Hope Hicks breaks down at Trump trial as she testifies about Michael Cohen

A chief aide who gave voice to Donald Trump’s chaotic 2016 campaign for the presidency broke down in tears on the witness stand in his hush money trial, moments after she testified about payments to an adult film star whose allegations threatened to derail his campaign.

The emotional moment from Hope Hicks inside a Manhattan criminal court on Friday followed revealing testimony about her damage control in the weeks before Election Day, and her behind-the-scenes public relations efforts to salvage Mr Trump’s campaign while stories about his alleged affairs and vulgar comments about women were piling up.

Ms Hicks – the first major figure within Mr Trump’s orbit to testify in the trial, which concluded its second week of testimony on Friday – turned her face away from the court and dabbed her eyes with a tissue as she began to cry. Microphones on the witness stand picked up the sounds of quiet sobs.

Moments earlier, she said that Mr Trump had told her that his former attorney Michael Cohen “felt like it was his job to protect him.”

Cohen wired Stormy Daniels $130,000 weeks before Election Day in 2016, and a series of reimbursement payments from Mr Trump in the months that followed are now at the center of a criminal case against the former president.

Mr Trump is charged with 34 counts of falsifying business records for allegedly covering up those payments as “legal expenses” in an effort to boost his chances of winning the election. He has denied the affairs and pleaded not guilty.

“He did it in the kindness of his own heart and he didn’t tell anyone about it,” she said, recalling what Mr Trump told her in 2018 about Cohen’s payments.

Asked by the prosecution whether she believed that Mr Trump’s description of Cohen was