid.

The evidence will show that he did so to cover up crimes relating to the 2016 election.

Multiple judges rejected Trump's last ditch efforts to halt the trial brought by the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg. Now, hundreds of potential jurors are being questioned in a courthouse downtown.

I don't know how you're going to have a trial that's going on right in the middle of an election. Not fair, not fair.

Lawyers for both sides will whittle that group down to just 12 jurors and six alternates, asking them questions to root out any bias. It includes. Have they ever attended a Trump rally? Subscribe to the conspiracy movement of QAnon or followed an anti-Trump organization on social media? The process expected to take as long as two weeks.

The whole point of jury selection is to find out, not just do people know who the parties are involved, not just did they know the charges, but rather can they set all of that information aside and be a fair and impartial juror? In this particular case, the.

Charges 34 counts of falsifying business records, the crime, not the alleged sexual activity, but the paperwork used to keep the payments to Stormy Daniels quiet. Prosecutors say Trump disguised the payments he made to his one time lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen, for Daniels to bury her affair claims, labeling them instead as legal payments for a nonexistent retainer agreement with Cohen.

He directed me to make the payments. He directed me to become involved in these matters.

Prosecutors say those disguised checks cut from the Trump Organization to Cohen were part of a larger catch and kill scheme devised by Trump and his allies with the publisher of the National Enquirer. Together, prosecutors say they would repeatedly buy negative stories about Trump, only to never publish them.

He was very concerned about how this would affect the election.

To help his campaign.

To help him and the campaign.

Trump has pled not guilty to the charges and has called the case election interference. He also claims the affair with Daniels never happened.

Did you know about the $130,000 payments?

Trump is no stranger to the legal system, but he has only come face to face with a jury during his presidential bid for the white House once before. Earlier this year, a nine person jury heard a civil defamation case brought against Trump by the writer Jean Carroll, who accused Trump of sexually assaulting her in the 1990s and then defaming her when she went public with her allegations in 2019. There, Trump personally analyzed the potential jurors, often craning his neck and turning around as they answered questions. He never attended the first trial, where a jury found him liable for sexual assault and defamation of Carroll. Some jurors, the second time around in the trial to determine damages against Trump, appeared visibly shocked when they entered the room, only to see the former president of the United States seated there. After days of witnessing Trump's behavior in court, including storming out of the courtroom, that jury of seven men and two women found Trump liable for defamation and ordered him to pay $83 million in damages. We will.

Immediately appeal.

We will set aside that ridiculous jury.

Now Trump is repeating that process again. But these jurors will be charged with deciding a criminal case. If convicted, he could face a maximum of four years in jail for each of the 34 counts.

And again, this is the first of four criminal prosecutions Trump is facing. Our thanks to Olivia Rubin for that report. I want to bring in our chief Washington correspondent, Jonathan Karl. John, this is a significant trial. We haven't seen this before, a trial involving a former president. What are you watching for?

Yeah, and not only that, but a trial that's playing out in the middle of a presidential campaign. Not just a former president, but the Republican presumptive Republican nominee for president. Now, what I am watching for is how Trump will use the next 6 to 8 weeks. Remember, this is a trial that is going to play out over the course of the next two months. Throughout this, the a very significant part of of the presidential campaign. And he doesn't need to be there today during jury selection. But once this trial is underway, he is required to be there in the courtroom. The court will be in session for four days a week Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday. And he is going to use this as not just an effort to defend himself against these criminal charges, but he will use it as a centerpiece of his presidential campaign. We saw a little dose of that just a short while ago, when he came out in front of the cameras and called this a political prosecution and suggested that somehow the the Biden White House was behind what the Manhattan district attorney is doing.

I think we'll be seeing a lot more of that. But this is a this is both an opportunity for Trump to lean into what is the central message of his campaign, which is essentially that he has been a victim and by extension, his supporters have been victims of an unfair political prosecution. But but there's a real risk here, because we have seen a time and time again that voters say that whatever they may or may not think of his indictments, that actually a felony prosecution, that him being convicted of a felony could well change how they view Donald Trump.

And, John, you bring up a good point that the president, the former president, didn't need to be there today for jury selection. I want to bring in our legal contributor, Brian Meyer. I do want to would like you to break down the jury selection process, but share with our viewers why he may have shown up today when he doesn't really have to be there.

Well, it's a criminal case rather than a civil case. So in a criminal case, you have the right to be present for each and every proceeding of your case. So it's his right to be there. And with most rights you can waive them as well. But put aside for a second, I know it's hard to that he's a former president. He's Donald Trump. Any criminal defendant should be present during jury selection because it just shows them how much you care in some of those proceedings. Ultimately, a jury of your peers is going to be making a decision about you, and you don't want to be absent for that. Think about the way we talk about the Aegean, Carol, with Donald Trump, that he wasn't there for the guilt phase, but he was there for the for the sentencing portion. There's always that air of did you really care? Why were you not there? And then in terms of your second part of your question in the process, again, it's going to be the judge having their preliminary statements.

Do you know this person? This is the nature of the case. This is how long the case will go. Do you think you'll be able to sit and be impartial in this case? For those people who say, no, I can't. On the on their own, the judge is going to say, you're excused. Maybe this isn't the right trial for you. And then we're going to go through those 42 questions that we've heard John and Aaron talk about, and potentially an opportunity for either the prosecution of the defense to have their own questions. And through that, you're going to try to get that fair and impartial jury, as everyone says. But also, to a large extent, you're going to try to find a jury, whether you're the defense or prosecution, to someone who's going to be receptive to your theory of the case. As a defense attorney, are you going to believe that if I say, hey, once a liar, always a liar, don't believe them now? Oh, that's a good thing for you.

Maybe the defense wants that prosecution to try to eliminate that person. The prosecution say, well, do you believe in law enforcement or do you do you believe in these charges? Do you think that Donald Trump does something wrong? I want that person, but they're going to try to get them out. And that's a bit of gamesmanship. Until you get that 12 plus alternates.

It'll be hard to find a juror that doesn't have an opinion of Donald Trump. And we've spoken about this. It's going to be a very difficult process. John, I want to turn to you, our executive editorial producer here. What are Trump's attorneys looking for in these prospective jurors?

Well, listen.

They know they're not going to get a Maga supporter that's out there waving a flag. Right. But they also don't want somebody that thinks Donald Trump is the worst person on the face of the earth. So they need somebody that's somewhat middle of the road, somebody that's followed the case. Obviously, they know that they're not going to get away from that. But somebody doesn't have a really strong opinion against Donald Trump. One thing I've heard from one Trump advisor is that, look, we need somebody that is open minded. Here's us. But in some ways, hey, look, you know what? If you get like a cop or a firefighter or somebody that, you know, they think would be a Trump supporter or at least open to his perspective on this, that is a win for us. I also think that, you know, it's anybody that comes in hostile towards Trump. I mean, Brian, we were talking about this earlier is not somebody they're going to want quite literally and obviously in New York.

There's a lot of that tension. But Donald Trump, one of the things that we've reported, you know, Rachel Scott talked about this earlier, her Katherine Faulders and my colleague Olivia Rubin, and I is that Donald Trump still believes there are some New Yorkers that support him. And one of the things that we're expecting, Stephanie, is that during the off days of this trial, Wednesday's the day that Donald Trump doesn't have to be in court. One of the things the campaign is talking about is campaigning around the Big Apple, if you can believe it. Right. Actually getting into some communities that Donald Trump believes he has some support. I'm not sure where that's going to be in New York, especially in Manhattan, where only in the 2020 election they won 15% of the vote on the island. But nevertheless, that's what they believe.

Let's turn to ABC news contributor and former Georgia prosecutor Chris Timmons. Chris Trump is charged with falsifying business records to conceal criminal conduct. The case focuses on following the money. So kind of walk us through this. How can we expect prosecutors to really lay out that evidence?

So I think, you know, Stephanie, it's it's not that exciting, but a lot of the case is going to revolve around the documents. I mean, I think they're going to be able to prove that these payments were made. You've got the live witness testimony, which obviously has some credibility issues when you're talking about one witness, the former Michael Cohen, who's been convicted of perjury, and then the other witness who's Stormy Daniels, who is a porn star and obviously is going to have some baggage that's going to be associated along those lines. And with that, her former employment. But I think they're going to focus on the documents. I think they're going to focus on kind of consistencies with those documents from their witnesses. I mean, the witnesses are going to take some credibility hits, just as Brian talked about earlier. But, you know, when you match their their statements up with the documents, you can build credibility using those documents to to help you get your case across the goal line.

The other thing, though, Stephanie, one of the things I want to touch on with regard to jury selection is it's important to look for leaders. When you're talking about who you want on that jury, you're not just looking for folks that are going to be unbiased, but you really, really want to know who's going to be back in that jury room talking, who's our potential foreman, because you're going to have jurors that fall into two camps. You're going to have folks that are followers and folks that are leaders. And when you're in a jury selection type situation, you're kind of almost have like a four level grid where you're looking at people and trying to figure out, are they leaders, are they sympathetic to my case? And if they're against us and their leader, we want to strike them.

And the former president will sit throughout all of this. Chris, thank you so much. Our thanks to Jonathan Karl, John Santucci, Brian Meyer as well. We will have continuing coverage of the former president's trial all day long. But we're also following another major story fallout over Iran's assault on Israel, unleashing hundreds of missiles and drones, most of them shot down or failing to reach their target. Israel's war cabinet weighing a response as President Biden and other world leaders try to prevent further escalation. We have team coverage on the tensions in the Middle East, and that is coming up.

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Welcome back to ABC News Live. First, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is meeting with his war cabinet today to discuss potential responses to Iran's attack. The cabinet met yesterday but ended their meeting without making a final decision about a response. This after Iran launched a massive missile and drone barrage at Israel over the weekend. Two U.S. officials confirmed to ABC that at least half failed before reaching their targets. Centcom says 99% of the others were intercepted. I want to bring in senior white House correspondent Selina Wang, senior Pentagon reporter Louis Martinez and ABC news contributor General Robert Abrams and foreign correspondent Tom Birge in Tel Aviv, Israel. For more on this, Salena, I want to start with you. We hear President Biden is urging Prime Minister Netanyahu to slow things down. What more do you know about their conversation? Yeah, Stephanie.

Well, the president.

Essentially told Netanyahu to take the win, that he's already proven that Israel's military is superior. So from here, as you say, he should just take it slow. Think carefully and strategically. The president also made clear that if Israel decides to strike back, that they will do so alone. The president has been deeply concerned since the start of this conflict that this could escalate into a wider war. So while the US showed it's willing to defend Israel, it's staunchly behind that. It's not going to go on the offensive. Now, it appears here that Iran is saying they're essentially done here. Unless Israel decides to respond and they're warning, they would then respond accordingly. So right now the ball is very much in Israel's court. But despite the pressure we're seeing from U.S. officials onto their Israeli counterparts, a senior administration official says they believe that Israel still will strike back and that this is not over now.

It's just a matter of time. We'll see what happens. Thank you. Selena Louis. A senior U.S. official says that the Biden administration believes that Israel will strike Iran, saying, quote, most of the world thinks this is over. It is not. But Iran has made clear it considers the matter closed. So how significant is that? And what could a possible retaliation mean for that region?

Stephanie, as Selena just said, the ball is in Israel's court right now because that Israeli war cabinet is going to have to determine what kind of a response they're actually going to do or undertake against Iran. It could be that they could target proxies. It could be that they could actually strike at inside Iran, just as Iran did against Israel this weekend. How could they go about doing that? Well, 1 in 1, one plan long seen has been that Israel, with its high end fighter jets, could launch attacks inside of Iran. But that means undertaking a long missions that require air mid air refueling. Now, while Israel does have made a refueling, the United States has even more. And I think what we've seen, the message privately being expressed to Israel is that the United States will not assist Israel if it undertakes some kind of a military response against Iran. But again, Israel has much, many capabilities. They have long range ballistic missiles on themselves so that they may not need any kind of manned aircraft.

But again, it's all up to Israel. And now to determine what happens next. And then if there are any casualties inside of Iran as a result of this new retaliation, we could see things escalate if Iran retaliates yet again.

General Abrams, I want to turn to you. According to Centcom, US forces destroyed 80 drones and at least six ballistic missiles out of the more than 300 launched by Iran overnight. U.S. officials said it would not participate in any Israeli counterattack. And as we just mentioned, the US staying out of it. But could we see that change if this escalates, if there is this back and forth, do you see the U.S. stepping in at any point?

Well, at this point, based on all the information that we've seen and heard from, you know, all the parties and especially from the white House, I'd say no, I don't think we'll see US forces participating in an Israeli direct attack on Iran. But we should remind everyone that we we've got a lot of troops there in the Middle East, as you know, Stephanie. And, uh, there is a good chance that, uh, there could be collateral damage or even a direct attack against U.S. troops by Iran or by Iranian proxies. And then that could actually change the calculus in terms of the administration. But for now, I'd say we should take the administration at its word that they will not participate and authorize participation in an Israeli kinetic attack against Israel, I mean, against Iran. Having said that, though, I'd caveat by saying Israel has a full range of options, both kinetic and non-kinetic, and especially with cyber, um, that could require some U.S. assistance, but it would obviously not be known to the world.

And we, of course, will see with time what direction Israel does go in. Tom, the Israeli War Cabinet members are meeting today where officials are considering a response to Iran's attack. What's the latest on that?

Yeah, Stephanie, we just had word that the Israeli war cabinet meeting has broken up. It's the second meeting of the War Cabinet in 24 hours. We have no indication at this stage whether a decision was reached in that meeting. Of course, I think there is a consensus here in Israel that there has to be a response. The question is what type of response, the scale of the response and the timing of that response. And of course, as the general just said, yes, all options are on the table. It could be a cyber attack. More hardline elements in Netanyahu's government are pushing for a more hardline military response directly against Iran. But of course, allies like the United States, other allies in Europe, Arab nations who were critical, of course, in helping Israel defend itself against Iran in the early hours of Sunday morning. They're all pressing Israel to be restrained, to not give something to Iran. That means that they have to necessarily strike back against Israel. And then we're into a much more dangerous ballgame.

Certainly a situation we will continue to watch throughout the day very closely. Our thanks to Selena Wang, Louie Martinez, General Robert Abrams, and of course, Tom Burke. Thank you all. This unprecedented attack by Iran now has us asking, what could the impact of this strike have on our markets and oil prices? Our business reporter, Alexis Christoforos, is tracking that part of the story for us. Good morning Alexis. Good morning.

Stephanie. We're taking a look at the oil markets and the stock market, because unrest in the Middle East, of course, has Wall Street on high alert. Oil prices are a little change today after rallying Friday in anticipation of Iran's attack on Israel. Analysts say the risk of escalating warfare in the Middle East has already been factored into this year's roughly 20% rise in crude oil prices, and stocks are actually rallying today after having their worst week in months. That's after this weekend's drone and missile attack was largely thwarted by an international effort and did little damage. Now, stocks are also reacting to a much better than expected report on March retail sales today. That report, just the latest proof that Americans continue to spend despite stubbornly high inflation. Now, what happens next with oil and the stock market largely depends on Israel's response to the attack. Oil prices are currently at a six month high of around $90 a barrel. That's a level we haven't seen since the early days of the Israel-hamas war. Analysts say if the conflict escalates, we could see oil easily top $100 a barrel as turmoil in the Middle East, then threatens oil supply in that region, and could put key shipping routes in jeopardy.

If that were to happen, it could send gas prices above $4 a gallon and also push inflation even higher. Remember, just weeks ago, US stocks were rallying to record highs on hopes the fed would deliver three interest rate cuts this year. Those hopes were dashed after new reports confirmed inflation is back on the rise. And in addition to all of this, the conflict in the Middle East, those March retail sales reports, investors focusing on corporate earnings from major companies are coming out today, and in the weeks ahead, they're looking for more clues on inflation. And Stephanie, the health, the overall health of the US economy.

That happened really.

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Thank you Alexis. We'll have more of the day's top stories right after this break.

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Welcome back to ABC News Live. Let's take a look at some of the day's top stories. The weapons supervisor for Alec Baldwin's film rust. We'll learn her prison sentence today. Hannah Gutierrez was convicted of involuntary manslaughter last month for the death of another crew member, who was shot when a gun held by Baldwin went off. She faces up to 18 months in prison. Baldwin is also charged with involuntary manslaughter. His trial is scheduled to start in July. Security at the Boston Marathon is on high alert after law enforcement agencies have identified what they're calling a broad set of potential soft targets for an attack. That is according to a threat assessment obtained by ABC news. Officials say the most significant threat facing this marathon comes from lone offenders and small groups of individuals looking to commit acts of violence, particularly at designated viewing areas. Boston law enforcement says 48 local, state and federal public safety organizations will be positioned throughout the city and the path of that race. Police say they know of no specific threats to the area.

And in much lighter news, the highly anticipated WNBA draft tips off tonight. Caitlin Clark is expected to be the number one pick, with Angel Reese and Camila Cardoso not too far behind. The excitement comes after the women's NCAA championship game drew more viewers than the men's final for the first time ever. You can see the WNBA draft live tonight at 730 eastern on ESPN. We do want to thank you for streaming with us. I'm Stephanie Ramos. ABC News Live is here for you anytime with the latest news, context and analysis.

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Welcome back to ABC News Live. First I'm Stephanie Ramos. We are following breaking news on this Monday morning. The historic first ever trial of a former president is getting underway. We're getting a look at former President Trump inside the courtroom for jury selection in the hush money case against him. Earlier, he addressed reporters, saying he is proud to be there. Take a listen.

This is an outrage at this case was brought. This is political persecution. This is a persecution like never before. Nobody's ever seen anything like it. And again, it's a case that should have never been brought. It's an assault on America.

The district attorney charged Trump with falsifying business records to conceal payments he allegedly made to Stormy Daniels through his then attorney, Michael Cohen. Trump pleaded not guilty to the 34 charges last year, calling the case election interference and a witch hunt. We have full team coverage this morning as jury selection gets underway. Want to bring in ABC's executive editorial producer John Santucci, ABC's legal contributor Brian Meyer, senior reporter Katherine Faulders, and ABC's political director Rick Klein. Thank you all for joining me this morning. John, I want to start with you. We're learning the judge has already denied some of Trump's motions. What are you hearing from inside the court?

Well, for the moment, it's really just going through the process of things, right? Setting the calendar days. We're not going to be in we're going to wrap the day early for Passover. I mean, a lot of the process stuff, we're starting to get into the actual motions here. The judge already saying that, you know, he's keeping the case. We're going ahead here, folks, but thanks for trying. They're also getting into the beginning portions of what they're going to look for as far as asymmetry with the jury again, just going through the motions. Now, Donald Trump, according to our Lucian Brueggemann, who's watching the feed from the overflow of court and others, that, of course, have been watching Donald Trump for the last several minutes that he's actually been in this courtroom, say that the former president's demeanor is listening intently, his arms folded. He's moving around in his chair a little bit. He's leaning in in certain times. I mean, taking all of this in, right?

He's flanked by his legal counsel, Todd Blanche, of course, the lead attorney, lead attorney on this case for the former president. And, of course, District Attorney Alvin Bragg is also in the room. Stephanie, which is not too surprising. We have seen many of the prosecutors involved in the four criminal cases Donald Trump faces have shown up at some point during the proceedings where Trump has been in the courtroom. So for this one, this is day one. This is just the beginning. And we've got a lot to go.

A lot to go. And we were speaking about this earlier. He didn't really have to be there today for jury selection. It's optics. And also the opportunity that was given to him to be there. So he made himself present to make himself known. Brian, I want to turn to you. We just heard John mentioned this about asymmetry. That motion on asymmetry on the jurors questionnaire was denied. What do you make of that? How significant is that?

It's it's again, it's like John said, it's housekeeping. This is what you hear in terms of trials that I have done, trials that other people would do. But it is significant in the sense of you've got to make the motion the way we described it. When it comes to appeals down the road, if you don't use it, you lose it in the sense of if you don't make the argument here and the judge makes an incorrect ruling, if you go in appeal and you say, well, I knew the judge was wrong, but I didn't object to it because I knew it was wrong. I was gonna make the argument here. An appellate court would say, no, no, no, no, no. If you don't use it, you lose. You have to make the argument here, preserve the issue and then appeal it later. Donald Trump knows that this case is not the last one. There's going to be an appeal. So each and every issue is going to make sure that every judge and every prosecutor who sees a case, doctor eyes and crosses their t's, because if they don't, he's going to let this case just live out through appellate arguments.

Paul, this to the letter. Brian. Thank you. Catherine, I want to turn to you. Prosecutors are focusing on these payments Trump allegedly made to Stormy Daniels through his then attorney, Michael Cohen. What can you tell us about how they've built their case and what evidence they plan to show?

And, Stephanie, as we've been talking about with all the guests, this goes back to 2016, that Trump was worried that his election prospects would be hurt if people found out about the Stormy Daniels. So prosecutors are putting him alleging that he is right at the center of this hush money payment that was allegedly wired by his former lawyer, Michael Cohen. As we've reported, we expect prosecutors to rely heavily on witnesses, former white House employees when Trump was president, along with longtime aides at the Trump Organization, for example, we've reported that they expect prosecutors expect to call his longtime assistant, Rhonda Graf, who was essentially there for every crucial moment, maybe not involved in decision making in meetings, for example, but definitely a witness. And on the sidelines there. So obviously this is only jury selection. It's probably going to last the whole week. We're not in opening statements or them building their case in any way yet, but that is ultimately down the line. What we could see from prosecutors in terms of how they plan to build their case and what witnesses Trump's longtime current and former aides that they plan to call.

Right. This is just the beginning in this part of the saga. Rick, I want to turn to you. Trump has used these court appearances as unofficial campaign events. We heard him earlier right there at the courthouse. He sounded as though he was at a rally. How are these legal battles factoring into his messaging, and how is that playing with voters?

Yeah, we've seen.

For some time, Stephanie.

How the political.

And the legal have become one. Right? When he's talking outside a courtroom, he's talking about politics. When he's talking at a campaign rally, he's talking about his legal cases. They are so linked, and they have no choice now but to embrace the fact that this is the reality that four out of every five. Four of every five weekdays are going to be consumed by time in court for the foreseeable future, just on this one case. And that gives the former president access to a very loud microphone, literal microphones that he can just go to outside of court. Of course, his social media platform is another way to to express himself. He might be somewhat constrained in what he can say, and he's been railing about those constraints in attacking the limited gag ruling that's in effect. But he still is going to have plenty to say. And in fact, in some cases, he may have too much to say because him him kind of freelancing outside a court about things that just happened inside may not be the best in terms of legal strategy, but he's going to be in the news cycle.

And if there's anything that he knows well, it's how to dominate said news cycle.

Absolutely. And John, we've been talking about this. We know that the jury selection process is expected to take the week, but how challenging is that going to be? Evening that everyone knows who he is?

42 questions. Thousands of New Yorkers received those 42 questions. And thousands are going to pile into that courtroom. Stephanie, it's going to be extremely challenging, because who in the state of New York in the United States doesn't have an opinion or know who Donald Trump is? Look, the other thing you have to remember too less than 15%, 12% in the last selection, ten the one before that voted for Donald Trump on the island of Manhattan. So really, there's not going to be a Maga supporter that would end up on this case anyway, but it's somebody that would at least have an open mind to Donald Trump is what his legal team is going to be hoping for here. But that questionnaire, those 42 questions, some of them basic, I had it somewhere. I think you took my paper for me, Brian. But, you know, one of the things that are on there is that, you know, do you have a strong opinion of Donald Trump? Are you a subscriber or supporter of QAnon, a conspiracy theory?

You know, one of the things that jurors are always asked is how they get their news and information New York Times, ABC, etc. but on this questionnaire, they're asked if they are subscribers to Truth Social, Donald Trump's social media platform. So all of this is going to be really heavily complicated to wade through. I think they're going to take at least two weeks to get this year.

And that was my next question. Can they really get it done? Well, they have this week.

And not this week. I don't think so. I think two weeks. I mean, you think what do you think? You think goes three? I don't think so Brian.

I'll do the over I would say over two weeks. I get two if you're if you're.

Talking you're.

Talking no Wednesdays I'm.

Talking no Wednesday.

No Wednesday is four days. Eight days. I can see it being a 10 to 12 days election. And that would bring us if you're doing four days a week. Yeah. I don't think it's that crazy. You just want to.

Spend more time with me.

I mean, I'm stealing your stuff.

Right back here every single day. With a break on Wednesday. Catherine, we expect to hear. And you mentioned this earlier from some former members of Trump's inner circle, but how critical could their testimony be?

Well, it depends, but I think it could be extremely critical. We've reported some aides that you haven't heard of. They're not household names. Madeline, Madeline Westerhout, for example. She was crucial in the beginning of the Trump White House, for example. She was his top aide. She was the director of Oval Office operations. We have reported that we expect her to be called under a subpoena also. And we were talking about this a little earlier. Rhona Graff, who's Trump's longtime secretary at the Trump Organization. These are people who, while they might not have been crucial to meetings or decision making, were witnesses and knew everything that was going on in the inner workings of whether it was the white House or whether it was the Trump Organization. We've also reported longtime aide Hope Hicks is expected to testify as well. So again, as you guys have been talking about, we're in the early stages here, but it will be striking to see these longtime aides to Trump ultimately take the stand being called by prosecutors, for example.

It will be striking in aides that have known him for for so long now, Brian, we've talked about this. The defense says this is a fantasy unsupported by evidence and testimony. And and speaking of that evidence, obviously, the Manhattan D.A. is that mounting evidence that they'll present. How would you tackle this as a defense attorney? How would you mount this case against Trump?

So at the beginning, it starts right now at jury selection, because what you're looking for is finding a receptive jury. What I would say is the facts are the facts, but who interprets them is a whole other game. I've got a baby on my mind. I've got a two year old at home. If I was to tell you that pasta and apple juice is the greatest meal in the world, we would probably disagree. But I think our kids would be like, let's eat that five days a week. It's not necessarily the facts that change, but who is receiving it. And so for the defense team here with Donald Trump, they're saying we have a liar who's going to take the stand, someone who is a noted liar, and we're going to try to paint them as a liar again against Donald Trump. Are we going to find people, regardless of political affiliation, where they are in Manhattan, what what they bring into the background? Are we going to get people who are not going to trust a liar, no matter what they say on the stand, and then build your case around the themes and ideas of that?

