Judge has been left 'incredulous' by Alina Habba's 'rookie mistakes': court watchers

MSNBC's Lisa Rubin spent most of Thursday inside New York courtroom where day three of the defamation trial regarding comments Donald Trump made to E. Jean Carroll unwound.

And she had a view of the widely-mocked performance of attorney Alina Habba.

"Lisa, I was reading through our producer's ongoing log, so correct me if I'm wrong with anything here," host Chris Jansing began as Rubin joined her. "But at one point today, Judge (Lewis) Kaplan told Alina Habba, come on, this is evidence 101. Another, from our producer in the courtroom, said Kaplan seemed incredulous at a question that she had asked."

Jansing said that it's clear that Habba is a "forceful defender of the former president's position, right, which is her job." But she added, "We saw a lot of headlines late yesterday, overnight, about the tension between her and the judge."

Before the trial, those who know Kaplan warned that he was a no-nonsense judge and a stickler for the rules. Habba learned that firsthand as he repeatedly hit her over struggles with basic courtroom procedure.

"Judge Kaplan, in some respects, is an equal opportunity grouch about enforcement of the evidence in court rules," Rubin, a legal analyst for the network, said.

"He admonished E. Jean Carroll several times to stick to the question and answer it simply and directly. There was another evidentiary dispute later in the morning that Alina Habba won, and he looked at her and said, 'Ms. Habba, when you're right, you're right.'"

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The majority of the judge's frustrations, however, have been with Habba. That can reflect poorly on her and on Trump to the jury, several legal analysts explained Wednesday.

"Alina Habba has a lot of trouble asking questions according to the rules of evidence and civil procedure in federal courts," Rubin explained. "She wanted to know when E. Jean Carroll had an agent, and she said I hired my agent in 1982 or '3, and E. Jean Carroll had already testified she no longer has an agent. Habba's next question was, when did you fire your agent, and of course, that assumes something not in evidence. E. Jean Carroll never said she fired an agent. She simply said she no longer has an agent."

Rubin called those "rookie mistakes for someone in a federal litigation practice."

One would expect a former president to have a lawyer "with greater facility and fluency in trial practice than Alina Habba has shown herself to say. Those are the kind of mistakes that have caused Judge Kaplan to say, 'Oh, come on, this is evidence 101."

See the full discussion in the video below or at the link here.

The rookie mistakes of Alina Habbayoutu.be