Donald Trump trial LIVE: Ex-president wishes Melania a happy birthday and says he would

Trump entered the packed courtroom pursing his lips and wearing a navy suit and bright blue tie.

He sat at the defense bench with his lawyers. His attorney Todd Blanche has been benched again and is sitting on Trump’s left.

Emil Bove, who was cross-examining David Pecker on Thursday, is to Trump’s right meaning he will continue the questioning.

Donald Trump arrived at the Manhattan criminal court where he wished wife Melania Trump a happy birthday.

‘I want to start by wishing my wife Melania a very happy birthday,’ he said.

‘It’d be best to be with her, but I’m at a courthouse for a rigged trial,’ he added.

Trump said the former first lady is in Florida, and he will be heading there Friday evening.

The ex-president is in court for his hush money trial over payments to a porn star.

They were the untouchables, who used their money, influence and flattery to get into former company CEO David Pecker’s good graces – thus avoiding having their garbage surveyed, their lovers followed, and their peccadillos exposed.

But if you weren’t a friend, then all bets were off. There was nothing – within the law and sometimes skirting it– that wouldn’t be done to bring in a story.

‘He’s the biggest star f***er you’ve ever met,’ a former staffer who worked at the tabloid for more than 20 years told DailyMail.com.

‘He’s a failed Donald Trump. He picks the wrong people and much like Trump, he’s loyal to no one.’

Pecker and his close friendship with Trump has been back in the headlines this week thanks to the former publisher’s scene-stealing appearance at the 45th President’s ongoing hush money trial.

But while that friendship exposed the tabloid practice of ‘catch and kill’ – buying up a story only to keep it quiet for the benefit of a Pecker pal – insiders say that was just the tip of the iceberg.

‘What’s shameful is a lot of what we did was just good old-fashioned reporting but this stuff with Trump has smeared it,’ another insider said.

Donald Trump’s motorcade is on the way to court in Manhattan.

His press secretary Karoline Leavitt shared video footage of his SUV and police escort leaving his residence on Friday morning.

Attorneys for Donald Trump and special counsel Jack Smith made their cases before the Supreme Court on Thursday in the monumental case over whether a president has absolute immunity from prosecution.

There were many blockbuster moments throughout the three-hour hearing as the liberal justices fretted over the rise of Trump as a king if given total immunity.

Meanwhile, the conservative justices said they want to provide some legal safeguards to protect Trump and future presidents from political prosecution.

And there were no shortage of crazy hypotheticals raised about what could happen if a president staged a military coup or committed murder while in office.

The decision in the case will have a sweeping impact not just on the former president for presidential powers in the United States.

The arguments come as former President Donald Trump is facing criminal charges in four cases. He is the first former president ever to face criminal charges.

A decision is expected by the end of June before the Supreme Court recesses for the summer but they could move sooner.

DailyMail.com breaks down the major takeaways:

President Joe Biden told a glitzy fundraiser on Thursday night that he is too busy to watch Donald Trump’s hush money trial.

Biden has kept his thoughts on the trial mostly to himself since it began.

But he has fired multiple jokes at his adversary and mocked his hair.

He also also had battles of his own, including with the teleprompter and struggling over the date of January 6.

One of the hundreds of construction workers who turned out to support Donald Trump in New York has captured the heart of the nation with his savage takedown of Joe Biden.

The unknown worker had been part of the crowds gathered as the former president made a visit to a construction site in Midtown Manhattan on Thursday morning.

Crowds of construction workers and supporters lined up through the night as they anxiously waited to catch a glimpse of their beloved former president in what is normally Liberal heartland.

He is now being hailed as a hero on social media.

‘This is pretty much the sentiment of all blue collar hard working Americans. Really any American for that matter. Well said sir.’

Melania Trump‘s former spokesperson said Hope Hicks and Sarah Huckabee Sanders would check in with her to see how the first lady was ‘dealing’ with the Karen McDougal affair rumors – but didn’t share the details of a ‘deal’ with the National Enquirer.

The revelation came as former National Enquirer CEO David Pecker testified in Donald Trump‘s case involving hush money paid to porn star Stormy Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford.

Pecker was speaking about a joint call with Hicks, who served as White House communications director, and Sanders, who was White House press secretary at the time and is now governor of Arkansas, about a ‘catch-and-kill’ contract given to McDougal.

Donald Trump returns to court on Friday for the hush money trial to watch his lawyers cross-examine former National Enquirer publisher David Pecker.

During cross-examination before the court wrapped up for the day, Pecker ran through a series of high-profile arrangements he claimed he came to with celebrities and powerful men.

Pecker also claimed he helped bury stories about Mark Wahlberg and his wife having an argument and Rahm Emanuel having an affair after he left the Obama White House.

Pecker confirmed that he purchased the rights to photographs of Tiger Woods meeting a woman at a parking lot in Florida as part of another deal.

He agreed that they were used as ‘leverage’ to get Woods to appear on the cover of Men’s Fitness magazine.

It came out in court that Pecker also gave Trump the heads up about negative stories for years, and Pecker agreed.

Among the other high-powered men that Pecker did similar favors for was billionaire Ron Perelman, the owner of cosmetics giant Revlon.

Schwarzenegger got $50 million in addition to posts as editor at large of two AMI muscle-building magazines as part of a deal for AMI to buy them, the court heard.

Bove said that ‘30 or 40 women came to you and AMI’ when Schwarzenegger declared his candidacy. Pecker agreed.

‘Not that high. Hundreds of thousands of dollars,’ Pecker said.

Pecker confirmed that Schwarzenegger did not pay him back.