And I think that's the case here for Donald Trump.

And also dependent on the those those aides and those folks that take the stand. Rick, how are Trump's political allies reacting to this trial?

Well, some of them are ignoring it. And going out business as usual. It's a very busy week in Washington on Capitol Hill, so members of Congress can kind of dig in on that. But but it's been striking throughout this process is how many even the people that were his rivals during the primary season, that seems like a long time ago, were willing to back up his basic assertion of this being a witch hunt, providing no evidence to back that up, but suggesting that this is all politically motivated. And it is notable that this being the first case to go to trial, it's widely seen as as the weakest. And in terms of the politics, maybe the hardest one to make an actual case around that, that gets to the law. And and that I think has helped Donald Trump along the way. Certainly it did during the primaries. It's the general election now, though, and things will be different. And the idea that Donald Trump is going to be dominating the news every day, basically for the next umpteen weeks, suggests that it's going to be a challenge to break through for other candidates, like like President Biden.

So I do think most of his allies have stayed very loyal to him, particularly on this case, which again, is is a little bit more of a tenuous legal argument that's being made a little more indirect than some of the cases around January 6th, say, or classified documents. I have no, no sign that Republicans are going to break with him over this trial. But we have seen in public opinion polling that if he is convicted of a crime, there are people saying they're less likely to support him as a result. Whether that transfers over into reality remains to be seen.

Exactly. If he is convicted, we'll see how they react. Brian, by the way, I loved your example of the toddler and the pasta and the apple juice, and it's still on my mind. Sorry.

A lot of meals at home.

We can all relate to that, can all relate to the toddler situation. But it makes sense. It's like, who is receiving that information? Who is receiving that testimony, that evidence that is crucial. But Trump says this case should have never been brought. We heard him earlier this morning saying, this is an outrage. This is political persecution. What do you make of that? I mean, the evidence is there. The the D.A. has mounted their case. But when you hear the former president say this, I shouldn't even be here. This should have never been brought. What do you make of that?

So this is an argument that a lot of attorneys, friends and I have that go back and forth on. Is this the case that should have been brought? The facts are the facts, and we can all see how those facts may fit into the framework that is falsifying business records in the first degree. But what does that mean? The falsifying business records typically are just a misdemeanor. You put a wrong or a false information, you omit it wherever may be. But what the D.A. in this case is saying is that he put false information into documents with the intent to commit another crime. And the question has always been, what is that other crime? How are you elevating this from misdemeanor to felony? And the facts are the facts. Yes. But the question is as to what his camp is arguing. What many attorneys could make an argument for is why do these facts fit this scenario? People politicians have always been paying off people to to keep them silent. NDAs were falling. Sean Combs In other cases, we've looked at our Kelly and other and Weinstein, all those other kinds of cases where NDAs have happened, where you pay people to not speak.

But the question is, why is it here that they're elevating to a felony level? And that's where he's saying, this is a witch hunt. This is unique. This has never happened before. And that's the ground in which he's standing on.

And we'll see what the defense brings forward. And to prove their case, I want to thank everyone who has joined us this morning John Santucci, Brian Buck Meyer, Katherine Faulders and Rick Klein. Thank you all for your time. We, of course, will have continuing coverage of the former president's trial all day long. But we are also following another major story fallout over Iran's assault on Israel, unleashing hundreds of missiles and drones, most of them shot down or failing to reach their target. Israel's War Cabinet weighing a response as President Biden and other world leaders trying to prevent further escalation. We have team coverage on the tensions in the Middle East, and that is coming up next.

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Welcome back to ABC News Live. First, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is meeting with his war cabinet today to discuss potential responses to Iran's attack. The cabinet met yesterday but ended their meeting without making a final decision about a response. This after Iran launched a massive missile and drone barrage at Israel over the weekend. Two U.S. officials confirmed to ABC that at least half failed before reaching their targets. Centcom says 99% of the others were intercepted. I want to bring in senior white House correspondent Selina Wang, senior Pentagon reporter Louis Martinez and ABC news contributor General Robert Abrams and foreign correspondent Tom Sufi in Tel Aviv, Israel. For more on this, Salena, I want to start with you. We hear President Biden is urging Prime Minister Netanyahu to slow things down. What more do you know about their conversation?

Yes, Stephanie Will. The president essentially told Netanyahu to take the win, that he's already proven that Israel's military is superior. So from here, as you say, he should just take it slow. Think carefully and strategically. The president also made clear that if Israel decides to strike back, that they will do so alone. The president has been deeply concerned since the start of this conflict that this could escalate into a wider war. So while the US showed it's willing to defend Israel, it's staunchly behind that. It's not going to go on the offensive. Now, it appears here that Iran is saying they're essentially done here. Unless Israel decides to respond and they're warning, they would then respond accordingly. So right now the ball is very much in Israel's court. But despite the pressure we're seeing from U.S. officials onto their Israeli counterparts, a senior administration official says they believe that Israel still will strike back and that this is not over now.

It's just a matter of time. We'll see what happens. Thank you. Selena Louis. A senior U.S. official says that the Biden administration believes that Israel will strike Iran, saying, quote, most of the world thinks this is over. It is not. But Iran has made clear it considers the matter closed. So how significant is that? And what could a possible retaliation mean for that region?

Stephanie and Selena just said the ball is in Israel's court right now, because that Israeli war cabinet is going to have to determine what kind of a response they're actually going to do or undertake against Iran. It could be that they could target proxies, it could be that they could actually strike at inside Iran, just as Iran did against Israel this weekend. How could they go about doing that? Well, 1 in 1, one plan long seen has been that Israel, with its high end fighter jets, could launch attacks inside of Iran, but that means undertaking long missions that require air mid air refueling. Now, while Israel does have made a refueling, the United States has even more. And I think what we've seen, the message privately being expressed to Israel is that the United States will not assist Israel if it undertakes some kind of a military response against Iran. But again, Israel has much many capabilities. They have long range ballistic missiles over themselves so that they may not need any kind of manned aircraft.

But again, it's all up to Israel. And now to determine what happens next. And then if there are any casualties inside of Iran as a result of this new retaliation, we could see things escalate if Iran retaliates yet again.

General Abrams, I want to turn to you. According to Centcom, US forces destroyed 80 drones and at least six ballistic missiles out of the more than 300 launched by Iran overnight. U.S. officials said it would not participate in any Israeli counterattack. And as we just mentioned, the U.S. staying out of it. But could we see that change if this escalates, if there is this back and forth, do you see the U.S. stepping in at any point?

Well, at this point, based on all the information that we've seen and heard from, you know, all the parties and especially from the white House, I'd say no, I don't think we'll see US forces participating in an Israeli direct attack on Iran. But we should remind everyone that we we've got a lot of troops there in the Middle East, as you know, Stephanie. And, uh, there is a good chance that, uh, there could be collateral damage or even a direct attack against U.S. troops by Iran or by Iranian proxies. And then that could actually change the calculus in terms of the administration. But for now, I'd say we should take the administration at its word that they will not participate and authorize participation in an Israeli kinetic attack against Israel, I mean, against Iran. Having said that, though, I'd caveat by saying Israel has a full range of options, both kinetic and non-kinetic, and especially with cyber, um, that could require some U.S. assistance, but it would obviously not be known to the world.

And we, of course, will see with time what direction Israel does go in. Tom, the Israeli War Cabinet members are meeting today where officials are considering a response to Iran's attack. What's the latest on that?

Yeah. Stephanie, we just had word that the Israeli War Cabinet meeting has broken up. It's the second meeting of the War cabinet in 24 hours. We have no indication at this stage whether a decision was reached in that meeting. Of course, I think there is a consensus here in Israel that there has to be a response. The question is what type of response, the scale of the response and the timing of that response. And of course, as the general just said, yes, all options are on the table. It could be a cyber attack. More hardline elements in Netanyahu's government are pushing for a more hardline military response directly against Iran. But of course, allies like the United States, other allies in Europe, Arab nations who were critical, of course, in helping Israel defend itself against Iran in the early hours of Sunday morning. They're all pressing Israel to be restrained, to not give something to Iran. That means that they have to necessarily strike back against Israel. And then we're into a much more dangerous ballgame.

Certainly a situation we will continue to watch throughout the day very closely. Our thanks to Selina Wang, Louie Martinez, General Robert Abrams, and of course, Tom Sophie Berg. Thank you all. This unprecedented attack by Iran now has is asking, what could the impact of this strike have on our markets and oil prices? Our business reporter, Alexis Christoforos, is tracking that part of the story for us. Good morning Alexis.

Good morning Stephanie. We're taking a look at the oil markets and the stock market, because unrest in the Middle East, of course, has Wall Street on high alert. Oil prices are a little change today after rallying Friday in anticipation of Iran's attack on Israel. Analysts say the risk of escalating warfare in the Middle East has already been factored into this year's roughly 20% rise in crude oil prices, and stocks are actually rallying today after having their worst week in months. That's after this weekend's drone and missile attack was largely thwarted by an international effort and did little damage. Now, stocks are also reacting to a much better than expected report on March retail sales today. That report, just the latest proof that Americans continue to spend despite stubbornly high inflation. Now, what happens next with oil and the stock market largely depends on Israel's response to the attack. Oil prices are currently at a six month high of around $90 a barrel. That's a level we haven't seen since the early days of the Israel-hamas war. Analysts say if the conflict escalates, we could see oil easily top $100 a barrel as turmoil in the Middle East, then threatens oil supply in that region, and could put key shipping routes in jeopardy.

If that were to happen, it could send gas prices above $4 a gallon and also push inflation even higher. Remember, just weeks ago, US stocks were rallying to record highs on hopes the fed would deliver three interest rate cuts this year. Those hopes were dashed after new reports confirmed inflation is back on the rise. And in addition to all of this, the conflict in the Middle East, those March retail sales reports, investors focusing on corporate earnings from major companies are coming out today, and in the weeks ahead, they're looking for more clues on inflation. And Stephanie, the health, the overall health of the US economy, that.

Happened really quickly.

It really did.

Thank you Alexis. We'll have more of the day's top stories right after this break.

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Welcome back I'm Stephanie Ramos today on ABC News Live first. We're following breaking news. The historic first ever trial of a former president is getting underway. Former President Trump is inside the courtroom for jury selection in the hush money case against him. The district attorney charged Trump with falsifying business records to conceal payments he allegedly made to Stormy Daniels through his then attorney, Michael Cohen. The judge has already denied a motion from Trump's legal team regarding jury selection, and another aimed at forcing the judge's recusal. The judge will also allow evidence involving Trump's interactions with the National Enquirer and an alleged hush money payment to another woman. Earlier, Trump addressed reporters at the courthouse, saying he is proud to be there. Take a listen.

This is an outrage at this case was brought. This is political persecution. This is a persecution like never before. Nobody's ever seen anything like it. And again, it's a case that should have never been brought. It's an assault on America.

Trump pleaded not guilty to the 34 charges last year, calling the case, quote, election interference and a witch hunt. We have full team coverage as jury selection gets underway, starting with ABC news investigative reporter Olivia Rubin and a look at what's at stake.

I never thought anything like this could happen.

For the first time in American history, a former president of the United States standing trial on criminal charges.

These are felony crimes in New York state. No matter who you are.

Former President Donald Trump fought repeatedly to delay the case beginning today, accusing him of illegally hiding payments he orchestrated to porn star Stormy Daniels to silence her affair allegations during his 2016 white House bid.

The evidence will show that he did so to cover up crimes relating to the 2016 election.

Multiple judges rejected Trump's last ditch efforts to halt the trial brought by the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg. Now, hundreds of potential jurors are being questioned in a courthouse downtown.

I don't know how you're going to have a trial that's going on right in the middle of an election. Not fair, not fair.

Lawyers for both sides will whittle that group down to just 12 jurors and six alternates, asking them questions to root out any bias. It includes. Have they ever attended a Trump rally? Subscribe to the conspiracy movement of QAnon or followed an anti-Trump organization on social media? The process expected to take as long as two weeks.

The whole point of jury selection is to find out, not just do people know who the parties are involved, not just did they know the charges, but rather can they set all of that information aside and be a fair and impartial juror? In this particular case, the.

Charges 34 counts of falsifying business records, the crime, not the alleged sexual activity, but the paperwork used to keep the payments to Stormy Daniels quiet. Prosecutors say Trump disguised the payments he made to his one time lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen, for Daniels to bury her affair claims, labeling them instead as legal payments for a nonexistent retainer agreement with Cohen.

He directed me to make the payments. He directed me to become involved in these matters.

Prosecutors say those disguised checks cut from the Trump Organization to Cohen were part of a larger catch and kill scheme devised by Trump and his allies with the publisher of the National Enquirer. Together, prosecutors say they would repeatedly buy negative stories about Trump, only to never publish them.

He was very concerned about how this would affect the election.

To help his campaign.

To help him and the campaign.

Trump has pled not guilty to the charges and has called the case election interference. He also claims the affair with Daniels never happened.

Did you know about the $130,000 payments?

Trump is no stranger to the legal system, but he has only come face to face with a jury during his presidential bid for the white House once before. Earlier this year, a nine person jury heard a civil defamation case brought against Trump by the writer Jean Carroll, who accused Trump of sexually assaulting her in the 1990s and then defaming her when she went public with her allegations in 2019. There, Trump personally analyzed the potential jurors, often craning his neck and turning around as they answered questions. He never attended the first trial, where a jury found him liable for sexual assault and defamation of Carroll. Some jurors, the second time around in the trial to determine damages against Trump, appeared visibly shocked when they entered the room, only to see the former president of the United States seated there. After days of witnessing Trump's behavior in court, including storming out of the courtroom, that jury of seven men and two women found Trump liable for defamation and ordered him to pay $83 million in damages. We will.

Immediately appeal. We will set aside that ridiculous jury.

Now Trump is repeating that process again. But these jurors will be charged with deciding a criminal case. If convicted, he could face a maximum of four years in jail for each of the 34 counts.

Our thanks to Olivia Rubin, who is outside the courthouse now, and Olivia, we are learning. The judge has reaffirmed his decision that prosecutors can now play the Access Hollywood tape, or from many years ago, where Trump's defamation from the Aegean Carol case. So what is the latest?

Exactly. It's a win for Donald Trump, who did not want that infamous Access Hollywood tape that came out just before the 2016 election to be played before the jury. So it's a small win for him, but one of the few that he has gotten this morning because, Stephanie, remember, jury selection has not actually gotten underway yet. What is going on on the 15th floor of the courtroom is that lawyers for Trump and the prosecutors are going over again. Some of what the evidence is going to be to come into this case. And prosecutors have now, just this morning, successfully gotten in some more information about the National Enquirer, the publication that worked with Donald Trump, allegedly to hide some of these stories before 2016. And they will also get in some more information about Karen McDougal, who is another woman that was allegedly paid because of her claims about Donald Trump, though she is not related to the charges here. So a win for Donald Trump in the sense that the tape won't be played, but some losses and that there is more evidence coming in that he doesn't necessarily want before the jury.

Stephanie.

Thank you. Olivia, I want to bring in executive editorial producer John Santucci. John, we just heard from Olivia there that the Access Hollywood tape cannot be played, but the judge will allow evidence about the National Enquirer and Karen McDougal, the woman that Trump allegedly had an affair with. So what do you make of that?

Well, listen, the whole idea is that prosecutors are trying to set up the idea. This was a pattern for Donald Trump, this idea of catching and killing. And just quickly to break it down, catching a bad story, killing it by paying off the people that could potentially cause damage to Donald Trump and others. And in the case of Karen McDougal and a doorman who worked for Donald Trump at one time, this was something that happened before the Stormy Daniels payment. It was done with David Pecker. So thus it was a rinse and repeat performance for Donald Trump when he did do the Stormy Daniels payment with Michael Cohen, of course, making the payment and then the reimbursements that came thereafter. So really the idea is to show, you know, there's never any evidence or a set up, basically an idea presented by Trump's defense team. Well, you know, we never did this before. Well, wait a second. You did this two times before. Maybe there are others, right? This idea that it was an ongoing relationship between pecker, Cohen and Trump to catch the story, kill it, make it go away.

And Brian, what do you make of the motions? The judge denied? How could that affect the case?

It's going to affect the case in the sense of what the tenor of the of the arguments are, and also how either side are going to say, well, this is a little too far and this is maybe not enough. What I think we're going to hear a lot of when reporting comes out of what was argued in this court, he's going to hear this phrase a lot, saying more prejudicial than probative. And that's probably the reason why the tape was denied. It's too prejudicial for you to hear the former president's own words saying, you can just come up on them and grab them by this and the judge and say, well, what is this really probative of? What are we learning from this other than making Donald Trump look like a bad guy, which in many ways is what the prosecutor wants to kind of convince the jury. And so the judge is going to kind of straddle that line of like, all right, if you're trying to prove this catch and kill a theory that this is not just one, but many instances, I let you be probative to an extent, but not so far.

They're going to prejudice the jury to just say, like, well, this is a bad guy, that we're finding guilty. Not necessarily. The facts articulate that of the crimes he's accused of.

Right? Right. How does that video relate to these alleged payments that were made? Right. Exactly. Catherine, I want to bring you in ABC's senior reporter, Katherine Faulders. Catherine, the judge imposed a limited gag order against Trump last month. Is the former president really being careful in trying to avoid violating that order? And then if he does violate that order, what happens?

Well, look, it's a good question. I don't think he's being particularly careful, given some of his comments over the weekend on a social media platform, Truth Social. And look, I think it's something that his lawyers, at least from talking to sources close to the legal team, it's something they're worried about here. They don't really want him to approach that camera in the hallway. They really don't want him to do those press conferences following his court appearances that he is known to do, especially Stephanie. As it relates to jury selection. Trump is already on notice from the judge when he extended the gag order, for example, over jury selection. So there is a worry inside Trump world that he will violate it. He has violated gag orders in the past. So look, I don't know. This is all fluid. John Santucci knows this as well. From talking to sources. You can't really tell him not to go to the camera, but it is something that his lawyers are keeping an eye out for.

They don't want him to violate this gag order, and if he does, there could be a warning, there could be sanctions, he could be fined as he was in the past. We'll just have to see what he ultimately does in terms of his public comments throughout the day. And of course, after this wraps up.

Yeah, we will just have to wait and see how he reacts. ABC's political director Rick Klein is also with us. And Rick Trump says the gag order is a violation of his protected political speech. Do you think that is playing into his campaign strategy.

100% of this? I mean, I think it goes back to months ago when he talked about how he was being persecuted and forced off the campaign trail into courtrooms, and he would go to court oftentimes. Without any reason to actually be there, and then fundraise over the fact that he was he was dragged into court, even though, again, he didn't have to be there. Similarly, he's fundraising over the fact that he is being limited in some fashion from what he is able to say publicly about this case, he is saying things and doing things that most ordinary defendants would probably end up in jail for. Frankly, if you violate gag orders and if you say the kind of provocative things and often false things about people involved in a trial, most citizens don't get to do that. He has gotten a lot of leeway, not just in this case, but across a range of cases about what he has said and done. But he is also getting a lot of political mileage over the fact that he's been limited in any way.

And the point he's made over and over again about this being in the middle of a campaign and being unfair has been a consistent one, and something that comes up outside courthouses, but also at his campaign rallies. And when we talk to his supporters across the country, they point that out as well, to see all of these cases going on at the same time, to be have the former president limited in what he can say about him. That all adds up to a powerful political argument that Trump has been using for some time.

Lots to watch. The first of four criminal prosecutions Trump is facing and maybe the only one before the election. We will speak once again, I'm sure later today and throughout this entire process. Our thanks to you, Olivia Rubin, John Santucci, Brian Meyer, Rick Klein, and Katherine Faulders. Thank you all. We, of course, will have continuing coverage of the former president's trial all day long. We will be right back. But we're also following another major story fallout over Iran's assault on Israel, unleashing hundreds of missiles and drones, most of them shot down or failing to reach their target. We have team coverage on the tensions in the Middle East that's coming up.

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Welcome back to ABC News Live. First, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is meeting with his war cabinet today to discuss potential responses to Iran's attack. The cabinet met yesterday but ended their meeting without making a final decision about a response. This comes after Iran launched a massive missile and drone barrage at Israel over the weekend. Two US officials confirmed to ABC news that at least half failed before reaching their targets, and Israel says 99% of the others were intercepted. I want to bring in senior white House correspondent Selina Wang, senior Pentagon reporter Louie Martinez, ABC news contributor General Robert Abrams, and foreign correspondent Tom Birge in Tel Aviv, Israel. For more on this. Thank you all for joining us. Tom, I want to start with you. Israeli War Cabinet members are meeting today where officials are considering a response to Iran's attack. What do we know so far?

Yes, Stephanie, we know that the second Israeli war cabinet meeting in just 24 hours is now broken up. Israeli officials saying that the possible response to options that Israel has were discussed. But there's no indication at this stage that Israel has actually made a decision. Clearly, it's looking at a range of options, and also the timing of any response would be clear. I mean, clearly there is a consensus that Israel has to respond. The scale and nature of that response is still up in the air. And clearly, Israel is under pressure from allies like the United States to rein in its response to not go for something that would be deemed to be too escalatory. We just come off a briefing from the Israeli Air Defense, Israeli Air Force and an official there confirming the importance of not only US coordination of that allied response in the overall defense on Sunday morning, but also the crucial role that Middle Eastern countries played, allowing Israeli jets to operate in their air defense to shoot down those missiles and drones and that sort of broad coalition.

The support will be a factor when it comes to the Israeli government's decision making, on what type of response it will make.

Certainly. Well, many waiting to hear what direction Israel will go in. Tom. Thank you. Salena, I want to turn to you. How is President Biden responding to all of this?

Yeah. Well, look, after the attack happened, the president spoke to Israel's Prime Minister Netanyahu over the phone, and his message to him was, take this slow, don't escalate things and think very carefully and strategically about your next step. Now, the president made clear that, look, they were willing to defend Israel. But if Israel decides to strike back, they will do so alone. The president wants to prevent this conflict from spreading into a wider war, something he's been very careful about since October 7th. And right now, as Tom was saying, the ball is very much in Israel's court. But despite this pressure we're seeing from the president, from US officials, the Biden administration does believe that Israel is going to respond in some way. That's according to a senior US official and the president very much wanting to stress to Netanyahu, though, to take the win, take the win here. You already proved that your military is superior after this onslaught from Iran, Israel coming out ahead.

And Louis, Israel says that 99% of Iran's missiles and drones that made it to Israel were intercepted earlier on Good Morning America, top white House national security spokesman John Kirby said Iran is not the power it purports to be, despite its military and ballistic missile capability, but that the US is going to stay vigilant. So what does that tell you about Iran's military capabilities and where the US stands, exactly?

Stephanie, Iran's military capabilities is still remains strong. I mean, the fact that some of these missiles did not hit their targets, that roughly half of them are the ballistic missiles that were launched from inside Iran towards Israel, did not make it towards as close to Israel as we had originally thought. Does that imply that they still don't have significant military capabilities? Now, what we are understanding now is that essentially Iran's maybe their guidance systems, their launch systems are not going to be as effective. But it gets to the question of volume when you have such a large inventory as the Iranians do, they have that capability. And even if their missiles don't all launch and hit their targets, that is, it's still a potential threat. And for American forces, that is another consideration. It could if Israel responds and with the retaliation against Iran, could this then lead Iran to pose a threat to US forces in the region? And that is something that they have said publicly now. So I think that is something that officials here depending on are taking very much a close look at just in case.

Yeah. An escalation, definitely not what many people want to see. General Abrams, I want to bring you into this conversation. A senior US official says the Biden administration believes Israel will strike Iran, saying most of the world thinks this is over. It is not. But Iran has made it clear it considers the matter closed. So what could a possible retaliation mean for that region?

Well, I think it really depends on the scale, scope and the timing of any sort of action taken by Israel. Um, and they've got a full range of options to include kinetic and non-kinetic options. So I think the region's response, um, will be based upon what exactly Israel does. And we'll just have to wait and see what that's exactly going to look like.

We certainly will. We'll keep a close eye on it as well. Thank you all for your time and your insights. Really appreciate it. Selina Wang, Louis Martinez, General Robert Abrams, Tom Burke, thank you. Coming up, hoop dreams are about to come true. We are just hours away from tonight's WNBA draft. We have a look at all of that excitement that is coming up next.

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Welcome back. Guess what? Today is tax day. You should probably know this business reporter Alexis Christoforos is joining us for more on some last minute tax tips. Talk about last minute talk about.

Right up against it. Right? Right. We're not going to shame anybody here.

No no no no no.

You know who you are. But you have until midnight tonight to file your taxes and avoid getting hit with penalties and interest. It's not too late, though, to save on your tax bill. First thing you want to be sure you're taking all of the credits you qualify for. If you have kids, you may be eligible for a $2,000 tax credit per qualifying child, depending on your income and your filing status. And not to be confused with the child tax credit is the Child and Dependent Care Tax credit. If you paid expenses for daycare, preschool, or another form of caregiving for, say, a spouse or a parent who's unable to care for themselves, you might qualify for this credit. It starts at $3,000, and if you paid qualified education expenses for an eligible student, you may be able to claim a credit of up to $2,500 with the American Opportunity Tax Credit. If you bought an electric vehicle last year, check and see if it is on the list of EVs that qualify for a credit of up to $7,500.

You also have until midnight tonight to make a tax friendly contribution to your traditional IRA. It's not too late. The max here $6,500 7500 if you're 50 or over. And if you know you're going to need more time to file, just go to irs.gov and request an extension. It'll give you an extra six months to submit your taxes until October 15th. But remember, an extension to file is not an extension to pay. So if you owe money, you still need to make payment by tomorrow or by tonight. Use your previous year's taxes to help estimate what you owe. And if you can't pay the entire amount right now, don't panic. Go to irs.gov. Set up a payment plan. The IRS actually wants to work with you so that you can pay your bill, right?

And they want to get their money too.

That's a huge part of it. Yes. Well, Alexis.

