Who is David Peck­er? Media mogul report­ed to be first tes­ti­mo­ny in Trump tri­al

David Peck­er, a key fig­ure in the hush mon­ey case against Don­ald Trump, is report­ed­ly slat­ed to be the first wit­ness to tes­ti­fy against the for­mer pres­i­dent at his New York crim­i­nal tri­al.
Peck­er is the for­mer CEO of the com­pa­ny that pub­lished The Nation­al Enquir­er and is expect­ed to deliv­er the first tes­ti­mo­ny against Trump after open­ing argu­ments begin in his tri­al on Mon­day, a source famil­iar with the mat­ter told the New York Times.
Pros­e­cu­tors say Pecker’s hush mon­ey rela­tion­ship with Trump and his for­mer attor­ney and fix­er Michael Cohen began at Trump Tow­er in August 2015, when he agreed to help Trump’s cam­paign iden­ti­fy neg­a­tive sto­ries about him.

FILE – David Peck­er, Chair­man and CEO of Amer­i­can Media, address­es those attend­ing the Shape & Men’s Fit­ness Super Bowl Par­ty in New York, on Jan. 31, 2014. (Mar­i­on Cur­tis via AP, File)

Trump’s tri­al cen­ters on alle­ga­tions that his company’s inter­nal records were obscured to hide reim­burse­ment pay­ments to his for­mer fix­er and attor­ney Michael Cohen, who arranged hush mon­ey pay­ments to hide neg­a­tive sto­ries about him dur­ing the 2016 pres­i­den­tial race. The for­mer pres­i­dent has plead­ed not g …