Alan Dershowitz says ruling would be overturned on appeal if Trump is convicted in New York

Harvard Professor Emeritus Alan Dershowitz slammed the trial of former President Donald Trump on Monday, stating that if Trump gets convicted then it would be overturned in an appeal.

Trump is currently facing the first of four criminal trials against him, which centers around allegations that he doctored financial papers to hide an alleged "hush money" payment to former porn star Stormy Daniels. The trial's key witness and a former attorney for Trump, Michael Cohen, testified in the case on Monday.

Dershowitz said he cannot see any crime that the former president allegedly committed, and that testimony from Cohen could not be taken seriously. He also slammed allegations that Trump was attempting to defraud voters.

"Even if you take every word [Cohen] said, seriously, I just don't think there's a crime there," Dershowitz said on the "Just the News, No Noise" TV show.  "When you list payment that you made to avoid a lawsuit as legal expenses, that's fairly accurate. Even if you think it's inaccurate, it's not criminal. It's not fraudulent. Then the idea that he intended to defraud the voters, my God, if you ever prosecuted candidates for defrauding the voters, every campaign would be conducted from prison."

Dershowitz questioned whether it was "fraudulent" when President Joe Biden said he supported Israel, but then "denied it" the right to defend itself by stopping a shipment of weapons. He also questioned whether it was "fraudulent" when Biden claimed that he would fix the border issues, but then didn't. 

"You just can't use the criminal justice system to make political points this way," Dershowitz said. "So I'm fairly confident this case will be reversed on appeal. But the goal was to get a down and dirty conviction to influence the election, along with a gag order, and keeping him in the courtroom. And they're achieving those political goals, even if they are using an improper legal means to do it."

Cohen, who testified that Trump cared more about his brand than he did about his wife, is expected back in court on Tuesday. 

Trump, who has pleaded "not guilty" to all 34 counts in the Manhattan case, is also facing felony charges in Florida for allegedly mishandling classified documents. But the case is currently on hold until preliminary issues are resolved. He also faces two election subversion cases in Georgia and Washington D.C., related to his alleged efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

Misty Severi is an evening news reporter for Just the News. You can follow her on X for more coverage.