Thank you so much. Those are great tips. And yeah, we all lead busy lives. So if today's a day for you to get your taxes done. Hey, you're getting it done. Clock is ticking. Clock is ticking. Thank you. All right. The WNBA draft kicks off tonight as well. After that epic championship game between the Iowa Hawkeyes and South Carolina Gamecocks, it is now the second most watched non-Olympic women's sporting event in U.S. history. Our faith Abubey has more. From a sports bar in Minneapolis dedicated to celebrating women athletes.

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Bars for women's sports popping up across the country from a bar of their own in Minneapolis to the sports bra in Portland.

Women's sports are what everyone's excited about, what everyone's talking about, what everyone is tuning into. Undefeated South Carolina.

It's one. It's third national championship.

The women's NCAA championship game, drawing more viewers than the men's final for the first time ever.

No. One. More to grow the popularity. This game then Caitlin Clarke.

Caitlin Clarke the likely number one pick, generating huge crowds interest in the game with that number one pick, the Indiana Fever surging with 13 times as many tickets sold compared to this time last year. It feels.

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And Stephanie. Baths like this one are allowing.

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Good afternoon, I'm Stephanie Ramos today on ABC News Live. First, we are following breaking news. The historic first ever trial of a former president is getting underway. Former President Trump is inside the courtroom for jury selection in the hush money case against him. The district attorney charged Trump with falsifying business records to conceal payments he allegedly made to Stormy Daniels through his then attorney, Michael Cohen. The judge has already denied a motion from Trump's legal team regarding jury selection, and another aimed at forcing the judge's recusal. The judge will also allow evidence involving Trump's interactions with the National Enquirer and an alleged hush money payment to another woman. Prosecutors will not, though, be allowed to play the infamous Access Hollywood tape or video from Trump's deposition in the Eugene Carroll defamation case. Nor will they be allowed to introduce unproven sexual misconduct allegations. A number of other women against him made ahead of the 2016 election. Earlier, Trump called the trial an assault on America. He has pleaded not guilty to the 34 charges against him.

You see him there as he made his way through the courthouse in downtown Manhattan. Here in New York City, we, of course, have full team coverage. As jury selection gets underway, we will start with executive editorial producer John Santucci. John, a prosecutor is seeking admission of Trump's alleged witness intimidation into evidence. How significant is that in this trial? Well, it is.

Hugely significant because, again, you have to remember, there are so many witnesses that come into play in Donald Trump's orbit, both his campaign, his political life and his personal life. So any idea that Donald Trump intimidated a witness from not telling the truth? Over the course of the last year as we were getting ready for this trial will be hugely consequential. I mean, listen, we're talking about some people that have worked with Donald Trump for decades. Let's talk for a second about Rhona Graff, his longtime assistant at the Trump Organization. Donald Trump. Believe it or not, in his entire professional career, Stephanie only had two executive assistants, Norma Federer and Rhona Graff. They both knew everything about Donald Trump. I can tell you our former colleague, the late, great Barbara Walters, when I first started covering Donald Trump, had one piece of advice to me get to know Rona. She knows everything. And that exactly is clear in the fact that she's on this witness list by prosecutors. Rona knew where everything was.

Her office was right next to Donald Trump's, and before it was Rona, it was Norma. Norma, of course, has passed away. But Rona is alive and well and will be critical to prosecutor's case. Because the other thing you have to remember, too, is that a lot of Donald Trump's life as a businessman was not documented on computers or email. It was all paperwork. You know, I had many times where we would send, you know, different proposals or things for ABC to Donald Trump when he was a candidate, and they would print it out for Trump and he'd write back notes on it, and he would hand it to his assistants. That obviously was the way he did his operations, his bookkeeping, etc. so I do think that's hugely important and will come into play in this case, about the paperwork, about the falsifying of documents. And those assistants would know that now Rona no longer works for the Trump Organization. Another witness that has been called, Madeline Westerhout, was the assistant at the white House for quite some time.

She had to leave after she allegedly made some disparaging comments about members of Trump's family out in public around media. Nevertheless, did Donald Trump ever contact the two of them or any of the witnesses? Perhaps there's some evidence comes into play, could be consequential need to say.

And John, you mentioned this earlier, how a lot of these aides have been loyal for so many years. I mean, with someone who's had such personal ties to or connection with Donald Trump, are they going to break or are they going to I mean, you would assume that they would be just as loyal. They are on the stand 100%.

I think that obviously, the only one that would falls into a unique bucket is Michael Cohen. Right? Jon Karl talked about this earlier in our programming. Michael Cohen had described himself at one point as Donald Trump's pit bull, right, that he would do anything and everything to protect Donald Trump. That pit bull has flipped, and that obviously has changed things.

And we're looking at live pictures right here. You guys can see this of the former president there just coming out of the courtroom. I believe they're taking a 10 to 15 minute break. They just took that break. He is going back into the courtroom now. That is in downtown Manhattan. And we saw him earlier as well, calling this a political persecution and kind of treating it as a campaign rally. Some of the same statements we've heard in the past. Uh, Brian, I want to bring you into this. The judge will not allow prosecutors to introduce the sexual misconduct allegations. A number of women made against Trump at the end of his 2016 campaign, the judge said. Prosecutors are allowed, though, to show the jury video clips of Trump from some of his campaign events, where he appears agitated about some of these allegations. We saw it this morning, he appeared agitated. Morning as well. What do you make of that? The judge making these decisions this morning.

It makes sense. What I think the judge is attempting to do is trying to ground this evidence in relevance. And that's what a lot of judges and defense attorneys and prosecutors do. And so you start off with a question of, okay, you have this bit of information. You have this Hollywood access tape. You have these allegations of sexual assault. How are these relevant to the question as to whether or not Donald Trump falsified business records? Now, if they play into the idea that this is a catch and kill scheme, that he has bad allegations come up, he sends his fixers out there to kind of hush the the noise, so to speak, then that makes sense. But if these sexual assault allegations are not connected to any form of that catch and kill or any form of that falsifying business records for the purpose of getting elected, then the judge is going to say, well, why is this relevant? The prosecutor is going to push back and say, this is the environment in which Donald Trump existed in this bad press was coming at him left, right and center, a lot of them surrounded around sexual assault allegations.

And that's why he felt this way. The judge is saying, you know what? In private, I don't think it's going to come in. But if he's agitated and we can see it during the election process, then it now becomes relevant because he's having this emotional response based on these allegations and he's trying to get elected. So I think it's really walking a tightrope there.

And just to jump in for a quick second, sorry, Brian, but Stephanie, you know, it's interesting. Our team is getting this real time reporting. So obviously no cameras in there. Right before that break, prosecutors made a statement in open court saying, quote, shortly, we will be seeking an order to show cause as to why the defendant should be held, not be held in contempt. This, of course, says the Trump violated merchandise gag order. That's going to be quite striking right now. Obviously, you know, Catherine is touching this earlier in our coverage that Donald Trump has gotten dangerously close to violating the gag order in a lot of his public statements on the campaign trail, bopping around court across social media. So if there is an argument about to be presented on that front, we're going to need to watch that. They, as you just noted, Donald Trump walking back into court, if that's where we're going. One, interesting that we're still not in jury selection, but two, if right on day one, they're going to make this argument that he violated the gag order and potentially what consequences come with that?

We'll see.

We definitely will. I mean, we and you say that this is the this is the very first day to see this on the first day says a lot. We've heard from Trump even earlier sounding agitated. And also he has said in the past that this gag order is a violation of his protected political speech. Still sticking with general terms earlier today, though, not bringing up individuals that are at the center of this case, I want to bring in ABC news contributor and former Georgia prosecutor Chris Timmons. Chris, what do you make of that contempt motion?

I think that shows that the prosecution is going to be aggressive. I mean, they're coming out of the gate swinging because, you know, if you listen to Donald Trump's comments, it didn't directly violate the gag order. I think he was a little more kind of general than he was sort of more specific. He was talking about which one he was talking about. You know, this is a purely political action that it's being orchestrated by the former president of the United or the current president, United States, just as Jon Karl mentioned earlier in our coverage. And so I think by moving to, you know, find him in contempt straight out of the gate, suggests that prosecution is going to be very aggressive in this case. And it also shows that they recognize the two front war that they're fighting. They're fighting the war. That's the the the battle that's going on in the courtroom there in, in New York. But the other battle they're fighting is the public battle that they're, that they're fighting out there.

And you've got to remember, once you've got jurors in place, they're told that they're not supposed to watch the news. They're told that they're not supposed to pay any attention to the media. But jurors do. Unfortunately. Brian Buckmaster can tell you, unfortunately, they do pay attention to the coverage even when they're told not to. So some of those words that he's speaking are intended to inflame the jury and help him get a not guilty verdict in this case.

And Chris, we we heard from him. Yeah, just a few moments ago or this morning as Trump was entering the courtroom, uh, talking about how this is an outrage, political persecution. Brian, we've seen we've seen the president today saying these statements, jury selection, that process hasn't even started. We've already the judge has already brought up the gag order. So what are the next steps as we move through this week, which is supposed to focus on that jury selection process? Yeah.

So the process in which we're going through right now, we call pre-trial motions or pre-trial arguments. And so you get out. What's the schedule going to look like. How are we going to bring these jurors in each party saying do you want to bring anything forward? And now we're hearing the prosecutor saying, hey, we want to revisit this gag order issue because it appears that Donald Trump might violated it. The judge wants to get all of that out of the way, because once you start bringing jurors in, the train is probably left for the station and you don't want to stop. You want that process to be smooth and continuous. And so what I would expect is the judge is taking a quick break. What we just saw a few moments ago, most of the arguments may have come about. They might talk about this gag order. I think that might be the the last big thing to discuss. Of course, Donald Trump's attorneys always have that one more extra argument they want to make at the 11th hour.

But I would expect that after the lunch break and here in New York, we typically take a lunch break from about 1 p.m. to 215. I would expect at 230, the judge is going to say, you know what, train's leaving the station. Let's start bringing the jurors in and start this process.

I want to bring in ABC's political director Rick Klein. Trump's 2016 political rallies are also part of this trial. Could this change the way he campaigns, the way he moves forward?

There's no question that this is going to change the substance of his campaign. First, anything that happens in that courtroom or things that he's likely to be raising money off of and talking about outside of the courtroom. And secondly, the the real time interaction that you often see at his campaign rallies sometimes is built around the the kind of the kind of rhetoric that he puts out there. 2016 we remember the locker up chants. They take on a different tone in the context of today. And just from a functional matter for the foreseeable future, he's not going to have a lot of time to do campaigning out on the trail. He'll have weekends. And for now, Wednesday's because this court doesn't sit on Wednesdays. Other than that, he's going to be relegated to sitting in that courtroom and maybe popping up here and there. If we're just relatively close by, this is going to be the big messaging, messaging piece of the campaign, most likely for a while. And think about how busy things have been, the kind of big issues we're talking about with Israel and Iran and abortion rights.

There's a huge number of things that candidates could be talking about right now. His rival, President Biden, is going to be out on the trail in Pennsylvania over the next couple of days, Tuesday and Wednesday. And that's something that former President Trump can't do. Now, we should note that there have been times where he has used courthouse appearances, essentially as campaign events, and the rhetoric mixes, mixes with with each other. And he likes that, that the idea of looking there looking like he's in battle, looking like he's going to to fight for his own voters. But it does put some serious constraints on what he can do as a candidate.

And certainly does. ABC's senior reporter Katherine Faulders, I want to bring you in so we know that the Manhattan D.A. also plans to introduce evidence about two other payments that Trump allegedly made with Cohen that Cohen and Trump coordinated to suppress, suppress negative stories. And that includes evidence about the National Enquirer and Karen McDougal, another woman Trump allegedly had an affair with. How significant is that to be able to bring in those other that that other piece of evidence?

Well, it's significant because prosecutors are going to use these two payments in these instances to go right to the heart of what they've said is Trump's character. So they want to use that to build on their case here, for example, that just involves a one payment of. We saw Trump's lawyers push back on that. They think it's irrelevant. They think it's too salacious. I think is one of the words that they used. But obviously the judge did not rule in Trump's favor on that. Now, as it relates to the Access Hollywood tape that we've talked about a lot here. The judge did uphold a previous ruling where he said that this tape, audio or video of the tape cannot be played. Prosecutors will be allowed to use Trump's words. But specifically, the judge said he doesn't want that played to the jury. He doesn't want the jury to hear it, doesn't want them to see the video. So again, all of this is what's happening before jury selection, which still hasn't gotten underway yet.

The judge in the beginning of the day said he wanted to tie up some loose ends. So that's what they're doing right now. Of course, we'll wait to see what happens. On this potential contempt ruling. That could be a big deal as it relates to the gag order. So still, let's just say some a bit of fireworks this morning before the jury actually before jury selection actually gets underway here. Stephanie.

Thanks, Catherine. Tying up some loose ends, some some administrative items taking place this morning before that jury selection process. And Brian, let's talk a little bit more about that as we were speaking about this earlier. It's obviously going to be difficult to find someone who isn't extremely familiar with the former president. And right now we're looking at sketches of the former president there in the courtroom. But as we look at that, Brian, how how are how is this process going to play out? There are a certain set of questions that the potential jurors will need to answer. But how are they going to select these 12 jurors and six alternates?

I think if you got 12 attorneys in a room and asked them this exact question, you'll probably get different ones, but I'll go with the more general jury selection is equal parts are equal parts science. And when we talk about the science from the 42 questions, how the judge starts and then moves on. But a lot of it that art part of it is kind of reading the tea leaves. And what both sides are going to do is they're going to take things like the age, gender, what part of New York City, because we as New Yorkers know, there's a very different mentality from someone who is born and raised in Harlem than someone who was born and raised in Midtown, for example, or Alphabet City or the Upper East Side. Their employment. How many years have they been in the city? Are they born and bred New Yorkers who have been here forever, or are they kind of transplants? I've only been here for a year or two and also race, and they're going to take all of those factors and kind of read the tea leaves and say, what is this person going to think about when they're presenting the information?

The best example I'll give you myself, I'm a 36 year old man who lives and lived in Harlem. I'm an attorney. I've been in New York for over a decade, and I'm black. I'm guessing that someone will take that and be like, well, what is this person going to think about when they get these facts? And that's what the prosecutor and the defense are doing here, kind of reading the tea leaves from what they garner, from the from the potential jurors.

And the judge, of course, will likely insist that their views should not interfere with being fair.

Well, they'll suggest it, but I'll give you one last example. When we talk about picking a jury, we always talk about I want fair and impartial. And I say it's a lot like picking a spouse like you always want that. The big factor is the kind, the smaller the this. But at least when I picked my spouse, I was like, she's very attractive to like, I might not say it out loud, but I hope I get that. And for the defense attorneys, yeah, you can laugh. I know for defense attorneys, for.

Example, today we're relying on apple juice and apple juice.

No, no, I'm gonna make the connection. But you will. Just as much as a defense attorney says I want fair and impartial. No, I want someone who's going to buy the facts as I present them going forward. And the prosecutor is going to say the same thing. Oh, I want fair and impartial. No, you want that attractive juror who's going to buy what you're selling to some degree. And so that I think is going to be the little hidden undertone we're going to see here what jurors are going to be more impartial to one side over the other, even though both sides won't really say it out loud.

You brought it together. It makes perfect sense. You did. Thank you very much, Brian. And thanks to the rest of our team, John Santucci here at the desk, Rick Klein, Katherine Faulders and Chris Chemins. Thank you all. Former President Trump is heading back to court. Actually, he went back. He is in court right now. You're just looking at sketches of the former president in that courtroom. We, of course, will be covering this historic.

Trial.

All day long. But we're also following another major story fallout over Iran's assault on Israel, unleashing hundreds of missiles and drones, most of them shot down or failing to reach their target. We have team coverage on the tensions in the Middle East and that is coming up.

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Welcome back to ABC News Live. First, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is meeting with his war cabinet today to discuss potential responses to Iran's attack. The cabinet met yesterday but ended their meeting without making a final decision about a response. This comes after Iran launched a massive missile and drone barrage at Israel over the weekend. Two US officials confirmed to ABC news that at least half failed before reaching their targets, and Israel says 99% of the others were intercepted. I want to bring in senior white House correspondent Selina Wang, senior Pentagon reporter Louie Martinez, ABC news contributor General Robert Abrams, and foreign correspondent Tom Bourg in Tel Aviv, Israel. For more on this. Thank you all for joining us. Tom, I want to start with you. Israeli War Cabinet members are meeting today where officials are considering a response to Iran's attack. What do we know so far?

Yes, Stephanie, we know that the second Israeli war cabinet meeting in just 24 hours is now broken up. Israeli officials saying that the possible response to options that Israel has were discussed. But there's no indication at this stage that Israel has actually made a decision. Clearly, it's looking at a range of options, and also the timing of any response would be clear. I mean, clearly there is a consensus that Israel has to respond. The scale and nature of that response is still up in the air. And clearly, Israel is under pressure from allies like the United States to rein in its response to not go for something that would be deemed to be too escalatory. We just come off a briefing from the Israeli Air Defense, Israeli Air Force and an official there confirming the importance of not only US coordination of that allied response in the overall defense on Sunday morning, but also the crucial role that Middle Eastern countries played, allowing Israeli jets to operate in their air defense to shoot down those missiles and drones and that sort of broad coalition.

The support will be a factor when it comes to the Israeli government's decision making, on what type of response it will make, certainly.

Well, many waiting to hear what direction Israel will go in. Tom. Thank you. Salena, I want to turn to you. How is President Biden responding to all of this?

Yeah. Well, look, after the attack happened, the president spoke to Israel's Prime Minister Netanyahu over the phone, and his message to him was, take this slow, don't escalate things and think very carefully and strategically about your next step. Now, the president made clear that, look, they were willing to defend Israel. But if Israel decides to strike back, they will do so alone. The president wants to prevent this conflict from spreading into a wider war, something he's been very careful about since October 7th. And right now, as Tom was saying, the ball is very much in Israel's court. But despite this pressure we're seeing from the president, from US officials, the Biden administration does believe that Israel is going to respond in some way. That's according to a senior US official and the president very much wanting to stress to Netanyahu, though, to take the win, take the win here. You already proved that your military is superior after this onslaught from Iran, Israel coming out ahead.

And Louis, Israel says that 99% of Iran's missiles and drones that made it to Israel were intercepted earlier on Good Morning America, top white House national security spokesman John Kirby said Iran is not the power it purports to be, despite its military and ballistic missile capability, but that the US is going to stay vigilant. So what does that tell you about Iran's military capabilities and where the US stands, exactly?

Stephanie, Iran's military capabilities is still remains strong. I mean, the fact that some of these missiles did not hit their targets, that roughly half of them are the ballistic missiles that were launched from inside Iran towards Israel, did not make it towards as close to Israel as we had originally thought. Does that imply that they still don't have significant military capabilities? Now, what we are understanding now is that essentially Iran's maybe their guidance systems, their launch systems are not going to be as effective. But it gets to the question of volume when you have such a large inventory as the Iranians do, they have that capability. And even if their missiles don't all launch and hit their targets, that is, it's still a potential threat. And for American forces, that is another consideration. It could if Israel responds and with the retaliation against Iran, could this then lead Iran to pose a threat to US forces in the region? And that is something that they have said publicly now. So I think that is something that officials here depending on are taking very much a close look at just in case.

Yeah. An escalation, definitely not what many people want to see. General Abrams, I want to bring you into this conversation. A senior US official says the Biden administration believes Israel will strike Iran, saying most of the world thinks this is over. It is not. But Iran has made it clear it considers the matter closed. So what could a possible retaliation mean for that region?

Well, I think it really depends on the scale, scope and the timing of any sort of action taken by Israel. Um, and they've got a full range of options to include kinetic and non-kinetic options. So I think the region's response, um, will be based upon what exactly Israel does. And we'll just have to wait and see what that's exactly going to look like.

We certainly will. We'll keep a close eye on it as well. Thank you all for your time and your insights. Really appreciate it. Selina Wang, Louie Martinez, General Robert Abrams, Tom Sophie Berg, thank you. Coming up, hoop dreams are about to come true. We are just hours away from tonight's WNBA draft. We have a look at all of that excitement that is coming up next.

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Welcome back. Guess what? Today is tax day. You should probably know this business reporter Alexis Christoforos is joining us for more on some last minute tax tips. Talk about last.

Minute talk about right up against it. Right. We're not going to shame anybody here.

No no no no no.

You know who you are. But you have until midnight tonight to file your taxes and avoid getting hit with penalties and interest. It's not too late, though to save on your tax bill. First thing you want to be sure you're taking all of the credits you qualify for. If you have kids, you may be eligible for a $2,000 tax credit per qualifying child, depending on your income and your filing status. And not to be confused with the child tax credit is the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit. If you paid expenses for daycare, preschool, or another form of caregiving for, say, a spouse or a parent who's unable to care for themselves, you might qualify for this credit. It starts at $3,000, and if you paid qualified education expenses for an eligible student, you may be able to claim a credit of up to $2,500 with the American Opportunity Tax Credit. If you bought an electric vehicle last year, check and see if it is on the list of EVs that qualify for a credit of up to $7,500.

You also have until midnight tonight to make a tax friendly contribution to your traditional IRA. It's not too late. The max here $6,500 7500 if you're 50 or over. And if you know you're going to need more time to file, just go to irs.gov and request an extension. It'll give you an extra six months to submit your taxes until October 15th. But remember, an extension to file is not an extension to pay. So if you owe money, you still need to make payment by tomorrow or by tonight. Use your previous year's taxes to help estimate what you owe. And if you can't pay the entire amount right now, don't panic. Go to irs.gov. Set up a payment plan. The IRS actually wants to work with you so that you can pay your bill, right?

And they want to get their money too.

That's a huge part of it.

Yes, Alexis, thank you so much. Those are great tips. And yes, we all lead busy lives. So if today's a day for you to get your taxes done. Hey, you're getting it done. Clock is ticking. The clock is ticking. Thank you. All right. The WNBA draft kicks off tonight as well. After that epic championship game between the Iowa Hawkeyes and South Carolina Gamecocks, it is now the second most watched non-Olympic women's sporting event in U.S. history. Our faith Abubey has more. From a sports bar in Minneapolis dedicated to celebrating women athletes.

It's a rite of passage for any sports fan catching the big game at your local sports bar. And with the popularity of women's sports on the rise, sports bars aren't just for the boys anymore.

It's great that this is finally happening, and that women's sports are finally getting the platform that they deserve.

Bars for women's sports popping up across the country from a bar of their own in Minneapolis to the sports bra in Portland.

Women's sports are what everyone's excited about, what everyone's talking about, what everyone is tuning into.

Undefeated South Carolina. Has won its third national championship.

The women's NCAA championship game drawing more viewers than the men's final for the first time ever.

No one has. Born to grow the. This game then Caitlin Clarke.

Caitlin Clarke the likely number one pick, generating huge crowds interest in the game with that number one pick, the Indiana Fever surging with 13 times as many tickets sold compared to this time last year.

It feels really comfortable to walk in a space where you already know that you're going to have some sort of shared interest with the people who are in their.

Spray and Stephanie baths.

Like this one are allowing.

Fans to get a front row seat to witness history and also, of course, will be glued in to the WNBA draft tonight. 730 eastern live on ESPN. Back to you, Stephanie.

And it's going to be fun. Thank you so much, Faith, and thank you for streaming with us. I'm Stephanie Ramos ABC News Live is here for you anytime with the latest news, context and analysis. We'll be right back.

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Welcome back to ABC News Live. First I'm Stephanie Ramos. Today we are following breaking news. The historic first ever trial of a former president is getting underway. Former President Trump is inside the courtroom for jury selection in the hush money case against him. The Manhattan district attorney charged Trump with falsifying business records to conceal payments he allegedly made to Stormy Daniels through his then attorney, Michael Cohen. Prosecutors say they may ask for Trump to be held in contempt, arguing he has violated the partial gag order the judge imposed. Trump has been ordered not to attack witnesses, individual prosecutors or family members of the judge and district attorney. Trump has pushed the limits of that order, targeting the judge's daughter over her work as a political consultant. Earlier, Trump called the trial an assault on America. He has pleaded not guilty to the 34 charges against him, and we will have full team coverage as jury selection gets underway. But we are starting with ABC news investigative reporter Olivia Rubin and a look at what's at stake.

I never thought anything like this could happen.

For the first time in American history, a former president of the United States standing trial on criminal charges.

These are felony crimes in New York state, no matter who you are.

Former President Donald Trump fought repeatedly to delay the case beginning today, accusing him of illegally hiding payments he orchestrated to porn star Stormy Daniels to silence her affair allegations during his 2016 white House bid.

The evidence will show that he did so to cover up crimes relating to the 2016 election.

Multiple judges rejected Trump's last ditch efforts to halt the trial brought by the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg. Now, hundreds of potential jurors are being questioned in a courthouse downtown.

I don't know how you're going to have a trial that's going on right in the middle of an election. Not fair, not fair.

Lawyers for both sides will whittle that group down to just 12 jurors and six alternates, asking them questions to root out any bias. It includes. Have they ever attended a Trump rally? Subscribe to the conspiracy movement of QAnon or followed an anti-Trump organization on social media? The process expected to take as long as two weeks.

The whole point of jury selection is to find out, not just do people know who the parties are involved, not just do they know the charges, but rather can they set all of that information aside and be a fair and impartial juror? In this particular case.

The charges 34 counts of falsifying business records, the crime, not the alleged sexual activity, but the paperwork used to keep the payments to Stormy Daniels quiet. Prosecutors say Trump disguised the payments he made to his one time lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen, for Daniels to bury her affair claims, labeling them instead as legal payments for a non-existent retainer agreement with Cohen.

He directed me to make the payments. He directed me to become involved in these matters.

Prosecutors say those disguised checks cut from the Trump Organization to Cohen were part of a larger catch and kill scheme devised by Trump and his allies with the publisher of the National Enquirer. Together, prosecutors say they would repeatedly buy negative stories about Trump, only to never publish them.

He was very concerned about how this would affect the election.

To help his campaign.

To help him end the campaign.

Trump has pled not guilty to the charges and has called the case election interference. He also claims the affair with Daniels never happened.

Did you know about the $130,000 payments?

