Trump legal team blundered by 'believing their hype' about hush money case collapsing: NYT's Haberman

New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman on Monday revealed that former President Donald Trump's legal team had really convinced themselves that they'd saved their client from facing criminal charges, only to receive a rude awakening last week when an indictment was announced.

Speaking with the New York Times' "The Daily" podcast, Haberman said that the Trump team was feeling confident after attorney Robert Costello testified before a Manhattan grand jury to undermine the credibility of former Trump attorney Michael Cohen, who is a key witness in the former president's hush-money scheme involving adult film star Stormy Daniels.

In fact, they were apparently so confident that they thought Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg would soon be forced to drop the case entirely.

"The Trump folks appear to have started believing their own hype, claiming that the case is falling apart," Haberman explained. "Bragg, according to them, was now having concerns about bringing this case. They never provided any evidence of what they were saying."

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Haberman noted that even Trump seemed to have bought into it, as he posted last week he had gained "respect" for the grand jurors listening to the case when it seemed like no charges would be coming.

"And so when the indictment comes... it really catches Trump and his advisers off guard, because of what they had been telling themselves," she said.

She added that Trump was "furious" and "very, very angry" about the indictment going down.