DONALD TRUMP HASN’T surrendered to authorities yet. But his lawyers are already fighting — with themselves.
Days after the former president’s indictment at the hands of Manhattan prosecutor Alvin Bragg, some of Trump’s lawyers are taking aim at Joe Tacopina, his co-lead defense attorney in the Bragg case.
A source familiar with the matter and another person close to Trump tell Rolling Stone that a number of Trump’s other current lawyers have privately described Tacopina as “dumb” and a “loudmouth.”
Tacopina is no stranger to made-for-tabloid drama: He has a lengthy track record of repping high-profile clients, such as Meek Mill and baseball legend Alex Rodriguez, as well as securing hard-to-land wins. But he’s also had some equally high-profile flameouts, including an acrimonious parting with his ex-client, former New York City Police Commissioner Bernie Kerik.
In recent days, as a Trump attorney, Tacopina has also become a more and more familiar face on cable television — and not always to the ex-president’s benefit. During a recent appearance on Ari Melber’s The Beat, for example, Tacopina tried to grab a piece of paper held by the MSNBC host during the heated exchange. Tacopina also defended Trump’s denial of paying off porn star Stormy Daniels to keep her quiet about an alleged affair, albeit in a somewhat unique way: Insisting that the denial wasn’t a lie as it wasn’t made under oath.
“A lie to me is something material, under oath, in a proceeding,” Tacopina said. Melber explained that he wasn’t asking whether Trump perjured himself, just if the statements were true or false. Tacopina said: “It’s not a lie because it was a confidential settlement. So if he acknowledged that he would be violating the confidential settlement.”
And some five years before Tacopina represented Trump, he said on CNN that, if the facts in the hush money scandal were as Daniels described, he thought the alleged payoff could be considered an in-kind campaign contribution, meaning it would have needed to be disclosed on campaign finance forms, which it was not. This omission could well be at the crux of Bragg’s attempt to get Trump on a felony charge.
Framing his comment as a hypothetical, Tacopina said on CNN at the time it could be legally risky for Trump, “because this could be looked as an in-kind contribution at the time of the election. This is a real problem. And they both, and I’m telling you this, the reason we’re here I strongly believe is because of the words of both Michael Cohen and Donald Trump.” Tacopina has since called the Daniels’ payment “plain extortion” and argued it wasn’t a problem with campaign finance law.
Tacopina tells Rolling Stone that he did not change his mind. Instead, he says, his previous comments were qualified as a hypothetical, whereas his current opinion follows having learned the case’s facts. “It was a hypothetical question asked by a T.V. host and I answered by twice qualifying my answer with ‘if those are in fact the facts!!’,” Tacopina says.
The two sources say some of Trump’s lawyers and advisers have warned the ex-president that he should be careful with Tacopina, and that he cannot trust the attorney’s loyalty.
“He pisses off others with his antics, but he’s a blunt object that Donald Trump wants, apparently,” says one of the sources.
“People are saying” that this is all a savvy strategy by Donald Trump who is known for pitting his executive against each other. uh huh. Sure.
Tacopina criticized his critics for being anonymous, and he attributed their criticism to jealousy. “When anonymous sources make comments criticizing others it reveals jealousy and cowardice. Anyone who takes a look at my track record of trial success and the results I have achieved for my clients couldn’t seriously criticize my work or my intelligence,” he says in a statement to Rolling Stone.
“My results are documented and if you truly wanted to do an honest and thorough story you would speak to the clients I served over the years instead of printing false allegations from ‘unnamed sources’ who are jealous that they haven’t been chosen in this case or the other many high profile cases I have had. The story loses journalistic value and calls into question the integrity of the story and the credibility of the so-called anonymous sources,” he added.
Asked for comment on the infighting, a Trump spokesman replied: “President Trump has the strongest legal team at his disposal as he fights against the radical Manhattan DA and other woke Democrats who are weaponizing the Justice system to persecute the leading Republican candidate for president.”
And then there’s this:
Some of the tension is playing out publicly. Asked on CNN Friday whether Tacopina is the right lawyer to defend Trump in Manhattan, Trump attorney Tim Parlatore said Tacopina had “potential conflict issues given his prior contacts with Stormy Daniels.” Daniels and Tacopina allegedly communicated around 2018 about her purported sexual encounter with Trump, when she was looking for legal representation. Their communications were turned over to Bragg’s office, according to CNN.
Asked again, directly, if he thought Tacopina is up to the job of defending Trump, Parlatore replied: “I’m not going to comment on Joe Tacopina.”
Oh, and then there’s this:
Parlatore and Tacopina have a history. Tacopina represented Kerik in 2006 when the former commissioner pleaded guilty to charges in a Bronx court that he had illegally accepted gifts while working as New York’s jails boss and that he didn’t report a loan on financial disclosure documents. In 2014, Kerik sued Tacopina, challenging the attorney’s legal representation and alleging racketeering and defamation. Tacopina denied the claims and filed a defamation lawsuit against Kerik. Kerik’s suit was dismissed by a federal judge, and Tacopina’s defamation suit was dropped.
Parlatore was a member of Kerik’s legal team for Kerik’s lawsuit against Tacopina, and Tacopina also sued Parlatore for defamation. The case was subsequently dismissed.
This is such a New York scandal…