Trump is no stranger to the legal system, but he has only come face to face with a jury during his presidential bid for the white House once before. Earlier this year, a nine person jury heard a civil defamation case brought against Trump by the writer Jean Carroll, who accused Trump of sexually assaulting her in the 1990s and then defaming her when she went public with her allegations in 2019. There, Trump personally analyzed the potential jurors, often craning his neck and turning around as they answered questions. He never attended the first trial, where a jury found him liable for sexual assault and defamation of Carroll. Some jurors, the second time around in the trial to determine damages against Trump, appeared visibly shocked when they entered the room, only to see the former president of the United States seated there. After days of witnessing Trump's behavior in court, including storming out of the courtroom, that jury of seven men and two women found Trump liable for defamation and ordered him to pay $83 million in damages. We will.

Immediately appeal. We will set aside that ridiculous jury.

Now Trump is repeating that process again. But these jurors will be charged with deciding a criminal case. If convicted, he could face a maximum of four years in jail for each of the 34 counts.

Let's bring in executive editorial producer John Santucci, ABC news legal contributor Brian bookmaker and ABC news political director Rick Klein. For more on this, and also our thanks to Olivia Rubin for that report. John, we were talking about this earlier. We heard from the former president there at the courthouse, speaking to reporters, speaking to the camera, saying, this is an outrage. This is an assault on the country. But we've also seen him kind of walk this fine line around this partial gag order. He's kind of speaking generally, not about the individuals that will likely take the stand. So talk to us a little bit about that. How exactly is he walking this fine line. And he could still this he could still be in jeopardy and go against this gag order.

Right? I mean, listen, I would say he's walked the fine line today. Congratulations. You did great on day one. But let's talk about the weekend. In the last couple of days, he has not done a good job of walking this line at all. He has hit the judge, he has hit prosecutors and we now know from our team that's in court right now. Stephanie, that prosecutors, at this moment in time right now, are making that argument that Donald Trump has violated that gag order and they believe he should be held in contempt. We don't have a read as of yet. It's just gotten underway. As we noted a little earlier ago, they took a quick break. So that is probably, as Brian and I were talking about earlier, probably one of the last motions we're going to see before we actually get into what today was supposed to be, which is jury selection. But the reality is that Donald Trump sometimes is his own worst enemy. And when Donald Trump is in front of a microphone and gets as he says, you know, he's revved up by the crowd, that's exactly what happened this weekend.

He's talking about the judge. He's, you know, posting things on social media. The worst thing for Donald Trump is that little button. I don't know what you technically call it on Truth Social, but let's pretend it's Twitter, even though it's called X now, so it's relaxing or retweeting. I don't even know what the phrase is, right? But the reality is that is Donald Trump using his megaphone and projecting that rhetoric. So that is going to be something we're going to need to see very shortly here. If prosecutors are making that argument.

And we're looking at images of the former president there in the courtroom, those taken this morning. We also saw the sketches of Trump there in the courtroom as well, right here in New York City. Now, Brian, what do prosecutors need to show in order for Trump to be held in contempt? And what consequences could he face?

Prosecution needs to show evidence that Donald Trump was on notice and that he knowingly violated the orders of the court. It could be anything. Typically, we see it in terms of orders of protection. Don't be around this person's home, school, place of business here. It's don't speak disparagingly as to these individuals. And so prosecutors will likely come forward with the social media posts from Truth Social, from ex, from Instagram, wherever it may be and say, judge, here are the statements. We know that Donald Trump posted them himself. You can show either through the way that he speaks, the way that he's posted other posts, because he obviously can't be someone who's handling his social media, and then they'll go back to the order itself and say, this is what you said, judge. This is a violation. Typically, as an attorney, I'd have to tell people that you can face up to a year in prison for a misdemeanor contempt of court, but I don't think we're there here when it comes to Donald Trump.

I think the big thing is, what is this? The proverbial sticks, so to speak, when it comes to punishing Donald Trump. The logistics of having someone even incarcerated just for a half a day to show the punishment with a former president. How is that going to work out? Are you going to put him behind the courtroom that has typically their own little holding cells and have Secret Service stay there with him? And like, I don't know how that would work. And so that's why I even say like jokingly, more likely than not, we're talking about fines or maybe something the judge kind of improvises on their own and say, you know what, I want you to write an essay about the importance of following court orders, and you have to hand it to me by here. I've seen judges say, you know, you're going to buy opposing counsel lunch or something of that nature. I think it's going to be something smaller that maybe hit him in the pocketbook or something a little bit more personal.

Mhm.

Would he really write an essay?

I don't know, maybe his.

Team maybe, maybe.

His team. I've seen it before but I definitely don't think he's going to be in a holding cell. It's got I more likely than not I probably say the essay somewhat jokingly. It's probably gonna hit him in the pocketbook in some sort of a fine.

I will say that'll be the first essay that it would be signed in Sharpie. That would be new. That would be something we've never seen before. We had to do it unique.

Very unique. Rick, I want to bring you in. Trump argues this gag order limits his political speech. Would you say that statement plays into his campaign messaging?

100%? I think it is a campaign message. When he says it, he says it in fundraising appeals. He says it at rallies. He tells us his supporters all the time. How about is another example in his view, of how unfair this is. And it's a it's a testament to his ability to control the messaging and the the thinking of so many of his supporters that that's been internalized the way it has. This is a, you know, the gag orders, as Ryan and others will know, they don't happen all the time, but they happen in cases that that have particular histories with defendants or, or particular public scrutiny. And these these gag orders have been pretty narrowly tailored. And so far, he's gotten a lot of leeway in what he's been able to say and do. And judges are, I think, rightly, trying to to carve around the fact that we're in the middle of a political campaign. He has and continues to to test the limits. He also gets a lot of benefit from the perception that he is limited in what he can say, because that that feeds the campaign argument that he's been making to to so much success for so many months.

Right. And, John, the judge rules prosecutors can admit evidence related to Trump's attacks on his former attorney, Michael Cohen. So how significant is that? Well, I'm.

Going to answer that question in two seconds, but I just want to flags. There's a little bit of breaking news from our team. So it sounds like from our team in court, Lucian Bergman was just as known to our main email system here is that the judge is trying to move things along rather quickly to get ahead to jury selection here. The judge saying, this is what we're going to do. Everyone's going to sit down and relax to both attorneys. Quote we have 500 jurors waiting for us. And to be honest with you, I'm not interested in getting into this minutia with you talking about all of the motions that are coming up right now in court, saying at one point, as he's going through this, there's so much of this has been frivolous this morning, and he just wants to get to actually the course of business, which is to see the jury.

And they have been there for the last couple of hours, three hours or so.

Yeah, starting first thing this morning. And nevertheless, we're probably going to get to lunch and not begin jury selection. But to answer your question quickly about Michael Cohen, basically what happened here is that the judge said, listen, if the defense presents anything about attacking Michael Cohen's character, then it opens the doors for prosecutors to introduce other evidence about Michael Cohen. So really, this is all going to be a very interesting game to watch, if you will. Not that it's a game as a fun one, but in the sense that if you do this, then that that happens and that really is going to get to a place of where how long this case is going to go, depending on, frankly, if they want to stick within some of the guardrails for the judge. But if they test the limits, judge already saying, fine, do that, then this happens.

Speaking of Michael Cohen, Rick Klein, this question is for you. Cohen once said he would take a bullet for Trump before becoming a vocal critic. How damaging could. His testimony be politically for Trump? Could it affect him?

Well, start with the fact that he is a admitted liar, admitted to having lied to Congress, lying in court, lying to the public and the media. Now in his telling, those lies were told in service of Donald Trump. And he has since acknowledged that that he that he needs to have seen a different path. And he served time as a, as as someone who's admitted to that lying. But as someone like John Santucci, who knew Michael Cohen when he was a loyalist to Donald Trump, getting a full portrait of who he was to him is still kind of an astounding fact. This was the ultimate insider, the ultimate lawyer slash slash body man slash, you name it. Anything he needed to do, fixer he needed to do, he would do it for Trump. And the fact that he ultimately turned on him in this most public way makes him potentially a very compelling witness. But the first thing the jury's going to have to do is believe him for it to be effective, because it's so easy to question his credibility, by his own admission, about previous areas where he's lied or been inconsistent.

So much of the case, to my mind, is going to hinge on that, because he's the guy that can connect all of these dots and make this about not just a hush money payment, but also about a campaign. There aren't many people that are as well situated in this, in this case, to to bring it all together as Michael Cohen.

It'll definitely be interesting to see what he has to say when he takes the stand. Now, Brian Trump's team is filing a new motion seeking a delay in the trial. We already saw them try to delay this trial three times last week. So how do you see that playing out?

I think no sooner than they finish the sentence for their argument, the judge will make a ruling in saying no. Let's just move on. Because ultimately, again, I understand from a defense standpoint, I have done it myself. I'm sure that the moment I'm done finishing this sentence, I'm going to get many prosecutors who are going to text me and say, oh, that's your stance on last minute delays, but you do it because the argument is, again, if you don't make the argument here, you cannot appeal it down the road. And they want every appellate argument that they can make going after this trial if they do lose. But ultimately, the judge has already signaled, as John has said, we've got 500 jurors waiting for us. This is about to start, whether you like it or not. If there's an issue, we'll take it up later. The appellate court can listen to it, but we're going to start this trial. And I don't think any argument is going to delay that at this point.

Yeah, this is going to take some time. Thank you Brian. Thank you John as well. And Rick Klein thank you all. We will have continuing coverage of the former president's trial all day long right here on ABC News Live. We're also following another major story fallout over Iran's assault on Israel, unleashing hundreds of missiles and drones, most of them shot down or failing to reach their target. Israel's war cabinet weighing a response as President Biden and other world leaders try to prevent further escalation. We have team coverage on the tensions in the Middle East coming up.

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Welcome back to ABC News Live. First, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is meeting with his war cabinet today to discuss potential responses to Iran's attack. The cabinet met yesterday but ended their meeting without making a final decision about a response. This after Iran launched a massive missile and drone barrage at Israel over the weekend. Two US officials confirmed to ABC news that at least half failed before reaching their targets, and Israel says 99% of the others were intercepted. Let's bring in senior white House correspondent Selina Wang, senior Pentagon reporter Louis Martinez, and ABC's national security and defense analyst Mick Mulroy and foreign correspondent Tom Sufi in Tel Aviv, Israel. To talk about this. Tom, we want to start with you. Israeli war cabinet members met today where officials were considering a response to Iran's attack. What do we know so far?

Yes, Stephanie. The second meeting of the War Cabinet within 24 hours is now broken up. We have no word yet on whether a decision has been made over Israel's possible response, or about the possible timing of any potential action Israel is due to take. What we are getting, though, is interesting comment from an Israeli official speaking to ABC news and that official saying that he or she believes that any Israeli response will be, in their words, carefully calibrated to not jeopardize the success of Saturday night. And of course, the success from Israel's point of view and the coalition around it, namely the United States, is, of course, the high shootdown of those Iranian missiles and drones in that mass attack. Unprecedented attack. But of course, this is a high stakes moment for Israel. Iran has effectively rewritten the rules here in the Middle East. Up until now, Iran was effectively fighting a kind of shadow war, using only proxies like Hezbollah and the Houthis in Yemen to attack Israel. Now the rules of the game have changed, and the Israeli government, you know, is weighing up its its options.

And of course, even within the Israeli government, there are competing interests and views. And that is this sort of crucial moment that now faces the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

And we know the Biden administration has told Israel to slow down. I want to bring in Selena Wang. Selena. Tell us exactly how President Biden and his team is responding.

Yeah, we'll look in that phone call after the attack. President Biden's message to Netanyahu was basically take the win here. You've already shown that Israel's military is superior, that you have a coalition of people helping you. You were able to take down almost all of the drones and missiles coming at you. So he's now asking Netanyahu to take it slow. Think carefully and strategically about his next steps. He's also made very clear to Israel that if they decide to strike back at Iran, they will do so alone that the US is not going to help. Clearly, the US is able to help on the defensive side, but they're not going to go on the offensive. President Biden, his priority here is to prevent this from escalating into a wider war. They're very concerned that if Israel counter strikes and there are any deaths in Iran, that this could be a tit for tat, where we see things really spiral here. So that is really the focus of this administration now. But despite all the pressure you're seeing from the US to the Israelis, to Tom's point, they likely are going to respond.

They are bracing for that. The question now is with the ball in Israel's court, is what they do next.

Exactly what direction do they go in? Thank you. Louis. This question is for you. Israel says 99% of Iran's 300 missiles and drones that made it to Israel were intercepted, but Israeli officials say Iran significantly increased the number of missiles it would fire. Uh, why is that? Is there is there anything there at the Pentagon or any officials that have spoken to that?

Stephanie, that's something that we're trying to chase down here at the Pentagon, because there was U.S. intelligence coming in in real time to the Situation Room about the extent of the Iranian attack on Israel. We know that there was a first salvo of 80 missiles that first went out towards Israel, and then there was a second salvo, a few, maybe an hour or so later. But one of the things that we're trying to ascertain is exactly. Remember, the drones were launched. It took hours for them to fly all the way westward towards Israel. Then it gave the United States and Israel, most importantly, time to react and to prepare the defenses that they already had ready in place. So the question is, did the Iranians then see that and then say, we need to launch a second salvo? So that's something that we're trying to narrow down here on the US side. Obviously that's coming in from Israeli officials.

And and, Mick, I want to bring Mick into this conversation. A U.S. official tells ABC they expect Israel to take some sort of countermeasure, but it's unclear how big. But Iran has made it clear it considers the matter closed. So what could a possible retaliation mean for the region?

So I think it's it.

Is clear that.

The Israelis feel they have to have some response or they would set a paradigm.

Whereas they attack these IRGC Quds Force officers, the primary Iranian entity that deals with proxies that attacks Israel. And then Iran feels it can attack directly into Israel from Iran. So from Tom's, uh, comments, it looks like they're going to go more on the low end, which is obviously in line with what the white House would like to see. White House potentially wouldn't like to see any response in Iran. But it's also important to point out that there is history here. So President Reagan asked Israel not to strike the nuclear facilities in Iraq. They did. Uh, President Bush asked them not to strike the nuclear facilities in Syria. They did. So there is a history here of them doing this either way. But hopefully, hopefully it's done in a way that doesn't bring Iran into feeling like they have to do an even larger attack, if any, back into Israel. But that's the biggest concern. That's how these, uh, these conflicts turns into wars and gets, uh, gets escalated very quickly.

The ball is in Israel's court, we will see what direction they go in. Thank you all. Thank you. Selena, Louis, General Robert Abrams and Tom Silfverberg. More of the day's top stories right after this break.

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Welcome back to ABC News Live. Let's take a look at some of the day's top stories. The weapons supervisor for Alec Baldwin's film rust. We'll learn her prison sentence today. Hannah Gutierrez was convicted of involuntary manslaughter last month for the death of another crew member, who was shot when a gun held by Baldwin went off. She faces up to 18 months in prison. Baldwin is also charged with involuntary manslaughter. His trial is scheduled to start in July. Security at the Boston Marathon is on high alert after law enforcement agencies have identified what they're calling a broad set of potential soft targets for an attack. That is according to a threat assessment obtained by ABC news. Officials say the most significant threat facing this marathon comes from lone offenders and small groups of individuals looking to commit acts of violence, particularly at designated viewing areas. Boston law enforcement says 48 local, state and federal public safety organizations will be positioned throughout the city and the path of that race. Police say they know of no specific threats to the area.

And in much lighter news, the highly anticipated WNBA draft tips off tonight. Caitlin Clark is expected to be the number one pick, with Angel Reese and Camila Cardoso not too far behind. The excitement comes after the women's NCAA championship game drew more viewers than the men's final for the first time ever. You can see the WNBA draft live tonight at 730 eastern on ESPN. We do want to thank you for streaming with us. I'm Stephanie Ramos. ABC News Live is here for you anytime with the latest news, context and analysis. We'll be right back.

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Good afternoon, I'm Stephanie Ramos today on ABC News Live. First, we are following breaking news. The historic first ever trial of a former president is getting underway. Former President Trump is inside the courtroom for jury selection in the hush money case against him. The Manhattan district attorney is seeking to hold Trump in contempt of court after charging him with falsifying business records to conceal payments he allegedly made to Stormy Daniels through his then attorney, Michael Cohen. The judge appears to be growing impatient with Trump's legal team. After hours of back and forth over various motions, Judge Juan Merchant abruptly ended the debate, saying 500 jurors are waiting to be vetted and there's more important work to be done. Earlier today, Trump called the trial an assault on America. He has pleaded not guilty to the 34 charges against him. We have full team coverage as this trial gets underway with jury selection. I want to bring in executive editorial producer John Santucci. The district attorney. John is now seeking to hold Trump in contempt. We saw him walk in.

We saw him speak to reporters and now this. What's the latest?

So it's actually nothing to do with statements Donald Trump has made to camera. It's actually social media post Donald Trump made on his social media platform Truth Social. So what prosecutors are arguing in court, Stephanie, that on three occasions, Donald Trump made posts intimidating witnesses that could be a part of this case or statements that involved witnesses in this case. So for each of those instances, the prosecutors in this case are asking the judge to find Donald Trump $1,000. So if we do the math times three, a $3,000 fine is what prosecutors are seeking. Now, our team is very quickly based off of the statements Donald Trump has made. I'm sorry the prosecutors have made in court pulled what we believe these social media statements are. It appears its comments attacking Stormy Daniels. Another comment that he posted about was reacting to a post from Michael Avenatti, who at one point was Stormy Daniels attorney, if you recall, often by her side when things first came to fruition. And there is a third post, we're still trying to locate it.

Something about Michael Cohen being a liar and obviously that would attack his credibility. So what prosecutors are saying is that, look, this gag order that Judge Merchan put into effect not only was about the prosecutors or the judge's family or others, it involved witnesses. And these posts very clearly from the mind of prosecutors, are targeting, attacking those witnesses and violating that gag order. Now, the judge is not ruled on that. They just broke for lunch. But you got to imagine when they come back, we're going to get a sense if this will be the first fine Donald Trump gets from this court.

And we were speaking about this earlier, how Trump had been walking this fine line when it came to this gag order. I want to bring in Chief Washington correspondent Jonathan Karl. Jon, prosecutors asked the judge to allow evidence of Trump's alleged witness intimidation. What can you tell us about this alleged pressure campaign to keep witnesses off the stand at this trial?

This has been an issue with Donald Trump, actually, in several of his cases, he's actually had to be admonished by more than one judge, reminded not to intimidate witnesses. So this is something the effort to, uh, to intimidate this, the central witness in this case, Michael Cohen, uh, Trump's former longtime lawyer, somebody who, uh, himself spent time in jail, uh, on charges related in part to these payments to Stormy Daniels. Uh, you know, it's it sometimes it seems a little, uh, it's intimidation, uh, reminding witnesses that, uh, that they'll be taken care of, uh, if they, um, if they don't cross Donald Trump. But there is a this has been a recurring theme with Trump in each of his cases.

Thank you. John. I want to bring in ABC's contributor and former Georgia prosecutor Chris Timmons. Chris, the judge says there are 500 potential jurors waiting to be vetted. How unusual is that? And to have that many people sitting there waiting. And what does that say about the magnitude of this case?

So, Stephanie, I mean, it definitely tells you it's a high profile case. You know, normally you get a jury of maybe 40 people, maybe 48 people. If it looks like it's controversial, this will be the the veneer that comes in at first for the jury selection here. The fact that they summoned 500, they know that this is not the just any ordinary case. This is not just any ordinary high profile case. This is probably the highest profile case to have happened arguably in the history of this country. You've got a former president on trial. And so with that, you've got to bring in 500 people because you've got to narrow it down. Can we find, you know, the 12, the 16, the 18, depending on how many alternates that can be fair, they can put aside in. And we're not looking for people that haven't heard about the case, but what we are looking for, our folks that can put aside any beliefs that they've formed about this case and render a fair and impartial jury or fair and impartial verdict.

Stephanie.

And this jury selection process expected to take just this week, probably going into next week as well. I want to bring in Rick Klein, our political director. Rick Trump's attorney says he wants to attend every day, every day of this trial. Is this the new campaign trail?

Yes it is. And look, it has been for some time for Donald Trump, where he spent more time in courtrooms, often by choice, than on the actual campaign trail. Now it is going to be more of a situation where he's required to be there for all the official proceedings. He acknowledged to the judge that he understands that, that he recognized that this is not a surprise to the campaign. The people running the campaign don't particularly like it, but they're stuck with it. And this is going to be the reality of this campaign is that Donald Trump, as the presumptive Republican nominee for president and a former president himself, is essentially going to be campaigning from inside and outside of courthouse for the foreseeable future for at least four days or so every week. They're going to have to put campaign rallies on weekends, they're going to have to schedule things for Wednesdays and maybe after or even before the court session begins, if he wants to do anything else. But this is the reality. It is.

Again, this is not how any campaign manager would ever design it. But if anyone is designed himself to take advantage of a situation like that, it is the former president who knows the media landscape so well, who knows the cameras so well, and the microphones that are waiting for him, which could also be problematic if he's if he says too much outside court. But I expect that the campaign will very much continue. It's not like it's on pause just because he's on trial.

And thanks, Rick. And John Santucci, I want to bring you in. John. Let's talk more about this proposed. Fine. This is day one is do you think this at all will kind of real Trump and will rein him in. Like will this stop him from speaking to cameras before going into the court, especially if he's expected to be there every single day of the trial? Will this kind of, uh, restrict him?

Well, it's interesting, right? Because it's almost like, you know, we all know Donald Trump in front of a microphone is dangerous, if you will, if you're his lawyers, especially. But the fact of the matter is, it's Donald Trump. Would something like this that now caused him a problem, right. That he's literally sitting there sometimes late at night. We, you know, listen, we wake up in the morning, we have old notifications that Donald Trump has done it. I remember so many times waking up campaign aides and eventually white House aides to Donald Trump saying, hey, what do you think about this tweet? And they would say, what tweet are you talking about? Right. Most people are not with him when he is on social media. So the idea is that people can try to step in and give him a nudge, give them a look when it's in person. But this is where Donald Trump has to actually be his own hall monitor, right? Like you can't post in common things, you can't retweet things or whatever we call it on Truth Social.

So I do think if this actually goes through, you know, look, $3,000 to Donald Trump in a past couple of months, you'd say, yeah, not that much. He's on the hook for nearly $500 million between the New York AG. Find what he owes Jean Carroll and defamation case. So I don't know. Maybe you say to yourself, huh? Let me knock it off. I've got a lot of bills at the moment. That would be the thought.

And when we saw him this morning, he we were speaking about this. He kept it pretty general. He didn't bring up individuals who were expected to take the stand, however, on on the social media platform where he, of course, talked about Michael Cohen, Brian Trump's team has filed another motion to delay the trial. We saw that they tried to delay the trial last week three separate times. What's their goal with these motions? Just to extend this process as much as possible?

Delay, delay delay has been the tactic for most, if not all of his cases, ultimately trying to push them beyond the election. Ultimately, if he gets elected as the next president, he gets to turn around and say, I can't go to court. I'm I'm running a country. I can't abide by whatever potential punishment he does receive if he is convicted of this case. And also he gets to say, you know what? I've got bigger fish to fry and can ultimately, as the president, kind of look and say, maybe this case should be terminated because I've got other things to do. But what I'm really interested about is this contempt of court that we're probably going to hear about either immediately after the lunch break or some other time. When we talk about contempt of court, I think specifically this one, we're talking about $1,000 fine. That's the misdemeanor criminal contempt that we have here in New York. And I think the big arguments here are either that he intended. You disobeyed or resisted a lawful process or a mandate or the other one.

I can see the argument being that that's an intentional failure to obey, uh, to failure to obey any mandate, process or notice issued upon him. And I think what's going to happen here is the is going to say, hey, he intentionally did this like he named names, and he was told not to do this. And the pushback for the defense would be that it was too vague, it was too general. And you're getting into this First Amendment issue where he should be allowed to say, I question the credibility of the people coming forward. He's not making direct threats as to try to harm anyone. And I think that's going to be the play that we're going to see come. 215 230 after the lunch break.

All right. We will see. Let's check in with senior investigative correspondent Aaron Katersky who is outside the court. Aaron, you have been watching these proceedings from the overflow room. What is that scene like?

Well, we've seen this that the prosecutors from the Manhattan District Attorney's Office have made a motion to try and hold former President Trump in contempt of court over his extrajudicial statements, namely, three social media posts that prosecutors believed were disparaging of witnesses in the case and therefore a violation of the limited gag order Judge Juan Merchan imposed. The judge said he would think that over over lunch, the defense attorneys pushed back and said Trump's social media posts were not in violation of the gag order. But it gives you a sense of just how contentious the proceeding is. And we haven't even started jury selection yet. At one point, the judge noted, we have 500 potential jurors waiting for us, and he didn't want to get into the minutia of some of the legal wrangling that the defense attorneys and the prosecutors were trying to argue. So we expect that after the lunch break, we'll get into jury selection proper. But we've had a look at former President Trump throughout the proceedings. He does appear to be engaged, actively conferring with his attorneys.

At one point, in fact, defense attorney Todd Blanch appeared to to kind of whack Trump on the arm a little bit, as if to say, okay, I got it enough, but we're not sure what that specific dialog was like. But the former president is clearly interested in what his lawyer is communicating to the judge.

That is very interesting. And we're looking at we were seeing sketches of the former president there in the courtroom. Thank you so much, Erin. Let's check in with senior reporter Katherine Faulders. Katherine Trump is, of course, facing legal battles on multiple fronts. What are you watching for as this case moves forward? I know earlier you were speaking of the the aides and in certain individuals that are expected to take the stand, but what's sticking out? What are you looking out for the most.

Throughout this trial? Well, I think during the jury selection process that will be interesting to see, for example, what Trump's lawyers strike potential jurors on, whether it be for cause, whether it be what they said is bias. Do Trump's lawyers try and do another Hail Mary attempt to ask for another change of venue? I'm told that that's something that they could try. Logistically. I don't know really how that would work, or even if the judge would allow it. But I think what's fascinating here is you see that image right there at Trump, the one that you just had before and is is lead lawyer Todd Blanch sitting beside him. Blanch came on the Trump legal team just for this case. He's now leading the federal cases the Jack Smith probes. So January 6th in the classified documents case. And what's even more striking is when you saw Trump exit Trump Tower today with his legal team, he was also exiting with another one of his co-defendants in another case, while now to his valet, his top aide, who is charged alongside him federally in Florida for Trump's alleged efforts to conceal and obstruct the classified documents probe.

