Live updates: Gary Farro testifies in Trump hush money trial

The LLC is Resolution Consultants LLC, the shell company that Cohen used to set up the McDougal transfer that Pecker ultimately backed out of.

The type of business on the First Republic Bank form to set up the LLC is listed as “MANAGEMENT CONSULTING”.

Cohen is the only listed officer for the LLC.

Cohen signed off on it on 13 October 2016, two days after calling Farro’s office to try to set it up.

A question on the form asked “is the entity associated with political fundraising/political action committees?” The corresponding box was checked “no”.

On the morning of October 26, Farro’s assistant emailed Farro asking him to return Cohen’s call. He did.

“He said he was changing course, no longer wanted to open Resolution Consultants, and wanted to open a new account,” Farro says.

“Every time Michael Cohen spoke to me he gave me a sense of urgency … This was one of those times.”

The account had never actually opened, because Cohen didn’t pay for it, so there wasn’t anything to do necessarily.

An email in the morning from October 13 2016.

The subject line is: FW: Message from “26-Copier-Pantry”

There’s a PDF attachment.

Farro then emailed one of his coworkers about opening an account for Cohen “immediately”.

We see an email from October 11 2016 from Farro’s assistant about a missed call from Michael Cohen.

She sent another email two days later asking him to please return his call “regarding an important matter”.

When he called back, Cohen said he wanted to open an LLC account.

This was all roughly three weeks before election day.

Farro: “Michael Cohen was assigned to me after a client left in 2015.”

He said he believed he was given Cohen for “my knowledge and my ability to handle individuals who may be a little challenging”.

“Michael did a lot of his own business and frankly I didn’t find him difficult,” he said.

Gary Farro is the next witness — the third of the trial — and was formerly a senior managing director at First Republic Bank. He says he’s here voluntarily, but “I did receive a subpoena”.

He now works at Flagstar Bank but worked at First Republic Bank for 15 years, beginning in 2002.

It was there he allegedly set up the home equity line of credit through which Michael Cohen paid Stormy Daniels.

We see an email from Graff to Madeleine Westerhout at the White House on April 6 2017:

Here is the Fed Ex label you requested. Hope it works ; )

Necheles asks: The only reason you’re testifying here today is because you worked at the Trump Organization?

You don’t want to be here, do you?

Lawyers are expensive, aren’t they?

“I haven’t seen the bills but I assume they are.”

The Trump Organization is paying bills for all employees?

Is the payment of your legal fees conditioned on how you testify?

No one from the Trump Organization has told you how to testify?

No further questions and no follow-ups from the prosecution.

Trump lawyer Todd Blanche asks for a sidebar.

Graff agrees with Necheles that Trump “was actively involved” with The Apprentice, and that part of her job duties was to work with the show’s producers.

“He was very hands-on, yes. … At the time it was probably the most popular TV show,” she says.

The series elevated him to “a whole other platform from being a businessman to … rock star status.”

Graff says she has some memory of Trump saying he thought Stormy might be a “good contestant” on the show.

“I can’t remember a specific incident when I heard it. It was part of the office chatter.”