JUST IN: Judge Makes Major Ruling In Trump Trial

Former President Donald Trump shook his head in frustration on Monday, appearing in court as he reacted to a ruling by the Manhattan judge he has condemned as anti-Trump.

In the opening hours of court, District Judge Juan Merchan ruled that the transcript of Trump’s infamous Access Hollywood tape may be read into the record even as he denied the prosecution’s request to play the tape in which the future president brags about grabbing women by the genitals. The team of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg told Judge Merchan they intended to cite the video as evidence that President Trump struggled to attract female voters in 2016, hence the decision to allegedly pay a six-figure settlement to quiet an affair.

Such “outside matters” which President Trump could be questioned about also include the recent $364 million settlement against him in a New York real estate case, or anything that constitutes “criminal, vicious and immoral acts” in Judge Merchan’s ruling according to the Daily Mail.

Adding insult to injury, the judge said Trump may also be questioned about racking up $15,000 in fines related to “untrue, disparaging and personally identifying posts” about a clerk for Judge Arthur Engoron in that case.

A 12-member jury and five alternate jurors were selected last week, allowing Monday’s proceedings to kick off with opening statements and potentially end with testimony from the prosecution’s first witness David Pecker, a former publisher for the National Enquirer. Pecker is expected to testify about internal plans at the publication to bury negative stories about Trump during the 2016 election.

Court observers will be watching for indications that DA Bragg’s team will position the alleged crime as “election interference,” a designation that could garner more scrutiny from a jury than a salacious sex scandal.

“It is an election interference gateway drug,” Norm Eisen, a former Obama White House ethics lawyer who served as a special counsel to the House Judiciary Committee during the first impeachment of Trump, told Politico.

“Trump’s lawyers and Bragg’s team are going to be having an argument about: Was this a serious case of campaign corruption and cover-up?” Eisen said. “Was this a scheme to interfere with an election? … Or is it a case about an affair, a few wrong words on the books and making a mountain out of a molehill?”

In a post on Truth Social before the trial, President Trump complained that his supporters are being kept away from the courthouse while anti-Trump “rioters” are allowed to “scream” and “block traffic” around the country.

“America Loving Protesters should be allowed to protest at the front steps of Courthouses, all over the Country, just like it is allowed for those who are destroying our Country on the Radical Left, a two-tiered system of justice,” he posted Monday morning.

“Why are Palestinian protesters, and even rioters, allowed to roam the Cities, scream, shout, sit, block traffic, enter buildings, not get permits, and basically do whatever they want including threatening Supreme Court Justices right in front of their homes, and yet people who truly LOVE our Country, and want to MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN, are not allowed to “Peacefully Protest,” and are rudely and systematically shut down and ushered off to far away “holding areas,” essentially denying them their Constitutional Rights.”