So, of course, this is just one of the legal challenges that Trump is facing. He has so many additional matters outstanding. How does the legal team juggle all of these? There's various different hearings and various different districts. But as Rick and Santucci and Karl have also been talking about here, Trump is really using this to blend the political with the legal. He has said before that Joe Biden is taking him off the campaign trail, when he didn't really have to be there. He's trying to capitalize on this and use his legal challenges as a way to boost his political campaign. You will see a lot of that through his rhetoric, but also through the people around him, whether it be his lawyers or his top campaign aides who have been seen there today.

And we will see what happens after lunch there as the court is in recess. Catherine, thank you so much. And thanks to the rest of our team, Erin, John, Brian, Chris Timmons, the whole team with you all day long. We will have continuing coverage of the former president's trial here on ABC News Live. More of the day's top stories, including the latest on tensions in the Middle East. Stay with us.

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Welcome back to ABC News Live. First, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is meeting with his war cabinet today to discuss potential responses to Iran's attack. The cabinet met yesterday but ended their meeting without making a final decision about a response. This after Iran launched a massive missile and drone barrage at Israel over the weekend. Two U.S. officials confirmed to ABC news that at least half failed before reaching their targets, and Israel says 99% of the others were intercepted. Let's bring in senior white House correspondent Selina Wang, senior Pentagon reporter Louis Martinez, and ABC's national security and defense analyst Mick Mulroy and foreign correspondent Tom Birge in Tel Aviv, Israel. To talk about this. Tom, we want to start with you. Israeli war cabinet members met today where officials were considering a response to Iran's attack. What do we know so far?

Yes, Stephanie. The second meeting of the War Cabinet within 24 hours is now broken up. We have no word yet on whether a decision has been made over Israel's possible response, or about the possible timing of any potential action Israel is due to take at. What we are getting, though, is interesting comment from an Israeli official speaking to ABC news and that official saying that he or she believes that any Israeli response will be, in their words, carefully calibrated to not jeopardize the success of Saturday night. And of course, the success from Israel's point of view and the coalition around it, namely, the United States, is, of course, the high shootdown of those Iranian missiles and drones in that mass attack. Unprecedented attack. But of course, this is a high stakes moment for Israel. Iran has effectively rewritten the rules here in the Middle East. Up until now, Iran was effectively fighting a kind of shadow war, using only proxies like Hezbollah and the Houthis in Yemen to attack Israel. Now the rules of the game have changed, and the Israeli government, you know, is weighing up its its options.

And of course, even within the Israeli government, there are competing interests and views. And that is this sort of crucial moment that now faces the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

And we know the Biden administration has told Israel to slow down. I want to bring in Selena Wang, Selena. Tell us exactly how President Biden and his team is responding.

Yeah, we'll look in that phone call after the attack. President Biden's message to Netanyahu was basically take the win here. You've already shown that Israel's military is superior, that you have a coalition of people helping you. You were able to take down almost all of the drones and missiles coming at you. So he's now asking Netanyahu to take it slow. Think carefully and strategically about his next steps. He's also made very clear to Israel that if they decide to strike back at Iran, they will do so alone that the US is not going to help. Clearly, the US is able to help on the defensive side, but they're not going to go on the offensive. President Biden, his priority here is to prevent this from escalating into a wider war. They're very concerned that if Israel counter strikes and there are any deaths in Iran, that this could be a tit for tat, where we see things really spiral here. So that is really the focus of this administration now. But despite all the pressure you're seeing from the US to the Israelis, to Tom's point, they likely are going to respond.

They are bracing for that. The question now is with the ball in Israel's court, is what they do next.

Exactly what direction do they go in? Thank you. Louis. This question is for you. Israel says 99% of Iran's 300 missiles and drones that made it to Israel were intercepted. But Israeli officials say Iran significantly increased the number of missiles it would fire. Uh, why is that? Is there is there anything there at the Pentagon or any officials that have spoken to that?

Stephanie, that's something that we're trying to chase down here at the Pentagon, because there was U.S. intelligence coming in in real time to the Situation Room about the extent of the Iranian, uh, attack on Israel. We know that there was a first salvo of 80 missiles that first went out towards Israel, and then there was a second salvo, a few, maybe an hour or so later. But one of the things that we're trying to ascertain is exactly. Remember, the drones were launched. It took hours for them to fly all the way westward towards Israel. Then it gave the United States and Israel, most importantly, time to react and to prepare the defenses that they already had ready in place. So the question is, did the Iranians then see that and then say, we need to launch a second salvo? So that's something that we're trying to narrow down here on the US side. Obviously that's coming in from Israeli officials.

And and, Mick, I want to bring Mick into this conversation. A U.S. official tells ABC they expect Israel to take some sort of countermeasure, but it's unclear how big. But Iran has made it clear it considers the matter closed. So what could a possible retaliation mean for the region?

So I think it's it.

Is clear that the Israelis feel they have to have some response or they would set a paradigm, whereas they attack these IRGC Quds Force officers, the primary Iranian entity that deals with proxies that attacks Israel. And then Iran feels it can attack directly into Israel from Iran. So from Tom's, uh, comments, it looks like they're going to go more on the low end, which is obviously in line with what the white House would like to see. White House potentially wouldn't like to see any response in Iran. But it's also important to point out that there's history here. So President Reagan asked Israel not to strike the nuclear facilities in Iraq. They did. Uh, President Bush asked them not to strike the nuclear facilities in Syria. They did. So there is a history here of them doing this either way. But hopefully, hopefully it's done in a way that doesn't bring Iran into feeling like they have to do an even larger attack, if any, back into Israel. But that's the biggest concern. That's how these, uh, these conflicts turns into wars.

It gets, uh, gets escalated very quickly.

Our thanks to Selena Wang, Louie Martinez, Mike Mulroy, and Tom Sophie Berg. Thank you all. More of the day's top stories right after the break.

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Welcome back to ABC News Live. Let's take a look at some of the day's top stories. The weapons supervisor for Alec Baldwin's film rust. We'll learn her prison sentence today. Hannah Gutierrez was convicted of involuntary manslaughter last month for the death of another crew member, who was shot when a gun held by Baldwin went off. She faces up to 18 months in prison. Baldwin is also charged with involuntary manslaughter. His trial is scheduled to start in July. Security at the Boston Marathon is on high alert after law enforcement agencies have identified what they're calling a broad set of potential soft targets for an attack. That is according to a threat assessment obtained by ABC news. Officials say the most significant threat facing this marathon comes from lone offenders and small groups of individuals looking to commit acts of violence, particularly at designated viewing areas. Boston law enforcement says 48 local, state and federal public safety organizations will be positioned throughout the city and the path of that race. Police say they know of no specific threats to the area.

And in much lighter news, the highly anticipated WNBA draft tips off tonight. Caitlin Clark is expected to be the number one pick, with Angel Reese and Camila Cardoso not too far behind. The excitement comes after the women's NCAA championship game drew more viewers than the men's final for the first time ever. You can see the WNBA draft live tonight at 730 eastern on ESPN. We do want to thank you for streaming with us. I'm Stephanie Ramos. ABC News Live is here for you anytime with the latest news, context and analysis. We'll be right back.

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The people of the.

State of New York versus Donald.

J. Trump, the first ever criminal trial of a former president of the United States. Right now, Trump is in recess as he attends the trial there in Manhattan for jury selection in the hush money case against him, the culmination of a year long indictment by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, Trump is charged with 34 counts of allegedly falsifying documents to hide those payments he made to porn star Stormy Daniels to keep her quiet about an alleged affair prior to his run for the white House in 2016. Trump has pleaded not guilty to the charges, claiming that the case is just election interference as he continues to campaign for the November election and he continue to push that claim. As he entered the courthouse this morning, the former president attempting to discredit the case, calling it an assault on America.

Politico persecution. This is a persecution like never before. Nobody's ever seen anything like it. And again, it's a case that should have never been brought.

We have full team coverage of this historic New York criminal trial. Joining me now, our senior investigative correspondent, Aaron Katersky, also executive editorial producer John Santucci. Elizabeth, Chelsea is here in Washington. Jay O'Brien is up on the hill. Former Georgia prosecutor Chris Timmons is with us and criminal defense attorney Tim Jansen. We have a full slate. Erin, let's start with you. Talk to us about what has happened so far today.

It's all been preliminary so far at this historic first criminal trial of a former American president. Former President Trump paused at the door to the courthouse, then walked down the center aisle, took his place at the defense table, and conferred frequently with his attorneys during the proceedings, which have all focused on preliminary matters. The judge immediately turned aside a request to recuse himself from the case. Trump has been pushing for that over the political work of the judge's daughter, he said. That was just based on innuendo. No need for that. And then he took up a number of evidentiary matters. As Trump's attorneys and prosecutors squabbled over which evidence should be allowed. And then, just before lunch, prosecutors asked the judge for permission to file a request to hold Trump in contempt of court because they say he violated the judge's limited gag order with a series of social media posts disparaging witnesses. The judge's order prevents Trump from attacking witnesses in the case, along with others, and defense attorneys said, well, he didn't do it.

But the judge said he's going to consider it now during the lunch break.

All right. We'll see what happens during the lunch break. Chris Trump is charged with falsifying his business records, as we know, to conceal this alleged criminal conduct. As a former prosecutor, what exactly does the D.A. need to prove? Because everyone pretty much knows by now the name Stormy Daniels, the fact that she wrote a scathing book and also Michael Cohen. I mean, we know how he has thrown his former boss under the bus and has been very open about their relationship and Trump's activities.

So, Kiara, what I think everybody has to remember is that this case is coming out of what happened back in 2016 and what was going on at that time, allegedly, at least according to the prosecutors, was that Donald Trump was paying this money to keep Stormy Daniels from coming forward and thus jeopardizing his chances of being elected in 2016. I think the hardest part that the prosecution is going to have is intent. I think Donald Trump's got a number of arguments on what his intent was. Look, I thought I was just paying legal fees. I didn't pay any attention. I didn't know that these were hush money payments. I had no involvement in that. There's a lot of different things you can say. And finally, I think what he could say is, look, I was just paying this money because I didn't want my family to find out that I had these affairs going on. I didn't really care about the election. Look, I mean, you know, I got elected regardless of these things coming out, I still have a ton of support despite, you know, having these things in my background or these alleged things in my background.

And finally, I think he'll also deny that he ever had an affair with Stormy Daniels. So there's a lot to look at. And your job as a prosecutor really is to disprove the defenses, to get around that high beyond a reasonable doubt burden.

So, Tim, you're a criminal defense attorney. Trump has denied having an affair with Stormy Daniels, even though she gives far too many crunchy details in her book. How would you be approaching this case if you were on the Trump legal team?

Well, of course, you know, Michael Cohen has been labeled a serial murderer. He's a convicted felon. Uh, stormy Daniels has drafted a letter in 2018 in which she said, not only did I not do this, but we never had an affair. Uh, she was motivated by money. And and clearly they're going to have a hard stretch proving the intent issue. Did Trump know? Well, they're going to have to rely on the testimony of Michael Cohen, a convicted felon who's labeled as a serial perjure to prove that Trump knew this wasn't legal fees. Um, and I think Trump probably will not testify. He would probably be his own worst enemy. The prosecution would love him to testify. But I think they're going to be able to prove that they cannot prove the intent. Remember this these are misdemeanor charges that have been now trumped up into federal charges in a state courtroom. There are a lot of hurdles that this prosecution is going to have to get over. And Trump has a really good defense team.

So John Trump has made at least, what, 11 attempts now to delay the trial? He loves to delay and so far it has worked in his favor. But could things actually change this time around?

Well, it feels like 1112. And he tried again today in the Court of Appeals in New York. I mean, we don't know what's going to happen just yet on that one. It's not mattering. Right? Because look at where we are at this moment. We are in this courtroom. We are going through a calendar. We are getting the rules for the road as jury selection, as many expect, will get underway once lunch ends. And the reality is, Donald Trump has succeeded in delaying three of the other cases, but one somehow has gotten through. And this just happens to be it. Look, the other part of this, though, is that this makes things extremely complicated for Donald Trump, the candidate. Obviously, he's the defendant in that courtroom, but as we all know, he is a candidate for the 2024 race for the white House. So being in court four days a week, as one aide said to me, makes it impossible for him to do the things we need him to do, get out there and campaign, raise money.

Now they're going to find ways around that. Doing remote events, sending him out on Wednesdays and over the weekends. But nevertheless, this case, however long it goes, makes it very difficult, as you well know, for Donald Trump to actually do what he should be doing right now. Campaigning.

Well, Elizabeth, does he really need to campaign because he seems to use these moments in time to help his re-election campaign. His polls are still very strong. So thoughts on that? Plus, President Biden, do you think he'll use this in any way, shape or form to his advantage? Because it doesn't seem to really help him when he does?

Well, I'm sure we've seen just how intertwined the former president's campaign and his legal battles are. They're one and the same at this point. He's using every opportunity to try to raise awareness about the fact that the white House race is just a few months away. But when it comes to President Biden, he is staying far from this. Do not expect to hear from the president or the white House about this trial. In fact, we haven't heard from the white House on any of the four criminal indictments that the former president is facing. And that's because they say they don't want to interfere with the court system. They are trying to draw a very clear contrast here with the former president, who has relentlessly attacked the judicial system and tried to accuse the former president, the current president, without evidence of interfering with these cases. So for now, the white House says the president is governing. We expect Kira. Unlike Trump, President Biden will be hitting the campaign trail this week. Tomorrow, he's heading out to Pennsylvania, where he'll be spending most of the week.

So, Jay, what's the word up there on Capitol Hill? Our lawmakers talking about this, paying attention. Do they have their TVs on?

It's interesting to the amount that they're paying attention. I'm not quite sure. We've heard a little bit of reaction today from Republican lawmakers. The usual suspects, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Matt Gaetz, Troy Nehls of Texas, who's made it his mission to come out and defend Donald Trump at every turn, called these charges a quote unquote, total sham, but to the point that Elizabeth and John made about Trump using this at every turn to help his campaign. He's also used those for criminal cases, not just this one to bend Republicans on Capitol Hill to his will. House Republicans are investigating Alvin Bragg's prosecution right now. We've also seen Republican leaders up here on the Hill from Mike Johnson, a staunch Trump ally, to Mitch McConnell, who's had a very public break with Trump until recently, come out against these charges, say that they view them as political. Mitch McConnell has endorsed Donald Trump. So the point being, we now see Republicans who maybe even months ago, when there was an active primary, might have been somewhat fractured in lockstep behind Donald Trump preparing themselves for the general election that is already upon us.

All right. Erin, John, Elizabeth, Jay, Chris and Tim, appreciate you all. We'll be checking back in with you, of course, throughout the afternoon. All right. We are still following the fallout from Iran's unprecedented attack on Israel for the second day in a row, Israel Prime Minister, Israeli Prime Minister and his war cabinet are meeting to discuss their response to Saturday's attack. The US is making it clear to Israel that if it does strike back militarily, it will do so alone. But Biden, just a short time ago, reaffirming his support for Israel and adding together with our partners, we defeated that attack. Both countries confirming Iran's attack was pretty much a failure. At least half of those strikes failed before even reaching their targets, while almost all of them were intercepted and shot down. We have team coverage starting off with our foreign correspondent Tom Sufi Burj there in Tel Aviv, senior white House correspondent Selina Wang in Washington, senior Pentagon reporter Louis Martinez, and also ABC news contributor and former deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East, Mike Mulroy.

So, Tom, the Israeli War Cabinet reconvening today. Let's talk about what do we know, if anything, with regard to Israel's potential response here?

Yeah. It's the second meeting of the Israeli War Cabinet in just 24 hours. Since that since that unprecedented Iranian attack on Israeli soil in the early hours of Sunday. We haven't got any word yet. If the Israeli government has reached a decision, what the timing of any possible response could be. Well, we're getting some interesting comment from one Israeli official who, in their words, says that any Israeli action will be, quote, carefully calibrated not to jeopardize the success of Saturday. The success, of course, being the high shoot down rate of the of his by Israel. Of those drones and missiles as they even before they even got into. Many of them even got into Israeli airspace and of course the wider coalition around it. But of course, this is a high stakes moment for Prime Minister Netanyahu. It's a big, big decision. On the one hand, he has to make sure that Iran, other people in the region don't think that an attack of this nature can go unpunished. But at the same time, the US and other allies are weighing in on Israel and telling them to to hold back, refrain from, from doing something more severe, which would probably mean that Iran would respond again.

So, Celina, how involved is the white House at this point?

Well, look here right now, the white House is watching very carefully. They're on edge and they're really urging restraint. In a phone call after that attack, President Biden essentially told Netanyahu to take the win, that you've already proven that the Israeli military is superior. You did not face any significant damage and really urging restraint here, telling Netanyahu to take things slow, think very carefully and deliberately about the risk of escalation here. And we did just hear the president, in his first on camera remarks in the Oval Office since that Iranian strike, and he touted the unprecedented military onslaught from Iran and the ability of the U.S. and its partners, along with Israel, to combat it and take a listen to what else he said here.

We're committed to a ceasefire that will bring the hostages home and preventing conflict from spreading beyond what it already has. We're also committed to the security of our personnel and partners in the region, including Iraq.

So the president, they're keeping the focus as well on what's happening in Gaza. Remember the relationship between Biden and Netanyahu? It is frosty. Just less than two weeks ago, the president had threatened to change U.S. policy if Netanyahu doesn't do more to protect civilians in Gaza. But the president's focus here is to keep things from escalating. He made it clear to Netanyahu as well that if they strike back at Iran, the US is not going to get involved. They are not going to help.

So, Louis, 99% of Iran's targets intercepted, shot down, according to Israel. What does that tell you about Iran's military capabilities and more importantly, Israel's?

Kira. I mean, we have heard for years about Iran's military capabilities, how they have heavily invested in their ballistic missile program. And it is a threat. It remains a threat. I think what you saw on Saturday was the combination effort on the part of the United States working with Israel, working with other partner nations in the region and also in Western Europe to essentially help defend Israel from any kind of a big attack from Iran. That big attack did take place. And so, as we heard from Todd there in Tel Aviv, the Israelis want to build on that relationship, on that success that they had over the weekend diplomatically and in terms of a potential response against Iran. So what we I think what we've learned is that the United States and Israel have developed a significant technological advantage in being able to destroy a large number of these incoming missiles, but at the same time, it still remains a threat. And you can't always count on that technology to bring down every single weapon.

That is true. And Mike, if the US doesn't back Israel and a potential military response, how could or would it damage their relationship?

I think Israel is looking at this. If they don't respond to this very, uh, large attack by Iran directly at Israel, they will set a new paradigm. But they're having to balance that with what obviously appears. The U.S. does not want to see a direct strike in Iran. I do think that the United States made it clear, as you point out, that they will not be involved in any offensive actions, but they've also made it clear that they will be in defensive actions. And that means a lot to Israel, because this is a very difficult scenario to defend against, as we pointed out, it was very successful, but it's very it's very deliberate and it's very expensive. So I think the relationship will of course endure, especially since the U.S. has shown so much commitment to Israel's defense and will if this does escalate or not.

Tom, we are also learning more details as to what Intel Israel and the US received ahead of the attack.

Yeah, that's right. A senior Israeli Air Force official in a briefing this afternoon basically said that the majority of the Intel Israel got about giving it an advance warning about the Iranian attack came from coalition partners. And that response was in response to a question related to the actual actions of Middle Eastern nations in the overall defense in the early hours of Sunday morning. Now, Israeli officials are holding back on much detail they're giving in about those specific nations. Jordan has already admitted that it intercepted either is Iranian drones or missiles in its airspace. But Israeli officials are stressing that, you know, those Arab nations did allow Israeli jets to operate within their airspace and potentially coalition jets as well. And that support was clearly, clearly vital. And if you look at the overall support that Israel got in that successful defense of that Iranian attack, you clearly kind of think that actually that gives the U.S. and other allies more leverage when it comes to the very tricky conversations with the Israeli government on how and when they might respond.

All right, Tom, Selina, Louie and Mike, appreciate it. Thank you. Sentencing day for rushed Ariana Gutierrez is the latest on that case when we return.

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Glad you're streaming with us. Well, the movie, said Aamer, convicted of involuntary manslaughter in the rust film shooting, is set to be sentenced today. Hanna Gutierrez faces a maximum of 18 months in jail after a jury found her guilty of two counts of involuntary manslaughter for the shooting that resulted in the death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins. For more, let's bring in our legal contributor and defense attorney, Shauna Lloyd. She's been following it from the very beginning when this all went down. So as for today, what do you expect the judge to rule? Shawna, what do you think?

You know, Carol, when we look at this normally, we would expect it to be on the lower end of the sentence, right? Hannah Gutierrez.

Does not have.

A previous criminal history. She has roots to the community. She has the things that would typically allow for a lower sentence. But with this being a first, a case of first impression, it's the first.

Time a movie.

Set is being.

Really looked.

At in this way. I expect to see the judge give a higher penalty than we would ordinarily expect to see. Just due to the deterrence and part of sentencing, let's remember, is deterring others from making the same mistake. And I think that that is going to be a part that plays in this sentence, particularly for this trial.

All right. And let's talk about what's next. Just within the overall legal case, I mean, we have our eyes on Alec Baldwin as well.

Absolutely. From Hannah's team, you may expect to see an appeal that I would not be surprised at all to see an appeal of the sentence and the verdict. And later down the road, we do have to look forward to. Alec Baldwin will be on trial for his charges, and they are likely watching this sentencing very closely to see what they can foreshadow for his future and his trial as well.

All right.

Shannon Lloyd, appreciate it. We'll follow everything today right along with you. Coming up, the 128th Boston Marathon off and running. We've got the latest results for you next.

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Some of the top headlines. We're falling for you this hour here on ABC News Live. The FBI launching a criminal investigation into the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse in Baltimore. Authorities are looking into whether the ship's crew knew something was wrong before even leaving port. Agents were on the ship searching today. Late last month, the cargo ship Dolly lost power before crashing into that bridge, killing six people. It's being called one of the worst humanitarian crises in recent history. Today marks one year of the brutal civil war in Sudan, a bloody conflict between the Sudanese armed forces and a paramilitary paramilitary group called the Rapid Support Forces. The UN says 25 million people are in need of humanitarian aid, and in just one year, the war has displaced 8 million people and killed an estimated 14,000 human beings. Humanitarian agencies say the death toll is much likely to be higher, as that country remains impossible for observers to even enter from Hopkinton to the back Bay. The 128th Boston Marathon is off and running. The results are racing in to Ethiopia's Sisay.

Lemma won the men's race with a final time of two hours, six minutes 18 seconds. Hellen Obiri from Kenya breaking the pack for a repeat win in the women's race two hours, 22 minutes and 37 seconds. Then Marcel, who from Sweden took first place in the men's wheelchair race at one hour, 15 minutes and 33 seconds, Britain's Eden Rainbow Cooper winning the women's wheelchair race that she did in one hour, 35 minutes and 11 seconds so AG Simpson could prove to be a pretty polarizing person in death, as he was in life, because a battle is brewing over his estate now, and there are new questions as to whether the families of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman will get the millions of dollars they are still owed. Erielle Reshef has the details.

A looming showdown over disgraced former football star O.J. Simpson's estate. Simpson died last week after a battle with prostate cancer, his last will and testament filed in a Nevada court on Friday. His estate placed in a newly created trust with his longtime attorney, Malcom Laverne, as executor, who says he does not know how much the estate is worth.

Personal belongings. Anything they had like that is.

Going to be part of the estate, so there will be. I will be doing inventorying and trying to see what is out there. We, the.

Jury in the above entitled action, find the defendant or or James Simpson not guilty of the crime of murder.

Simpson was infamously acquitted in a criminal trial for the brutal 1994 stabbing deaths of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman, but he wasn't off the legal hook. In 1997, Simpson was found liable for the slayings in a civil suit and ordered to pay more than $33 million in damages. But Simpson only paid a fraction. Now the Goldmans want what they're legally owed, Ron Goldman, Sister Kim telling ABC news. Our family will follow the law, as we always have. We will continue to do our due diligence. But the executor of Simpson's estate defiant, saying it's my hope that the goldmans get zero, suggesting the estate needs to take care of other things first, including his former clients substantial IRS debt.

There's going to be a notice to creditors when those claims come in. We will deal with them and they'll be in a pecking order.

O.J. Simpson had an estimated net worth of upwards of $10 million in the early 90s, but after his fall from grace, mostly lived off of his NFL pension and actor's union residuals, reportedly earning $400,000 a year.

Uncle Sam is going to be first, right? And depending on the assets, if he owed taxes, it could be a situation where after the taxes are paid, there's next to nothing left. So then if you're the goldmans, you have to calculate, is this even worth doing?

And with Simpson's assets set to go through the Nevada court probate process, the Brown and Goldman families could be paid a piece of whatever Simpson left behind. Again, his executor says the value of his estate is still unclear. Kyra.

All right, Ariel, thank you. And thank you to all of you for streaming with us. I'm Kyra Phillips. From breaking news to all the stories that matter to you, you can always find us on your favorite streaming service, the ABC news app, and of course, on ABC news.com. The news never stops. Neither do we. We'll be right back.

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Good afternoon, everyone. I'm Kyra Phillips. Let's get right to our top story today. The people of the state of New York versus Donald J. Trump, the first ever criminal trial of a former president of the United States. Right now, Trump is sitting in a New York courtroom as attorneys begin jury selection in the hush money case against him, culmination of a year long indictment by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg. Trump is charged with 34 counts of allegedly falsifying those documents to hide payments he made to Stormy Daniels to keep her quiet about an alleged affair prior to his run for the white House in 2016. Trump has pleaded not guilty to the charges, claiming the case is just election interference as he continues to campaign for the November election. And he continued that push and the push that claim as he entered the courthouse this morning, the former president attempting to discredit the case, calling it an assault on America.

Political persecution. This is a persecution like never before. Nobody's ever seen anything like it. And again, it's a case that should have never been brought.

We have full team coverage of this historic New York criminal trial, starting with our investigative correspondent Olivia Rubin, and a look at what's at stake.

I never thought anything like this could happen.

For the first.

Time in American history, a former president of the United States standing trial on criminal charges.

These are felony crimes in New York state. No matter who you are.

Former President Donald Trump fought repeatedly to delay the case beginning today, accusing him of illegally hiding payments he orchestrated to porn star Stormy Daniels to silence her affair allegations during his 2016 white House bid.

The evidence will show that he did so to cover up crimes relating to the 2016 election.

Multiple judges rejected Trump's last ditch efforts to halt the trial brought by the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg. Now, hundreds of potential jurors are being questioned in a courthouse downtown.

I don't know how you're going to have a trial that's going on right in the middle of an election. Not fair, not fair.

Lawyers for both sides will whittle that group down to just 12 jurors and six alternates, asking them questions to root out any bias. It includes. Have they ever attended a Trump rally? Subscribe to the conspiracy movement of QAnon or followed an anti-Trump organization on social media? The process expected to take as long as two weeks.

The whole point of jury selection is to find out, not just do people know who the parties are involved, not just did they know the charges, but rather can they set all of that information aside and be a fair and impartial juror? In this particular case, the.

Charges 34 counts of falsifying business records, the crime, not the alleged sexual activity, but the paperwork used to keep the payments to Stormy Daniels quiet. Prosecutors say Trump disguised the payments he made to his one time lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen, for Daniels to bury her affair claims, labeling them instead as legal payments for a nonexistent retainer agreement with Cohen.

He directed me to make the payments. He directed me to become involved in these matters.

Prosecutors say those disguised checks cut from the Trump Organization to Cohen were part of a larger catch and kill scheme devised by Trump and his allies with the publisher of the National Enquirer. Together, prosecutors say they would repeatedly buy negative stories about Trump, only to never publish them.

He was very concerned about how this would affect the election.

To help his campaign.

To help him end the campaign.

Trump has pled not guilty to the charges and has called the case election interference. He also claims the affair with Daniels never happened.

Did you know about the $130,000 payments?

Trump is no stranger to the legal system, but he has only come face to face with a jury during his presidential bid for the white House once before. Earlier this year, a nine person jury heard a civil defamation case brought against Trump by the writer Eugene Carroll, who accused Trump of sexually assaulting her in the 1990s and then defaming her when she went public with her allegations in 2019. There, Trump personally analyzed the potential jurors, often craning his neck and turning around as they answered questions. He never attended the first trial, where a jury found him liable for sexual assault and defamation of Carroll. Some jurors, the second time around in the trial to determine damages against Trump, appeared visibly shocked when they entered the room, only to see the former president of the United States seated there. After days of witnessing Trump's behavior in court, including storming out of the courtroom, that jury of seven men and two women found Trump liable for defamation and ordered him to pay $83 million in damages.

We will immediately appeal. We will set aside that ridiculous jury.

Now Trump is repeating that process again. But these jurors will be charged with deciding a criminal case. If convicted, he could face a maximum of four years in jail for each of the 34 counts.

Thanks again to our investigative correspondent, Olivia Rubin. They're joining us now, senior reporter Katherine Faulders, executive editorial producer John Santucci. Our Elizabeth Schultz here in Washington, Jay O'Brien is up on the Hill. And then former Georgia prosecutor Chris Timmons joins us once again. So, Katherine, what's happened so far in the courtroom?

So so far, Kyra, this morning and early this afternoon has been a lot of procedural hurdles that they have to get through here. So look there have been some wins for Donald Trump, some not wins for Donald Trump. The judge said that he will allow prosecutors to introduce evidence about the Trump campaign's interactions with the National Enquirer, for example, and Trump's alleged affairs with former Playboy model Karen McDougal. The judge did say that he will not allow prosecutors to play that infamous Access Hollywood tape to play video or audio of it. They can use Trump's words, though, at trial. So that's what the morning has been like up until now. They were having a brief break. Prosecutors with the DA's office, of course, have also asked the judge permission to seek to hold former President Trump in contempt for alleged violations of the judge's order against attacking witnesses. They have said specifically, there are three social media posts here. The order would seek a $1,000 fine for each one of those. So we're waiting to see what the judge says about that.

But it's very clear that the judge now wants to move into jury selection. So when they come back from lunch, it will go into jury selection. Of course, that's what we've been waiting for all day. That process will start soon. Kyra.

So Chris, what do you make of these rulings and how do you think they could impact the case overall?

Well, I mean, I think here the judge is just ready to get going. I mean, you know, the latest rulings anyway. Tell him, look, we're here. We've wasted half a day on some of these procedural matters. You know, many of them important, many of them. He was just irritated that had been brought before him. But he's ready to go. He's ready to get moving on this particular case. He wants to, you know, talk to the first 500 jurors, Kyra, which is unimaginable. How many people that are there for that jury selection? The biggest I've ever seen is 250. And that was over the course of a week, you know, but he's got 500 people there. They're waiting to get into the courtroom. He wants to get started with jury selection.

So, John, just.

Before the lunch break, prosecutors said they intended to seek to hold Trump in contempt for three posts on a social media site they say they violate. He violated the gag order. Really no surprise there. He's done that in the past. What posts are they referring to?

Well, Catherine just touched on this a couple of minutes ago, Kyra. I mean, these are posted Donald Trump made right after that gag order was imposed by judge McCann. And what they were, they focused on attacks Donald Trump made on several witnesses, including Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen. And again, sometimes, you know, it's always about Donald Trump's words and rhetoric out on the campaign trail. But it is at times his posting on social media that can cause him headaches later on. And clearly, that's exactly what has happened here. Prosecutors want a $1,000 fine for each of those. Now, we don't know what the judge is going to do. He said he would take that under advisement while they was heading into the lunch break. So do they come and address that now, or does he, you know, deal with it at some point down the road? Because as we've all been noting, he wants to move ahead to jury selection, saying there are 500 jurors that are waiting today because remember, if they don't get to that today, those jurors get a free pass because they showed up, they actually moved down the list to the next trove of jurors.

And already this is going to be a very difficult and complicated case to seat a jury of 12 jurors and six alternates. So any day, any group of people that is missed really does complicate things and frankly, adds to a little bit of a delay here potentially.

All right. And Elizabeth, the trial could, you know, take Donald Trump largely off the campaign trail for up to eight weeks, but doesn't seem to have impacted his race for the white House so far. It seems like every time he does have a trial or a hearing, it just pushes his poll numbers even higher.

Well, and here we've talked so much about how these trials overall, not just this, but the four criminal indictments that the former president is facing have helped boost his support among at least some of his supporters. But the fact is that this has become so entwined in his political strategy. Already, we are seeing the former president send out fundraising emails based on the proceedings that have happened here today, but it does undoubtedly complicate, at the very least, the scheduling of his campaign. If he's going to be sitting in a courthouse for four days a week. And his lawyers have made very clear today here that he wants to be personally involved in a lot of what's going on in this trial, that that means he won't be out on the campaign trail in those days. Now, could he go out on the weekends? He's, as John pointed out, does a lot of his campaigning through social media. But this does set up a clear contrast with how he will actually be able to get out on the trail and when, and that's something that the white House, while they are not commenting on this trial at all, President Biden himself will be hitting the trail this week.

He's going to spend most of his week in battleground Pennsylvania. Kyra.

So, Jay, what are the former president's allies on the Hill saying today? Well.

Interesting. As you noted to Elizabeth, every time the former president has one of these proceedings in court, it helps his campaign. And every time he goes to court, two Republicans on places like Capitol Hill rally around him. Some of them are what we've come to call the usual suspects, the Marjorie Taylor Greene's of the world, Matt Gaetz, Troy Nehls, who tweeted today as they often tweet that they feel that these charges are political, that the former president is being victimized. But we've also seen the upper echelons of Republican leadership on Capitol Hill get behind Trump. Speaker Mike Johnson had that press conference with Trump last week. He has been a staunch ally of the former presidents. Mitch McConnell, as you and I were talking about earlier, who previously was no friend to Donald Trump, particularly after January 6th, has endorsed him now. And so, one of the things we're watching for here on Capitol Hill is, as the former president's legal calendar plays out and merges with the campaign, what does that do to the overall political dynamic on Capitol Hill, where these Republicans are so used to and so, frankly, ready to come out every day and defend him, as we've seen them do over the last few months.

All right. Katherine, Chris, John, Elizabeth, and Jay, thank you so much. We will track this, of course, as we take you now to the white House for National Security Council coordinator John Kirby is taking questions and briefing the press. Let's listen in.

Or drones. President Biden instructed the United States to defend Israel to the maximum extent possible and defeat that attack. And we did, with the support of our partners, the United States enabled Israel to spectacular so spectacularly defeated. Despite launching more than those 300 weapons from Iran in the region, Israel and a coalition of partners were able to defeat 99% of the attacks. There was virtually no infrastructure damage to Israel, but their attack requires an unequivocal condemnation from the international community. And so, as Kareen said, the president convened the G7 yesterday and they have forcefully condemned that attack and urge for calm and de-escalation. And I'd like to take just a few minutes to correct the record on a few points that have come out in the last several hours. I've seen reporting that the Iranians meant to fail, that this spectacular and embarrassing failure was all by design. I've also seen Iran say that they provided early warning to help Israel prepare its defenses and limit any potential damage. All of this is categorically false. To coined the phrase from the president are still a phrase from the president.

It's malarkey. This attack failed because it was defeated by Israel, by the United States, and by a coalition of other partners committed to Israel's defense. So let's be straight. Given the scale of this attack, Iran's intent was clearly to cause significant destruction and casualties. Iranian leaders launched so many missiles and other munitions because they knew that many were going to be defeated, but the aim was to get as many of them through Israel, Israel's defenses, as possible. Now, I've also seen this speculation about messages past forth and warnings. We did receive messages from Iran and they received messages from us too. But there was never any message to us or to anyone else on the timeframe, the targets or the type of response. In fact, before yesterday, it was presumed that 100 ballistic missiles might overwhelm even the best defensive systems. That was Iran's intent. And as you all saw for yourself, it didn't work. This attack was defeated thanks to our preparations to a coalition of committed partners and to Israel's remarkable defensive systems.

And I want to focus on that last point for just a moment. Israel today is in a far stronger strategic position than it was only a few days ago. Iran's vaunted missile program, something it is used to threaten Israel in the region, proved to be far less effective. Israel's defenses, on the other hand, proved even better than many had long assumed. Israel's defense was strengthened by a coalition of countries led by the United States, and working together, the United States has never before so extensively and so directly defended Israel from attack. To ensure that that continues to be the case, the House of Representatives must urgently pass the National Security Supplemental, which is already passed the Senate with overwhelming bipartisan support. That supplemental includes funding that the president requested for the Iron Dome and David's Sling system systems that saved countless lives this weekend and have saved many lives from Hamas and from Hezbollah rockets over the past six months. Passing that bill is the fastest and surest way to get Israeli aid it needs, and we must act urgently to replenish Israel's air defenses, just as Congress must act urgently to replenish replenish Ukraines air defenses, which also continue to be attacked.

Every single day with the same Iranian Iranian made drones. Now, finally, much of the world today is standing with Israel. When the president spoke to the G7 leaders yesterday, they were unified in their condemnation of Iran and their determination to hold Iran accountable at the president's direction. Our teams are now following up with G7 capitals on new multilateral sanctions to target Iran's missile and other nefarious programs. G7 countries that had yet to designate the IRGC a terrorist organization are now considering doing so. And going forward, we will be working to further isolate Iran internationally and increase economic and other forms of pressure. So that's the upshot here. A stronger Israel, a weaker Iran, a more unified alliance of partners. That was not Iran's intent when it launched this attack on Saturday night. Not even close. And again, they failed. They failed utterly. Now, as you also know, President Biden is welcoming both the Iraqi prime minister and the prime minister, Peter Fiala of the Czech Republic, to the white House. President and Prime Minister al-Sistani from Iraq will discuss the US and Iraq's shared vision for our broad, multifaceted relationship.

During the meeting, these leaders will reaffirm their commitment to advancing regional stability, to expanding opportunities for Iraq's people and reinforcing Iraq's sovereignty, security and stability. The Iraqi prime minister will be here for almost a week, and in that time he will meet a range of administration officials, including both Secretary Blinken at the State Department and Secretary Austin at the Defense Department. He will have opportunities to share his priorities and vision for Iraq with a variety of audiences here in Washington and in other parts of the United States. And, of course, the president will be taking the opportunity to discuss how we will continue to work with Prime Minister Sydney to defuse regional tensions and to prevent Iraq from being drawn into conflict. Iraq president firmly believes is central to the region's stability. And then later, as Karim previewed, he'll have a chance to meet with president. I'm sorry, Prime Minister Fiala, to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Czech Republic as a NATO ally. Over the past 25 years, our alliance has grown stronger and the relationship between our two countries have grown even closer as we've deepened defense cooperation, including through the Czech Republic's purchase of 24 F-35 fighters earlier this year.

President will congratulate the Prime Minister on legislation that Czechia recently passed, requiring it to spend at least 2% of its GDP on defense, which, as you know, is the NATO goal. The leaders were also discussing their strong support for Ukraine, and the president will thank the Prime Minister for leading an effort to help secure nearly 1 million rounds of ammunition for Ukraine. And one more thing. If you'll just bear with me, I'm almost done. Today marks the one year conflict in Sudan. Since fighting erupted a year ago, civilians have been forced to bear the brunt of this senseless conflict. Thousands have been killed and wounded. Women and girls have been kidnapped and assaulted, hundreds of thousands of families have been displaced. Communities and livelihoods have been utterly destroyed, and famine now is threatening to take hold. That's why the United States continues to commit resources to create conditions for a potential peace process, to hold accountable actors who are seeking to sow more violence, and to ensure that humanitarian assistance reaches the civilians who urgently need it.

We reiterate our calls for all parties in this conflict to lay down their weapons and put an end to this intolerable violence for the future of Sudan, but most of all, for the future of the Sudanese people. Thank you. Appreciate your patience. Um.

Israel's military.

As you've just said.

There will be.

A response to.

The attack in Iran.

So does the US.

Have any indication.

Of what those next steps are from Israel?

We will let the Israelis speak to that.

Does the US expect.

To be consulted in advance of them?

I won't get into our diplomatic conversations or expectations. The Israeli government will determine for themselves if there's going to be a response and what that response is going to look like.

And are you able to discuss the specific roles played by other members of the regional coalition from over the weekend, specifically Jordan and Saudi Arabia? Whether they helped shoot down missiles or what other actions they may have done? No, I think.

We'll let other members of the coalition speak for themselves.

Um, Israel is reportedly looking at options that.

Would send a.

Message to Iran but.

Not cause.

Casualties.

Is the administration presenting alternatives to India?

This is, uh, these this is an Israeli decision to make, um, whether and how they'll respond to what Iran did on Saturday. And we're going to leave it squarely with them.

Their decision to make.

But are you making suggestions?

We are not involved in their decision making process about a potential response.

And just, uh, is the president does he have any plans to speak to Netanyahu again?

I don't have anything on the calendar to speak to. But look, I mean, they've they've spoken frequently over the last six months. They will absolutely speak again at the appropriate time during.

Um, John, just one day before the attack, President Biden issued a warning to Iran, don't. And now the US is not taking any part in an Israeli reprisal. So does that signal to Iran that it can defy the US without facing any consequences?

I don't know, man. If I'm sitting in Tehran and I'm taking a look at what just happened on Saturday night. I don't think I'd be betting that the United States is, uh, not willing to get engaged here and help defend Israel. I mean, you had American fighter pilots in the air in combat operations, shooting down drones and missiles that were heading towards, uh, towards Israel, as well as US Navy destroyers at sea, knocking them down from there. So the message should be very clear to anybody when the president says, we're going to take our commitments to the region seriously, when we're going to help Israel defend itself, we've got skin in the game, and we prove that.

I understand what you're saying about deterrence, but what about consequences.

As I just said, and Karine also let in, he had a conversation with G7 leaders. He'll be engaging with other allies and partners. We have achieved. We have seen swift condemnations about what Iran did from the international community, and we're going to be working with international partners to, to, uh, to to work up options to hold Iran appropriately accountable. And then just.

On the logistics of this, with roughly 300 drones and missiles shot down, can you talk about how you will assess the debris fields and the shrapnel and how much that, um, impacted people on the ground?

We're not going to be doing any kind of an assessment, uh, of the impact on the ground. The Israeli Defense Forces and Israeli officials have already been out and about looking at the impact on the ground. There were very few missiles that got through, and the only damage that was done, it was very minor damage to one air base in Israel. Um, that did not even put that airbase out of commission. The Israelis have already spoken to this, and I believe they've already released imagery of some of the things they found on the ground. Sadly, a young girl, an innocent civilian less than ten years old, was severely wounded. That was the only casualty that we're aware of. Thank you.

John. Thank you John. A couple of questions on Iran and then on Iraq on the Prime Minister visit. You just said that the white House will not informed of the timing of the Iranian attack on Israel, but the president told us that the attack is going to be sooner than later and almost a day after the attack happened. So just going to explain this one.

I never said we didn't have an idea. I never said we didn't have, uh, information that, uh, that, uh, that we could, uh, that we could act on and speak to our Israeli counterparts about what I said was Iran never delivered a message giving us the time and the targets. No no no no no no no, no timing. I mean, I want to be clear, this whole narrative out there that Iran passed us a message with what they were going to do is ridiculous.

Do you believe that Iranian nuclear sites is a legitimate target?

I you're I'm not going to get into targeting discussions here from the podium.

Let me ask you about the Prime Minister. Is the white House satisfied with the way that the Iraqi government is reining in the militias in Iraq, considering they are one of the purposes of the Iranian regime?

We're going to we're going to have an in-depth discussion with the Prime Minister and his team about the continued activities of militia groups in Iraq, um, and, uh, and reinforce, uh, our views about how seriously we take the force protection of our, our troops and our facilities there. And we'll also expect, I fully expect that that the we'll talk with the Prime Minister about the counter ISIS mission in Iraq and its potential future. And finally.

Just when you said, in the spirit of partnership, uh, we disagree with the United States, and you mentioned something like we need a new system for. A national law to respect international law. International humanitarian law. Protection of civilians and diplomatic missions. So he's hinting at the Israeli attack in Damascus. Is also hinting about not doing enough to respect international law. Is this a point of disagreement between you and the Iraqi government?

You want to talk to the Prime Minister about what he meant by those comments? Iraq is a key partner, one we really value. We wouldn't be having this meeting today. He wouldn't be having meetings this week if it wasn't an important relationship. As I said, the president believes that Iraq is critical to regional stability.

Good day. Thanks, Karine. Thanks, Admiral.

You said just now that this.

Well, as many times as.

Reporters can ask John Kirby the question, he continues to say the same thing. And that is, we don't have any indication that Israel has made any type of decision on if they will respond to Iran or know what they might do, and we are not getting involved, period. Even reporters following up saying, okay, well, are you maybe suggesting alternatives or ways to go at this? Again, John Kirby saying we are out completely of this situation. So is it going to stay that way? Good question. Let's bring in our white House correspondent, Selina Wang, also former Assistant Secretary of defense for the Middle East, Mike Mulroy. Um, Selina, let's start with you. I mean, we're not getting anything new. As hard as reporters will press for questions, but John Kirby is standing pretty strong in that he's has no idea what Israel is about to do, and that the US is going to actually, in every sense of the word, not going to be a part of it, whatever it is.

Yeah. Kira Kirby, there is dodging a lot of those questions and what you can see him doing. He's just trying to underscore that the U.S. is not getting involved in their decision making process, and that it's up to Israel how they want to respond. He's also they're trying to underscore and clarify that Iran didn't give the US any heads up about what the targets were, what exactly they were going to do. He wanted to stress, he said, that Iran's intent was clearly to cause significant disruption and casualties. The reason why he says they launched so many munitions is because they were hoping that as many of them as possible would get through Israel's defenses. And again, he's highlighting what we've already heard from the president, touting the capabilities of Israel in combination with the US and other partners, to defeat almost all of those munitions coming through into Israel now. But we do know Kyra, though Kirby didn't say this on the podium, we know that during their phone call, the president urged Netanyahu to take things slow.

He urged restraint for him to think very strategically and carefully about the next steps, because, of course, the U.S. wants to avoid any escalation, wants to avoid this from spiraling into a wider war.

So, Mick, clearly, Israel will strike Iran. We just don't really know exactly how that's going to happen. And John Kirby saying, and however it does play out, the U.S. will not get involved. But what happened if a strike does happen and people are killed inside of Iran, that this ends up being a a huge escalation in the conflict. Will the US still stay on the sidelines?

I think what Kirby is doing here is they certainly we, the United States government, want to know when a when or Israel makes a decision and what they're going to do to prepare. But we don't want to look like we participated in it because we're not going to be involved in the actual offensive action. And I think that's where he's really trying to draw the line. I think contrary to what people thought Iran might have done, I think he just shot that down. Uh, literally, pardon the pun. Uh, they may, uh, basically, uh, send a message of where they're striking to be able to remove individuals from those facilities. And that might be a way to mitigate whether this escalates substantially.

All right. Selina Wang. Mike Mulroy, thank you both so much. Appreciate it. We're going to take a quick break. We'll be right back. We've got a lot of news on the other side.

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Good afternoon, everyone. I'm Kyra Phillips. Let's get right to our top story. The people of the state of New York versus Donald J. Trump, the first ever criminal trial of a former president of the United States. Right now, court is back in session after the judge ordered a short break for lunch. Former President Trump is present in that courtroom as attorneys begin jury selection in this hush money case against him, the culmination of a year long indictment by the Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg, Trump is charged with 34 counts of falsifying documents to hide payments that he made to porn star Stormy Daniels to keep her quiet about an alleged affair prior to his 2016 presidential campaign. Trump has pleaded not guilty to the charges, claiming the case is just election interference as he continues to campaign for a second run at the white House. The judge has imposed a limited gag order, keeping Trump from making comments about people directly and indirectly involved in the case. But prosecutors are now seeking to hold Trump in contempt for allegedly violating that gag order on social media.

We have full team coverage of this historic New York criminal trial. Joining me once again, investigative correspondent Olivia Rubin, also executive editorial producer John Santucci, Elizabeth Schultz here in Washington with us, former Georgia prosecutor Chris Timmons, also a part of the conversation. So, Olivia, Donald Trump, he is under this partial gag order in this case, prosecutors are now seeking to have him held in contempt. What did he put out there on social media?

Well, prosecutors are pointing to just three posts that they say were in violation of the order, which says that Donald Trump cannot talk about potential witnesses in the case. And they have pointed to post where they say he is attacking two potential witnesses specifically, that is Stormy Daniels and Michael Cohen, who are at the center of this case. And just as court got underway after that lunch break, the judge has now set a hearing on this issue for next Wednesday. So remember, court is not supposed to be in session on Wednesdays, but it leaves Wednesday open for any other business the court may have. So he has set an afternoon hearing next Wednesday on the contempt issue. And Trump's team has until the end of the week to file their own paperwork. But here I would just point out, look at the time, we are at 2:00 now. And so far they have dealt with evidence issues. They have dealt with contempt, they have dealt with almost everything except jury selection, which they still have not gotten to.

And the day is ending supposedly today at 430. So a question is going to be when are they going to get jury selection started, which is why everyone is here today.

All right, Chris, well, let's talk about prosecutors, what they need to show in order for Trump to be held in contempt here. And what consequences could he face? I mean, this is a little deja vu. I think we've been in this position before.

We have Kira. You know, the former president is John Santucci. Could tell you. Is not at all afraid to give his opinion on things. Even when a court says that he shouldn't. So, you know, what they're going to be looking at is, did he disobey a direct order of the court? If he did, then it's a misdemeanor contempt action, and it could be handled a lot of different ways. It could be handled either through a fine of some sort. It could be handled possibly through jail time, although that would be a logistical nightmare. Thinking about what they'd have to go through to be able to hold the former president in custody while he served out his contempt sentence.

Yeah, indeed. And Elizabeth, you know, Trump continues to argue that the partial gag order limits his political speech. So let's just talk about how that could or could not play into his campaign messaging here.

Well, so far, the former president has used every legal case against him to try to bolster his political case. We've seen him completely intertwine his campaign for reelection and his legal woes, and that's going to continue to be the case. We already see him today, Kira, trying to fundraise off of the limited proceedings that have happened so far. His lawyers have also made clear that he wants to be very involved attending these these proceedings in person, which complicates his schedule for his political campaign. If he's sitting in a courthouse in Manhattan four days a week, that only leaves a couple of days where he can get out on the campaign trail on the weekends. But the former president is using social media instead to try to get his message out. I do think the thing that we really want to look at here, Karen, we've talked a lot about how so far that has really bolstered support among a lot of Trump supporters. But if you look at a recent Reuters Ipsos poll, it did find that 13% of Trump supporters said that if he is convicted of a crime, they would not vote for him.

So the question becomes, if this is really the only trial that does proceed before the election, does that put into question some of the support? If there is a conviction, does that change how those supporters feel?

Interesting. All right. We won't know until indeed that time comes. And John, you think this case is more about the payment or more about the motivation to, you know, of the hush money?

Well, it's totally about the motivation, right? Because listen, at the end of the day, the motivation was Donald Trump did not want the allegations from Stormy Daniels to come out and impact the 2016 election. So that's at the core of it. Right. And that's why we're going to not though they're not part of the criminal charges. We are going to hear other examples of Donald Trump and David Pecker catching and killing damaging stories that could impact Donald Trump leading up to the 2016 election. But the real thing here, at the end of the day, this is a case when you really boil down and take all the noise and the witnesses away comes down to paperwork, right? It's 34 criminal felony counts of falsifying documents. So that's what we're going to be talking about here. The way that Donald Trump concealed those payments to Michael Cohen after the 2016 election, how they were labeled as legal fees, which they clearly weren't, they were payment back to Cohen for catching and killing Stormy Daniels story, hoping it would all go away.

But look nearly, what, eight years later, here we are. It hasn't gone away. If anything, it's made Donald Trump's life far more complicated.

Yep. And Olivia, jury selection underway Donald Trump has filed yet another motion to delay this trial. So what's the new argument? And could we hear a decision soon?

Well, we don't know because it's filed under seal. But what we do know is that Donald Trump has been trying essentially everything he can to push out this trial, even though now he is sitting in the room for jury selection set to begin any minute. So think back to just last week. There were three attempts by Donald Trump denied to push off the case to challenge the gag order. So nothing is really working. But it's a tactic that we have seen from Donald Trump before, essentially throwing everything at the wall and seeing what sticks. So I think there is sort of a sense among Donald Trump's team, at least from speaking to one source, that maybe they still have a little bit of time to by themselves to hopefully get something to stick. So it's kind of contrary to popular belief. Think about it. He's in there. Jury selection is going to start, but there has not been a jury seated yet. So is there still some time that he could hopefully throw something at the wall and have it stick?

That apparently is the hope here, but we do not know this latest effort yet.

All right. Olivia. John. Elizabeth. Chris, thank you all so much. We'll be checking in with you, of course, a little later. Meanwhile, more fallout from Iran's unprecedented attack on Israel for the second day in a row. Now, Israel Prime Minister and his war cabinet are meeting to discuss their response to Saturday's attack. The US is making it clear to Israel that if it does indeed attack Iran, it will do so alone. But Biden, just a short time ago, reaffirming his support for Israel and adding together with our partners, we defeated that attack, both countries confirming that Iran's strikes, well, they pretty much were a failure. At least half of them failed before even reaching their targets, while almost all of them were intercepted and shot down. We have live team coverage on this. Our other top story, our white House correspondent Selina Wang, is in Washington. Also, Pentagon reporter Louie Martinez, also our ABC reporter Josh in Injuries in Jerusalem, and also our contributor and former deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Middle East, Mike Mulroy.

Josh, let's start with you. Do we know anything with regard to this ongoing cabinet meeting with Netanyahu and his his forces?

Here's what we.

Know, Kyra.

Is that there's a big.

Debate going.

On among the War.

Cabinet. There are certain.

Right wing.

Members.

Of Benjamin Netanyahu's governing coalition.

Who.

Want to send a very strong message to Iran and want to hit them hard. There are other people both on that war cabinet. And I would.

Also add around the world.

In particular in Washington, who are who are trying very hard to.

Get Netanyahu.

To, you know.

Take his finger off the button, so to.

Speak, and try.

To hold off.

Remember, this.

Was a reaction to a reaction. The Biden administration.

Is very concerned about a further escalation here. And actually, you could see it in the rhetoric. You'll hear all day today from John Kirby with the National Security Council, from the white House, from the Pentagon, talking about how successful this was on Saturday night.

How brilliantly.

They fended.

Off the attack from Iran, and how.

Israel.

Really has a just a world class defense.

Strategy.

That all may be true, but the fact that they're harping on it.

So much really.

Does seem like they're trying to.

Pump up Netanyahu and make him.

Feel like, you know, he already won and he does not have to fight back against.

Iran. There's a huge.

Imperative to try to prevent a further escalation in this region, Kyra.

So, Celina, the president reaffirmed his support for Israel today. But of course, officials are saying that the US will not help Israel in any way if it chooses to retaliate.

Yeah. And, Kyra, I think this is a message that was just being discussed with you earlier, is that President Biden is telegraphing to Netanyahu in the phone call to take the win, that you've already proved to the world that Israel's military is superior to Iran. So from here, the president's message is, take it slow. Think very carefully and deliberately about your next steps and how that could lead to escalation. Now, we do know that the president did also convene a meeting with the G7 leaders. And we did just hear Kirby on the podium saying that they are considering sanctions against Iran's missile program. This attack from Iran has shifted the focus a bit away from all the harsh criticism we've seen from world leaders on Israel's military campaign in Gaza. Remember, it was just a couple of weeks ago where the president had threatened to change U.S. policy if Netanyahu didn't do more to protect civilians in Gaza. So the relationship between those two, it is frosty. And the question now is just how much of his of the president's advice is Netanyahu going to take?

Is he going to restrain his response here? The US making very clear that if Israel strikes back, they're going to do it alone?

So, Louis John Kirby reiterated that Iran's attack failed this weekend. We saw that. That's significant because Iran is, you know, of course, using this as propaganda to talk about that. This was a big win for them, holding Israel accountable, but nothing got through.

Kara, what this incident this weekend showed is the technological advances of the United States have has, along with Israel in air defense systems. The Iranians have built up their ballistic missile program for decades. They have hundreds, if not more than a thousand of these types of weapons that can travel long distances in short amounts of time. We understand that the flight time from these ballistic missiles from Iran towards Israel was about 12 to 13 minutes. Not a lot of time, but enough time for air defense systems to get working. Now, in this scenario, what we saw was Israel working to, in tandem with the United States, as well as some other countries like the United Kingdom and France, as well as some regional partners, presumably some of the Arab nations there in the Middle East who were helping them and provided assistance. And so what you had is this a non-official coalition, if you will, that was assisting Israel in its air defenses that night. So I think that is something that we need to think and consideration.

And it's obviously something that I think the Israelis want to maintain. And I think that could be placed in jeopardy should Israel attempt some kind of a military response to what we saw this weekend?

Mike, what do you think about the exchange of intelligence? What is real knew what the U.S. knew, other partners knew ahead of this attack. Can you kind of dig into a little bit of that? And and where exactly did that go? And did that help in any way?

Akira. Now that Admiral Kirby made it clear that there was no message sent from Iran regarding when this attack would take place, it really does show how significant the intelligence effort was in thwarting this attack. And that intelligence likely, of course, came from the United States, but also from many of these partners that Luigi's referenced. The United States have been building this relationship up for many years, and I think it showed.

Thanks, guys. We want to take you straight to Santa Fe, New Mexico. Right now, the news is breaking. Hannah Gutierrez the armor on the set of the rust you see right there being sentenced after last month's, uh, finding of her guilty of involuntary manslaughter. Let's listen. The courtroom gets cleared. Please do an order of.

Remand to the transport order to the Department of Corrections. And that the judgment and sentence. Yes, Your Honor. All right. We are in recess. All rise.

And you're looking at live pictures right now. It happened so fast. We got word that Hannah Gutierrez Reed was indeed receiving her sentencing. It literally took about less than 10s. As we look at these live pictures still inside the courtroom, Hannah Gutierrez received the rust film armorer, who was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter last month for the 2021 onset fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins. Just received her sentence from the judge in that New Mexico courtroom. Looks like 18 months in prison, Brian, you were paying close attention as well. That happened pretty quickly. Also, our guy is just outside the courthouse there in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Brian, let's start with you.

I'm somewhat.

Shocked.

I'm shocked in the sense that this is a first arrest. And Hannah Gutierrez Reed got the maximum that a person can get for what's considered a fourth degree felony in New Mexico, that being 18 months in prison now, depending on how that prison sentence works out for her, she could be affordable. It's called good time. And so she might not serve the full 18 months. It might be reduced based on the programs and her status in prison. But still, that is a strong message when it comes to sentencing. Judges typically look at a number of things rehabilitation, punishment and deterrence. I think when you look at an 18 month sentence, the judge relied heavily on punishment and deterrence to make sure that Hannah Gutierrez got the message, but also others in the film industry going forward.

And she was responsible for the firearm safety and storage there on the set of of of rust. And she also became the first person to stand trial and be convicted in this case. So now she stands, as you said, with the maximum sentence here, 18 months in prison. How do you see this impacting Alec Baldwin as we get ready for his case?

I think it's going to be a very big and scary wake up call for Alec Baldwin, because where many experts might say, you know what? Low level felony first time arrest, you may get probation. You may get somewhat of a slap on the wrist. No. If Hannah Gutierrez is doing 18 months in prison, there becomes a much more likely reality that if Alec Baldwin is found guilty, he could be suffering from the same amount of jail time, depending on how the facts play out. Because while Hannah Gutierrez Reed was ultimately the person responsible for the firearm on the set, Alec Baldwin occupies both hats, so to speak. In the rust movie set, he is both the actor who was given the gun, but also the producer that is in charge of the production itself, and we saw some pretty forceful video of Alec Baldwin speaking to others, and I think it's a prosecution. We'll color it kind of contributing to this environment of chaos that led to underfunding people, not doing their job properly.

And just as we saw Hannah Gutierrez read live bullets all over the set.

So we're waiting for our guy. He's there inside the courtroom, heard everything come down in real time there, so we wait for him to get to the cameras. Brian, let's kind of backtrack a little bit. One thing that I noticed throughout the whole court proceedings, even up to today, if you look back to the day when Hannah Gutierrez was active there on the set as the armorer, um, she had much, quite a different look color. Her hair was different colors, a lot of piercings. You know, she looked very rebellious, even the pictures of her with firearms. And then all throughout her trial, she changed her completely changed her look. She didn't even look like the same person. Um, and and in addition to that, what else do you think she tried to do to portray an image or a message? Um, that, um, she shouldn't receive the maximum sentence, that that she is a different person. Now she realizes what has happened. Um, how did that impact do you think?

What happened today? Just her change in attitude, demeanor, look throughout the trial?

Well, as a defense attorney, we often try to tell our clients that from the time you walk into a court at trial to the time that you walked out, all eyes are on you, and you want to make sure that you're putting your best foot forward. Some of my clients, again, I'm a former public defender, so they don't all typically come with with dress shirts and suits and whatnot, and they don't know what to wear. I often say, you know what, wear your Sunday best. If you if you're a person of faith or or wear what you would wear to go on on a first date, if you can have something nice, clean cut and whatnot because you want to present as an individual that a jury will look and say, you know what? This person is one of us. This person is not someone that I would think is capable of committing a crime. If my client is Hannah Gutierrez Reed, I would say, I want you to look like my daughter, my niece, my sister, someone that I can have compassion for when it comes down to not only the guilt or innocence, but also when the judge ultimately decides if you should.

Sentence to the max, or somewhat less than that. And so that's why I think the appearance was as it was. Um, we all do it. I would give the example of I wear very nice suits when I'm here with you, Kiera, but this is not what I wear in the day to day, especially when I'm taking care of a two year old. So you kind of dress for the occasion?

Yeah, it was interesting to watch. And, um, I'm just looking back at what exactly, uh, Hannah Gutierrez had said throughout her trial here and now ending with, with the sentencing that we have have just witnessed of the maximum 18 months. Um, looking back, she did, um, address the court saying, your honor, when I took on rust, I was young, I was naive, but I took my job as seriously as I knew how to. Despite not having proper time, resources, and staffing, I just did my best to handle it. Today, I humbly ask you to consider probation. I beg you, please don't give me more time. What did you make of what she had to say?

I thought that was a great line of saying, you understand I did wrong here. But also to suggest that her actions didn't go far, far surpassed that of negligence. And that's ultimately what this case is about. It was that she didn't meet industry standards, that she conducted herself in a way that made it a dangerous environment for other people around. And so I think she told that line very well. I'm saying I understand the mistakes that I've done. However, these are my reasonings, not necessarily excuses, because you're still taking responsibility for that. And I thought that would have softened the judge to some degree. But ultimately, while it isn't involuntary manslaughter, while she did beat the tampering charges, I think at some point also there were jail call videos and recordings of her kind of not really taking ownership after being convicted. I think that all ultimately went to the judge's mindset of, hey, I'm going to give you what the prosecutors ask, and that is being the max. I don't necessarily agree with it, but I'm not a New Mexico judge.

I would have bet that maybe not probation, maybe 6 to 12 months in jail would have made sense. But the judge said someone died and gave a very high jail sentence, the maximum that she could hand down.

I mean, bottom line, there was a live bullet on the set, Brian, and it was her job, you know, to check those guns, to check to see if there were live bullets, to make sure that the set was safe. And if we learned one thing, there never should have been a live bullet, uh, around any of those individuals. So now the question is, um, has she been held accountable here in the eyes of even Halyna Hutchins family, I I'd love to know what they are thinking about this sentencing, no doubt. Probably feel it should be a lot tougher considering what happened.

Absolutely. And I think that the only limitation, if you're looking at this from the Helena Hutchins family, the only limitation is the charge itself, because the prosecutor went after her charge that clearly they were capable of attaining if they went for a higher homicide charge, rather than involuntary manslaughter, going up to manslaughter or rather than manslaughter, trying to go for a lower level of murder. I think they would have been unsuccessful there. So I think the prosecution did the right move here of putting forth the strongest charge that they could succeed on, and that's what they did. Um, but the reality is that I often tell people the justice system always falls short in terms of giving justice. 18 months of Hannah Gutierrez Reed's life, all incarcerated is no exchange for that of the life of Helena Hutchins. Her jail time is not going to bring Hutchins back. And so this, I think, is the closest that we can bring the family of the victim to justice here.

Brian, stay with me. Prosecutors at the mic just outside the courthouse there. Let's listen in.

How much of a role do you think the jail phone calls played in this sentencing?

I can tell you that they. They played a very big role in my recommendation. I don't know, uh.

How much of.

A role they played for the court.

What does this sentencing.

Say about the.

Baldwin trial?

You know, I wouldn't want to comment on it. The cases are very different.

I think that sentencing is something that's, um, to a certain degree, individual. Uh, so I wouldn't say that this is, um.

Uh. Anything reflective of what may happen in that case.

Anyone goes back to the jail cause.

You said that they.

Made a big.

Decision in.

Your recommendation. That's what.

You spoke about when you.

First got up there.

When you heard those calls, you mentioned 200 calls.

What went through your mind?

Compassion fatigue. Um, you.

Know, we, uh, we have the the state has, uh, has, uh, has approached this prosecution, um, from a standpoint of compassion for Miss Gutierrez, for her age, for her lack of experience.

Um, and, uh, my compassion came to an end. With that in mind, the judge gave her the full to maximum sentence. I was not.

Do you have any reaction.

To her statement that you just spoke?

No I don't. Thank you. I appreciate you.

Guys. Thank you.

Brian. Hopefully we can get in front of that camera there. That's our crew that was able to get just a few comments made by prosecutors. Compassion fatigue. Uh, let's expand on that.

Yeah. So never being a prosecutor myself, my understanding is, well, I do some civil rights work. I understand being that close to a victim, being that close to someone who has lost an individual and wanting to do the best for them. And there is compassion fatigue in the place of the prosecutor. And when I think the comment was towards those jailhouse calls, they saw a lack of compassion from Hannah Gutierrez Reed. They saw that as their way of saying, you know what? She's not remorseful. Uh, she is not compassionate in the way that they want her to be. And that's why they ultimately asked for the highest sentence. And while we are not able, um, she being the prosecutor, asking for the highest amount of sentence for Hannah Gutierrez Reed because of those jailhouse calls that they got from from Gutierrez Reed the compassion fatigue is they are so intertwined with Helena Hutchins family looking for justice here that it's a fatiguing exercise. I say that oftentimes defense attorneys and prosecutors live adjacent to trauma based on our clients and the victims they represent, and that while it is not the same as being Helena Hutchins family, it is a compassion fatigue.

I think that's what they're commenting on. But I think a lot of the elements here went towards that, that that sentence of 18 months.

And it looks like Brian that Gloria Allred is, is somehow I don't know if she's representing, uh, Helena Hutchinson's family, but she's about to read a statement on behalf of family members as she approached the mic yet. Guys. Okay. All right. So so we're waiting to hear from her. So I guess they'll there were a lot of people there at the courthouse today, Brian, from all sides waiting to see exactly what was going to happen to Hannah Gutierrez. Reed, what happens now? She's been sentenced. So does she immediately, uh, go back to jail? And then we also were talking about how this how she may not serve 18 months. Let's talk about what could impact the length of her sentencing here and why she may be released earlier on good behavior or whatever it may be.

Yeah. So I'll kind of break that down. So the next step for her is that she will be sent to a jail for processing, or she might even go to a prison that is an intermediary, uh, before you go to the next jail, fingerprinting, photos taken, um, taking her personal belongings and storing them while she does do her jail sentence. And she may ultimately end up in a more permanent, uh, penitentiary system for that 18 months. Now, when it comes to what many attorneys will call good time credit or good time served, it all depends on the calculations from that state. I believe in New Mexico for every 30 days or every month of a sentence. While you're not committing crimes while incarcerated, you're not breaking any new rules. I think you get about four days. So just imagine taking four days off of every one of those months for 18. I'm an attorney, not a mathematician, but I think that could shave off about three months or so. I think she could ultimately do 15 of the 18 months, depending on she does.

I know that some jails in some states also afford defendants or convicted felons, as Hannah Gutierrez Reed is now the possibility of doing programs while incarcerated to also reduce your sentence there as well. If she gets out sufficiently earlier, there could be a potential for parole on the back end of that sentence. But that's ultimately up to her, her behavior and how she conducts herself going forward.

So and as we wait to hear, of course, that statement on behalf of um, Halyna Hutchins family, uh, the cinematographer that was killed because of that live round, that it was in that gun that Alec Baldwin fired on the set of rust. Just looking back with regard to Alec Baldwin's manslaughter trial, that now is scheduled for July. Um, I'm seeing here attorneys making the point that this is not a case where Hannah Gutierrez made one mistake. These are, of course, various attorneys speaking to Alec Baldwin's case, now scheduled for July. All right. It looks like Gloria Allred is speaking now. All right, let's go ahead and take the statement she's reading on behalf of Helena Hutchinson's parents. Next up. All right, Brian, so we lost our camera there. If it comes back, we'll go ahead. We'd love to hear. Of course. What? What the parents have to say about this sentencing, uh, on behalf of, uh, of the court there, but just talking about Alec Baldwin.

Um, you know, it's interesting how this case has unfolded, thinking, uh, he was in big trouble and then possibly in the clear and now back in trouble again. And now we're seeing what happened with Hannah Gutierrez, Reed and everything we've learned about her. And now I'm told the camera is back on Gloria Allred. All right, let's take a listen. The maximum of 18 months.

And this is.

It. This was. A serious offender and a serious offense was appropriate. I do not think the other two options that the court suggested. Were possible. Options were options that should have been. Uh, exercised by the court. Probation. Clearly inadequate. Yeah. And even just serving the remainder of 12 months, essentially in jail rather than prison would not have been appropriate. I do think the prosecution did an excellent job improving their case beyond a reasonable doubt, and we're looking forward to the next case.

I think this means for this next case, when you're looking at trying to get justice.

For Polina Hutchins and her family.

Um, what are you.

Expecting from.

July now that you've.

Seen this play out?

I'm expecting a jury that's going to give a fair trial, not only to the defendant, but also to Halyna Hutchins. May she rest in peace. Whatever happens, it's not going to bring Lena back. But. Definitely, as the family has said. Everyone who's responsible. Should have to face the consequences and be accountable.

Do you believe Alec Baldwin was part of that cascade of negligence that people talked about in the courtroom?

We support the prosecution of Alec Baldwin.

Was there anything about Miss.

Gutierrez read statement that stood out to you, considering we haven't heard from her until today?

Nothing about the statement that Hannah Gutiérrez gave in court today. Change the fact. That she should have to pay the ultimate price. Which is possible under the law of New Mexico. And that's what she was ordered to do.

Koch described the judge's comments.

I think the judge was very clear about the factual basis that supported her conclusion that the most serious option should be the one that she handed down. And I appreciated the fact that she explained why that was appropriate.

This is the same judge that's going to get involved.

It's going to be a different jury, perhaps the same judge, but. There should still be a fair trial. And I know Mr. Baldwin has done everything he could to try to dismiss the case. But at this point it appears the trial is going forward. I might add. That at this point still. Neither. Neither Taniguchi nor Mr. Baldwin has ever called Helena's mother, Olga. To even say they were sorry. For what happened. And you could see from the video that we showed in court. How devastating this has been to Olga and to Anatoly and to Svetlana. Devastating does not begin to describe it. There'll be more from the family in the future. Thank you. Thank you. I do have some still photos.

Let's see where. Okay.

And that's Gloria Allred is representing Halyna Hutchins family. Halyna Hutchins, of course, being the cinematographer that was killed by that live bullet on the set of rust. You are watching the sentencing that just took place for the armorer Hannah Gutierrez Reed. Given the maximum sentence of 18 months in prison, Alec Baldwin's manslaughter trial will now be scheduled for July. Gloria Allred they're saying she, of course, would like to see that actor, uh, prosecuted as well. You heard the questions about just a cascade of negligence that was laid out in the courtroom today. Even Hannah Gutierrez Reed coming forward and addressing the judge, saying, Your honor, when I took on rust, I was young and I was naive, but I took my job as seriously as I knew how. Despite not having proper time, resources and staffing, I just did the best to handle it. Hannah Gutierrez going on to say, today I humbly ask you to consider probation. I beg you, please don't give me more time. You heard Gloria Allred say that she was very pleased that Hannah Gutierrez did not receive probation.

She was there inside the courtroom when this was all going down. I wanted to bring him up now, along with our friend Buck Meyer, who's been following this from the legal side of things. I guess my first question to you is Gloria Allred saying that Alec Baldwin, neither Alec Baldwin nor Hannah Gutierrez ever called the family, or at least the mom of Halyna Hutchins, to apologize for what had happened or her death. Is that true? Do we know?

Well, that's what Miss Allred said today. And we heard a video statement from Halyna Hutchins mother, Olga, who echoed that those same thoughts and.

Feelings, saying that she.

Had been waiting for anyone involved in her daughter's death to at some.

Point during.

The last, you know, two years, reach out.

And express.

Some sort of sorrow, express something to her. And she says that her and her family had never heard anything from anyone involved.

So let me ask you this, Brian. Now that we see, uh, Hannah Gutierrez not receiving probation, she's going to jail. She got the maximum sentence, even though she didn't have any type of previous record. What do you think this could mean for Alec Baldwin? I mean, clearly, there were other people responsible for safety and protocol and procedures. Um, along with Hannah Gutierrez, Alec Baldwin, this was his movie. He was the main actor.

Yeah. I'm kind of of two minds here. One, I think. All right, let's fast forward past the trial and say if Alec Baldwin is convicted, I would. If I was him and his attorney, I'd be worried about jail time because I can't see that the same judge gives Hannah Gutierrez read jail time and not Alec Baldwin. However, I'm skipping over a very important part, and that's whether or not he's going to be convicted. When you are the second co-defendant to go forward on a trial and the first one is convicted, you have a very large opportunity to say, hey, you know what jurors state of New York, you quote unquote, got your pound of flesh. You got the person who is in charge of the gun. You got the person who was negligent beyond belief and had live rounds all over the set. While Alec Baldwin does occupy two roles, one is actor and as producer, as an actor, as a defense attorney, I would think, you know what?

He's safe. I gave this example to some of the people working here is like, if I got on air and my mic didn't work, yeah, the mics on my body, but that's not my expertise. That's the sound people that are supposed to be ensuring that's working appropriately. And I think that's the Hannah Gutierrez example. However, if I'm the producer of this show as well, I better make sure that each and every element of the show is working as well. And because Alec Baldwin wears two hats in that, in that movie set, that's where I think he falls into a little bit of a problem, and he's got to have the appropriate answer as to why why someone working under him can be negligent, but not him. As a producer of the movie.

Although, what was it like to be inside the courtroom? Any reaction color comments you want to add?

Yeah, it was interesting to see, uh, Hannah Gutierrez emotional from the very start of today's sentencing. There was this sort of emotion that we didn't see from her in the two weeks of of trial last month, really from the start, uh, needing tissues, crying, tearing up. And we again heard that emotion come out in her when she ultimately addressed the judge, saying that she wasn't a monster, that, you know, that she was, that she had been going through a lot and thinking about a lot and thinking about, um, uh, Miss Hutchins and what had happened to her. But again, ultimately, the judge saying that, uh, Miss Gutierrez, uh, Miss Gutierrez was not remorseful enough that she ultimately did not.

Express.

Any sort of remorse or the kind of accountability. That the judge needed to hear in order to to. To, you know, to to to to decrease the potential sentencing. And you know, we can't stress enough the, the jail, uh, phone calls that that Gutierrez had made here in the last few weeks. The judge had mentioned those the prosecution had mentioned those as having a significant impact on the way that the sentencing went down.

All right. More for us outside the courthouse there in Santa Fe, New Mexico, I and also our Brian Buckman. I appreciate you both. Thank you so much for bringing just the the latest on the breaking news as the sentencing came down in real time. Appreciate it. Turning now to the people of the state of New York versus Donald J. Trump, the first ever criminal trial of a former president of the United States. Right now, Trump is present in the courtroom in New York City as attorneys begin jury selection in the hush money case against him, the culmination of a year long indictment by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, Trump is charged with 34 counts of falsifying documents that he hid payments to porn star Stormy Daniels just to keep her quiet about that alleged affair that they had prior to his 2016 presidential run. Trump has pleaded not guilty to the charges, claiming that the case is just election interference as he continues to campaign for a second run at the white House. The judge has imposed a limited gag order, keeping Trump from making comments about people directly and indirectly involved with the case.

But prosecutors are now seeking to hold Trump in contempt for allegedly violating that gag order on social media. We have full team coverage of this historic New York criminal trial. Let's bring in our senior reporter, Catherine Faulders, also our Elizabeth Schultz and Georgia prosecutor Chris Timmons. Well, I don't know if there's any allegedly out there. I mean, he put posts out on social media. Chris.

Yeah. I don't think there's much you could say about what's going on as far as that. I mean, I guess maybe he could throw his social media director under the bus, but at the end of the day, it's going to be difficult. I think the bigger issue with regard to the contempt is what exactly is the judge going to do with these contempt charges? I mean, so if he finds them guilty of contempt, then he's got to figure out, well, do I find him or do I try to figure out what to do with the former president of the United States as far as confining him, in other words, putting him in jail? There's, you know, sometimes a jail cell behind the courtroom where he could hang out with the super Secret Service agents. But, you know, and he could even in some cases put him in Rikers Island, which would be a complete, uh, problem for all involved. I think you saw here in Georgia when the former president turned himself into the Fulton County Jail, and an active jail ground itself to a complete halt while we waited for that to happen.

So, I don't know, it's it probably a fine, if anything. We'll see. But I guess the deal is the judge is not going to take it up until Wednesday.

Did I just hear you say, Chris, that we could see possibly Donald Trump in Rikers Island?

If he gets a long enough sentence. Sure. Uh, you know, but I that's a nightmare scenario for all involved. I can't imagine anybody involved in Rikers Island wants the former president there, you know, let alone that. So probably if they're looking at any jail time, it's something he'd have to serve in the courthouse itself, which would be a way more secure facility. So, I mean, Rikers is always a threat. It's a threat for you or me or anyone else who's found a contempt in the state of New York courtroom, but not a realistic threat for Donald Trump. But again, I mean, it's in the realm of possibilities. Never say never.

Yeah, especially when it comes to Donald Trump. So, Catherine, 96 prospective jurors now sworn in.

96 prospective jurors sworn in. At the end of the day, there needs to be 12 jurors and then six alternates. So this could take at the very least a week. But Chris was speaking to this earlier. There's 500 jurors that the judge said, are there right now awaiting to go through jury selection. We know what will happen during this process is the judge will read jurors a summary of the charges of the case. For example, the judge will tell the jurors that the case centers on allegations Trump engaged with others in a scheme to unlawfully influence the 2016 election. The judge will then excuse jurors that he determines can't be fair or impartial, or if they have a conflict, they're not able to sit on a jury, for example, for 6 to 8 weeks. They also the jurors will be asked to answer 42 questions about themselves, their potential thoughts on the case. It's important to point out that these jurors are sitting in the same room as former President Trump. Their identities will remain secret.

Their names obviously, Trump and his defense will have access to their names, but he's not allowed, obviously, to make them public in any way. But right now, he's sitting in the room with these jurors as they're asked questions, they'll be asked questions by the judge. The lawyers are also allowed to ask follow ups. So at the very least, this could take a week. It could be, who knows, Kyra? 2 or 3.

All right. Standby. We're watching, uh, every single second of what happens today. Elizabeth. Catherine. Chris, thank you so much. We'll keep checking back with you straight ahead. World leaders encouraging Israel not to retaliate after Iran's unprecedented attack. We've got the latest on a potential response. Next.

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Glad you're streaming with us. More fallout now from Iran's unprecedented attack on Israel for the second day in a row. Israel's prime minister met to discuss its response to Saturday's attack and making no announcement yet. But the country's military chief did say just a short time ago that Israel will indeed respond. World leaders are urging Israel not to retaliate, including the US, making it clear that if it attacks Iran, it will do so alone. President Biden still reaffirming his overall support for Israel, though, adding together with our partners, we defeated that attack, at least half of those strikes failing before even reaching their targets, while almost all of them were intercepted and shot down. We continue to have live team coverage with our Josh singer, who's there in Jerusalem, also our senior white House correspondent Selina Wang joining us outside the white House. So, Josh, to you now, are we learning anything more about Israel's potential response? And if everyone is still active in that war cabinet meeting?

Yeah. So they've been meeting all day.

All.

Afternoon into the night. Kyra and.

I will tell you to.

The point that you just made about the army.

Chief who made that.

Statement, the actual statement that he.

Made. He said.

As we way our steps with the launch of so many missiles, cruise missiles, UAVs to the territory of the State of Israel.

Will be met with a.

Response.

But it's intentionally vague and the.

Response really.

Could be anything. You have.

Right wing.

Members of the.

Netanyahu.

Coalition saying that he.

Needs to be able to.

Maintain deterrence against Iran. It needs to be a forceful response.

With kinetic.

Weapons, you have others who say that perhaps.

He should revert to.

The shadow war that Israel and Iran have been waging for years, a war of assassinations.

That covert assassinations and.

And it hacks.

And.

Hacking.

Of nuclear systems. So it's really unclear what they.

Intend to do. Life in Israel today was back to normal.

They allowed schools to resume and large gatherings to resume.

The beaches were busy in.

Tel Aviv today.

People were in the grocery store. So Israel hasn't telegraphed.

That it's doing anything anytime.

Soon. Remember just before the attack from.

Iran, when the.

Intelligence showed.

That it was imminent?

They did clamp down on all of those things. So it's it's not clear.

That anything's happening imminently.

And, and it's very, very hard to know exactly what's.

Going on in those war cabinet meetings right now, except they say they will somehow respond.

Kira Celina, the president reaffirming his support for Israel today, but still saying the US is not going to help Israel if it chooses to retaliate.

Yeah, here the president is trying to walk a fine line here. He's been repeating that he does respect Israel's right to defend itself in the US, clearly played a role in trying to fend off that onslaught of Iranian attacks. However, he made very clear to the Prime Minister that if Israel retaliates, the US is not going to help. It will do so alone. And up on the podium right there, Admiral Kirby, he was trying to put some distance between the Israeli decision making process and what the president has been urging. He was saying that it is up to Israel to decide how to respond. But we know that in a phone call, Biden told Netanyahu essentially to take the win, that he's already proved to the world that Israel's military is superior. He wants Netanyahu now to take it slow to think very carefully and deliberately about his next steps. The president ever since October 7th, he's been focused on trying to contain this conflict and make sure that it doesn't spiral into a wider war. So even though it appears that Israel is going to respond in some way, the big question is how does Netanyahu taken the president's advice?

All right, Selena and President Biden did speak with congressional leaders as well about this aid to Israel. What more do we know about that and the impact that it could have on this now, I guess two fronts. Israel is fighting.

Yeah, Kyra. Well, what we saw over the weekend from Iran is certainly renewed. Calls in Congress, renewed efforts from the white House to get that national security supplemental passed. So we know that was the topic of discussion between the president and those big four congressional leaders. But Speaker Johnson, he hasn't made clear what his plan is moving forward. There is growing bipartisan pressure to get that National Security supplemental passed. It already passed in the Senate earlier this year. It's been stalled in the House. Speaker Johnson said he wants to find some way to move forward on Israel aid, but it's unclear if that's going to include Ukraine because he's facing pressure from hard right conservatives in the House to not include any additional aid to Ukraine. So big questions here. But the white House, for months they've been urging to get that aid through and up on the podium there. Kirby making clear that passing aid to Israel is critical to maintain those defense systems that over the weekend were so critical to protecting Israel.

Celina, Josh, thank you both so much. And the clock is ticking. Have you filed your tax returns? Better get that postmark or press send online business correspondent Alexis Christoforos does though have a few last minute tips. Where's your watch? Your tap in your wrist?

It's actually my phone, but.

You get it.

That's the universal sign. So you're right. You have.

Until midnight tonight.

Just a few hours left to file your taxes and avoid getting hit with those penalties and interest. But it is not too late, my friends, to save on your tax bill. You want to be sure you're taking all of the credits you qualify for. So if you have kids, you may be eligible for a $2,000 tax credit per qualifying child, depending on your income and filing status. Now, not to be confused with the child tax credit is the Child and Dependent care tax credit. If you paid expenses, say, for daycare, preschool, maybe another form of caregiving for a spouse or a parent who's.

Unable to care.

For themselves. You may qualify for this credit. It starts at $3,000, and if you paid qualified education expenses, like for college for an eligible student, you might be able to claim a credit there of up to $2,500 with what's called the American Opportunity Tax Credit. If you bought an electric vehicle last year, you want. A check and see if it's on the list of EVs that qualify for a credit of up to $7,500, and you have until midnight to make a tax friendly contribution to your traditional IRA. The Max, they're $6,500 7500 if you are 50 or over. And if you know you're going to need more time to file, just go to irs.gov.

And request an.

Extension, which will give you an additional six months to submit your taxes. You'll have until October 15th. But remember, an extension to file is not an extension to pay. So if you owe money, you still need to make that payment by midnight. Use your previous year's taxes to help estimate what you owe. And if you cannot pay the entire amount.

Right now, just go.

To irs.gov. Set up a payment plan. The IRS says if you file electronically and enroll in direct deposit, you should get that refund within 21 days of filing four weeks. If you file a by mail this year, the average refund about $3,000, please use some of it to pay down debt. Cara.

Very good advice. Thank you. Alexis. Coming up, the latest on the investigation into the two missing Kansas moms. What we're getting from investigators next.

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And good afternoon, everyone. I'm Kyra Phillips. Our top story this hour 18 months for the movie set. Armorer convicted of involuntary manslaughter in the rust film shooting.

I'm shutting you to 18 months of incarceration at a New Mexico women's correctional facility. I find that what you did constitutes a serious, violent offense. It was committed in a physically violent manner. A fatal gunshot.

Done with your.

Recklessness in the face of knowledge that your acts were reasonably likely to result in serious harm. You were the armorer. The one that stood between a safe weapon and a weapon that could kill someone. You alone turned a safe weapon into a lethal weapon. But for you, Miss Hutchins would be alive. A husband would have his partner, and a little boy would have his mother. Please take her.

So a judge sentencing Hannah Gutierrez to a year and a half behind bars after a jury last month found her guilty in the shooting that resulted in the death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins. For more, we want to bring in our challenges just outside court there in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and was in the courtroom when the sentencing was read. Also, our legal contributor, trial attorney Brian Buck Meyer. He was with me also when that all went down. So let's start with you and just what it was like in the courtroom and the reaction when she got the maximum sentence.

Well yet here. The morning began with the prosecution talking about how they had waited to try to figure out exactly what sort of sentence they wanted to, to pursue what they wanted to try to encourage the judge to pursue. And they had really been sort of torn about what to pursue until last week, when they got Ahold of some jailhouse phone calls that Hannah Gutierrez had made in recent weeks, where she expressed, according to them, no remorse, no accountability, where she was very critical of the jurors who convicted her, critical of the judge, critical of the witnesses who testified during her two week trial last month, and again showed very little remorse. And that's why the prosecution said that they were really pushing the judge for the 18 month maximum. We also heard from a slew of family and friends of of Halyna Hutchins, who described the mother, described the the wife, the friend, the sister, the daughter who had they had, uh, they had lost. We heard from Helena Hutchins mother who talked about this having shattered her life, how she not only lost a daughter but lost a best friend.

It was a very emotional video, uh, testimony that we that we heard from her mother and mother also saying that she's waited for the last 2 or 3 years for anyone connected to this case to come to her to express some sort of sorrow, express some sort of gratitude or, excuse me, some sort of sorrow for the loss of of her daughter. And she's still waiting that no one has, has reached out to her. Um, Hannah Gutierrez was very emotional throughout this roughly two hour hearing today, and that was notable because we saw very little emotion from Hannah Gutierrez during her roughly two week trial last month. She was teary eyed the entire time, crying today, needing a box of tissues, wiping away tears. And ultimately, that emotion also came through when she addressed the court, saying that she was not a monster, saying that her heart aches for Hutchins family and friends, that despite not having time and resources on the set, that she did her best and she begged for probation and community service.

But ultimately, Kira, this wasn't enough. You know, the judge also saying that that she has never really heard any remorse or accountability from Gutierrez, that even today, when Gutierrez had the opportunity to address the court, she really talked about how all of this had inconvenienced her more than anything else, not expressing any remorse or any accountability. And ultimately, the judge citing that as the reason to for her to to choose, sentencing her to, to the maximum to the 18 month maximum that she ultimately decided on Kira.

Well, let's go ahead and listen to what Gutierrez said then to the judge just before her sentencing.

My heart aches for the Hutchins family and friends and colleagues as well. And it has. Since the day this tragedy occurred. Helena has been and always will be an inspiration to me. I understand she was taken too soon.

Brian, what did you make about her statement? Because she also went on to say it was her honor to work on the set, that she was young, she was naive, that she took her job seriously, and also that despite not having the proper time, resources and staffing, she did the best she could to handle her job.

I mean, hindsight being 20 and 20, I would agree with Molly. There should have been more remorse there more. And my actions led to this. Someone doesn't have a family member because of my negligence, and I think that might have afforded her some grace that the judge may have considered. But I think that the defense thought they had a strong argument and saying she's had no criminal record. And typically speaking, when you have a lower level felony. And I don't mean to try to disparage the seriousness of this case, but involuntary manslaughter is not the highest of felonies. It's a fourth degree felony in the state of New Mexico. And so when you have a lower level felony first time arrest, you would think that a judge would come off of the top sentence. You may not get the probation you're asking for. So I think the defense is very confident in what they were going to get in this case. But I thought her words rung true to some extent. She seemed remorseful. Her heart ached.

I'm still shocked to the 18 months, but it's clearly a message that the judge wanted to send on behalf of the family and the criminal justice system.

All right, Brian, and appreciate you both. Thank you so much. Turning now to the people of the state of New York versus Donald J. Trump, the first ever criminal trial of a former president of the United States. Right now, former President Trump is in the courtroom in New York City as attorneys begin jury selection in the hush money case against him. Trump coming face to face with the 96 prospective jurors for the very first time as the judge gives them instructions to act impartially if they're selected. Trump is charged with 34 counts of falsifying documents to hide payments he made to porn star Stormy Daniels to try and keep her quiet after that alleged affair. Prior to his 2016 presidential campaign. Trump has pleaded not guilty to the charges, claiming that the case is just election interference as he continues to campaign for a second run at the white House. We have full team coverage of the historic New York criminal trial. Let's bring in our senior investigative reporter, Aaron Katersky, also our Elizabeth Schulze, who covers the white House for us here in Washington, and former Georgia prosecutor Chris Timmons.

Plus, former Trump White House attorney Ty Cobb is with me here on set. Aaron, let's go ahead and start with you. Give us the the latest from the courtroom.

Every available seat in the courtroom that isn't taken up by the defendant himself or the lawyers is filled with prospective jurors. The first batch of 96 entered the courtroom a short while ago, and the judge immediately launched into about a half an hour's worth of an explanation about what this is and about how a potential juror needs to be fair and a fair juror, he said. As somebody who was not biased or prejudiced for or against the defendant or witness, and to weed out any potential bias, those potential jurors are soon going to begin answering a series of questions about 42 of them, things like, have you ever attended a Trump rally, an anti-Trump rally? Do you follow the former president on social media? Where do you get your news? The lawyers want to spend as much as a half an hour with each potential juror to make sure they get the kind of person they believe would be favorable to their case, but the judge just wants someone who can be fair and impartial.

Got it? And tie. The last time I talked to you, you were working at the white House. I was covering the white House. Um, and I mixed minus in my ear. I take out this IFB for just a second. If you're hearing an echo to feel free to take the IFB out of your ear. Um, but just as you. Okay. It's been a number of years now, so I have you on set. You are no longer working for Trump. You are no longer in the white House. I just want to know what it's been like for you to sit back and just observe not only this trial, but the other hearings and the other charges that have been brought against the former president. Um, your thoughts?

Well, I think it's very sad for America.

Um, I think.

Beginning with the January 6th, uh, event, for sure, uh, you saw an abuse of norms that have historically, you know, gotten us through, uh, and Trump really has stressed democracy. And he stressed the legal system enormously. I think, um, you know, we're here on the occasion of the New York case. I think legally, the New York case is probably the least compelling case, certainly is a felony case. But at the same time, it's not it's not frivolous, at least says to the, uh, to the misdemeanor charges with regard to the, uh, uh, false documents that were created and the, uh, the fraudulent charges that were recorded. So I think and there's no defense, really as to as to the facts. I mean, there's no doubt that the the documents were, you know, fraudulently created. There's no doubt that that they misrepresented facts. So I think where the jury is going to have to do the heavy lifting, there is obviously in the, uh, trying to connect it to a felony.

And I think both sides will be sharply focused on that. But, you know, as an American, as somebody who's spent a lot of time in public service, uh, you know, these are sad events. Uh, it's it's sad that a former president stands accused of this. Um, so I don't think anybody takes any joy out of any of this.

What was the hardest part about being an attorney in his circle?

It was not.

Very difficult for me. Tell me why.

Well, I had.

A I had an assignment, uh, unique to itself in terms of, uh, uh, coordinating the white House response to the Mueller investigation and, um, uh, you know, that was something that the president was unfamiliar with. Um, and he did not, uh, um, you know, he didn't have much to comment on because unlike the New York case, where the conduct that he's charged with actually occurred and unlike, you know, the January 6th events where the conduct he's charged with actually occurred, or the Mar-A-Lago case where the conduct actually occurred, you know, there was really nothing for him to punch back on in the Russia case because, you know, there was no connection ultimately made by Mueller on the on the facts. Um, so it was it was a place where actually he was comfortable taking a lawyer's advice, as opposed to a case where he was intimately involved in a central actor.

As you look at all the various cases that are out there. Um, okay. Now, he owes a lot of money. We don't know if he's going to be able to pay the millions of dollars, uh, that Letitia James. Uh, in that case, you've got this ongoing trial right now. You've got the the the secret documents, uh, you know, held up at Mar-A-Lago. I mean, it's really actually hard to keep track of all the charges and the cases. Um, do you think that there will ever be a point that he will truly be held accountable?

So I do, certainly.

If he loses the election, you know, that that will occur, um, in the January 6th case that will go to trial. The Mar-A-Lago case ultimately will go to trial, although I'm on record and firmly believe it won't go on trial with the current judge. Um, so I think there will be a real trial as opposed to what's occurring down there now. Uh, but if he if and even if he wins, um, you know, the. Your case will be deferred arguably for four years, so he he may get to trial in that as a much, much more elderly elderly man. But if he wins, you know he will. He will dismiss both the both the Mar-A-Lago case and the January 6th case.

You're confident he will do that? If he wins, he will dismiss those cases and he will move forward.

He'll direct. He'll direct. Uh, you know, somebody at the Justice Department to, you know, take the action to dismiss those cases and it will be as though they never happened.

And, Chris, just as an attorney, um, your reaction to that?

Um, you know, I mean, it would not be surprising that if he were to come in, he would pardon himself in the federal cases. What he can't do, though, is pardon himself in the state. Cases in Georgia is hanging out there, you know, as the Rico case, that could be the biggest one and the one where he's facing a significant amount of time. He's looking at 20 years. The DA's office has indicated that they're going to want prison in that particular case if he's convicted of it. And so if he's convicted here in the state of Georgia, you know, he can't pardon himself. He's probably going to prison. But it's also among the more complicated cases to try, because you're talking about an over 90 page indictment with close to 200 predicate acts that they're looking at proving and months to try that case. And so it's not clear, even if the judge sets this thing in August, if it's going to be done before he would take office as the next president of the United States, where he to win the election.

And from a political standpoint, Elizabeth Schultz, that's what makes this so extraordinary that if indeed he wins the white House. Once again, all these various legal scenarios, from pardoning to to delaying to, who knows, um, what we could see within this, this possible presidency.

Extraordinary is the right word, Kara, because there is no precedent for what we're seeing here. We know that none of these legal cases are preventing the former president from running for reelection. But we do know that there's the possibility that he if he is convicted, he might not be able to cast a vote in that election. And that is something that, of course, we have never seen. When you're talking about a presidential race, the fact is that if he is convicted in this trial, which is something that this is the trial we're watching because it is possibly the only one that will actually come to this place before that November date. When you look at what voters are saying here, and this is a recent poll from Reuters and Ipsos, 13% of Trump supporters said that they would not vote for him if he's convicted of a felony. 24% of Republicans said that they would not vote for Trump. So that does put into question at least a little bit. And it is one poll. But it does put into question that ironclad support from his supporters up to this point so far.

He doesn't have to pardon himself. Does he know.

He can just direct the Justice Department to dismiss whatever is pending? Probably, probably would be an appeal and be an appeal at that stage of the game, if it had been been to trial or if it's if it's still the indictment, just the indictment, it hasn't gone to trial. He would just have the prosecution dismissed the case.

Stay tuned.

Absolutely. We're going to have you back to you. Great to see you. Great to see you. And thank you. Pleasure, Elizabeth. Aaron, Chris, thanks so much. We're going to keep checking, of course, back into court with all of you. Glad you're streaming with us. We want to move on now to Iran and the unprecedented attack that took place on Israel for the second day. Now in a row, Israel's Israel's prime minister has been meeting with his cabinet to try and figure out what the next move will be. They haven't made an announcement yet, but the country's military chief did say just a short time ago, Israel will respond. The question is how? World leaders have been urging Israel not to retaliate. And that includes the US making it very clear that if it does attack Iran that well, Israel will be doing it alone. President Biden reaffirming his overall support for Israel, though, adding together with our partners, we did defeat that Iranian attack, at least half of those strikes failing before they even reach their targets.

While almost all of them were intercepted and shot down. We have live team coverage, starting with our ABC correspondent, Josh Henninger. He's in Jerusalem. Also, our senior white House correspondent Selina Wang is there at the white House. Joe Biden is up on the Hill. And our contributor and former Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Middle East, Mike Mulroy, weighing in as well. Josh, let's start with you. What more do we know about Israel's potential response? Are we hearing anything out of that cabinet meeting so far?

Now. It's been.

Very, very hard to.

Get information out of that cabinet meeting. Kira. It's now after 10:00 at.

Night on a Monday night here.

In Jerusalem. We're almost 48 hours now past the attack of Iran. So there is.

Not.

Clearly a.

Rash snap immediate.

Reaction here. Even though Israel obviously knew this.

Was a possibility.

And had been.

Gaming out responses.

For.

Weeks actually, before.

This attack actually took place on Saturday, they clearly are heeding the warnings that they're getting from the white House, President Biden, other world leaders to try to use some degree of reserve and try to prevent a further escalation. Iran has said any attack now, not just on Iran but also on Iranian interests, will now yield an attack by Iran onto the Israeli homeland, which does change the rules of the Iranian and Israeli relationship that goes back decades. They've had basically a shadow war, one involving secret assassinations, and it hacks. So they're trying to figure it out. They're getting a lot of pressure from Washington and, and and the world is waiting to see what they end up doing.

Well. So, Salena, where does the white House stand on its involvement with Israel now?

Well, look, the white House says they're not getting involved in Israel's decision making, but we know that the president has put the pressure on Netanyahu. The president told him to take the win, that he's shown the world, that Israel's military is superior. But from here, he needs to take it slow, think carefully and deliberately about what his next step could mean when it comes to escalation. President Biden he does not want this conflict to spread into a wider war, which is why he's told Netanyahu that while the US is willing to defend Israel, as we saw over the weekend, they're not going to get involved on some kind of offensive here. And remember, this comes during a time of very frosty relations between President Biden, Netanyahu. It was less than two weeks ago when Biden threatened to change U.S. policy if Netanyahu doesn't do more to protect civilians in Gaza. Now, what happened to Israel from Iran that is somewhat shifted. The global conversation here, the G7 leaders convening and shortly after condemning Iran and saying that they have solidarity behind Israel, and this is also renewing calls here in the US to pass more aid to Israel.

All right, Jay, what's the latest from Congress passing this aid package for Israel?

Well, the House has reshaped its schedule this week here to focus on passing aid for Israel. And I talked to multiple Republican sources last night into today who said there are very real conversations happening right now amongst House Republicans about including aid for Ukraine into that legislation as well. And that would be a big concession for Speaker Johnson and Republican leadership, who have long stalled aid for Ukraine to pass out of the House of Representatives. But I can tell you, just as I was walking up to this camera moments ago, the House Freedom Caucus, a group of hardline Republicans in the House, put out a statement in which they said they would staunchly reject and oppose any move from GOP leadership to link aid for Israel to aid for Ukraine. So it makes the topic politically fraught. For Speaker Johnson, it's been politically fraught for him, frankly, for months now. And while that conversation plays out in the House and they look at drafting their own legislation that has aid for Israel and may include aid for Ukraine, it's worth noting that there is a $95 billion foreign aid package that has aid for both Ukraine and Israel that already passed out of the Senate months ago.

That is languished in the House, Kyra, because Mike Johnson has not wanted to bring it up for a vote.

All right. Selina. Josh. Mike. Jay. Thank you. Coming up, severe weather targeting millions of people where the storms are hitting right now and where they're headed next.

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Glad you're streaming with us. Severe storms hitting the Mid-Atlantic right now while another system is set to hit the plains. Meteorologist Tamara Theodore tracking it all tomorrow. What do you have for us? Well, Kara.

Right where you are? Down there in Capitol Hill. We have some storms getting ready to roll right through Washington, D.C. at the moment, you can see the storms pushing through parts of the Shenandoah Valley and the Pennsylvania Maryland border. Now, as we head through the evening, there is a threat for severe weather. As a result, we have a severe thunderstorm watch for pretty much all of Virginia, or nearly all of it West Virginia, the Delmarva Peninsula up into Baltimore, down the I-95 corridor into D.C. that's until 10 p.m. tonight. So be aware that the storms that bubble up there could be strong to severe. The greatest risk with these storms actually happens to be damaging winds, especially in the Richmond area. We could see some large hail. The tornado threat is on the lower end of the spectrum for these storms, but that's not the case in the heartland. We have a more elevated risk for severe weather farther west. So here we go. I've timed it out. I've pushed us through tonight.

You can see a lot of the strong, robust storms picking up this evening for Omaha, parts of Nebraska and Iowa up into Rapid City. We we're anticipating very strong storms and maybe a little bit of snow for the Rockies. So here you can see from Valentine to Kearney down a great bend. That's where we could see some strong storms. We have an elevated risk for tornadoes in the zone as well. Okay. Even as far south as Wichita Falls. And then tomorrow this threat shifts a little bit farther east. We have numerous severe thunderstorms, potentially for Des Moines down towards Kansas City, northern Missouri. And the threat for tornadoes will follow us farther west into cities like Chicago and down into.

Little Rock as.

Well. And finally, I just want to end with keeping in mind that there's also a fire danger risk that we have a red flag warning from Scottsbluff through Dodge City, right on down to Fort Stockton.

Cara. Okay.

Whew.

You're busy. Bee I thank you, thank you. Samara. All right, coming up, the 128th Boston Marathon. It's off and running. No rain so far, and we've got the results racing in. We'll bring them to you.

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This is our combat operations center.

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Different directions. Operational nuclear reactor. So you have a couple loaded and ready to go. The house is destroyed. But the flag. There's not a tear in it. Not a tear in it. How important is this label right here, made to USA. Look at your smile. You're proud of this. I love this great work.

Hi. Where are you? Where are you? Thank you.

David. Good to meet you.

Ismail. David. David. Correct? Yes. Yes.

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