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Were six weeks into the first of Donald Trumps trials. His adult children have testified. The former president has testified. The prosecution is resting. And now, his defense is up to bat.Trump has four high-profile criminal cases coming up, but this trial is a civil one. New York Attorney General Letitia James says Trump and his adult sons inflated the value of their properties to lenders and insurance companies. Thats fraud. And not just a little fraud.

The claims are that they inflated these assets wildly, sometimes to a factor of 23, said Barbara McQuade, who is a law professor at the University of Michigan and a former U.S. attorney for Michigans Eastern District.

Prosecutors questioned Trumps sons, Don Jr. and Eric, who are co-defendants in this case. Ivanka Trump also testified, though shes legally off the hook, since she left the family business in 2017. But the most explosive testimony came from their father, the former president. Its important to know that the judge already ruled that Trump and his co-defendants were liable for fraudon at least one count. So now whats at stake is the punishment. The judge could order Trump to pay a hefty fine and could ban him from doing business in New York.

So when Trump spent four hours answering prosecutors questions, it got ugly.

I thought Donald Trumps outbursts against the judge were truly remarkable, McQuade said. He said on the stand how the prosecutor is a hack and how the judge is biased and unfair.At one point, the judge asked Trumps lawyer, Could you please get your client under control? The response was, I will not violate my clients First Amendment rights, which is such an absurd response. In the courtroom, theres no First Amendment right to say whatever you want to say. Youre under oath to answer questions truthfully.

Trumps testimony this week could also give us an indication of how he may act in the four criminal cases ahead of him.

This is really all just a performance for Donald Trump. This is a show to provide a false narrative to his supporters that he is a victim, that he is being railroaded by prosecutors in the courts, and that he will continue to show that he is above the law, McQuade said. I think he anticipates that he will lose this case. And this way when he loses, he will be able to say to his supporters, See, I told you all along they had it in for me. It really does make me wonder whether he wont use the same strategy in one or more of his trials. Maybe all four of them.

On Thursdays episode of What Next, we dove into the trials of Donald Trump. Our conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.

Yasmeen Khan: Before Donald Trump took the stand earlier this week, you tweeted that it was a lawyers nightmare scenariothat Trump needed to explain his fraud allegations without committing perjury. Did he do that?

Barbara McQuade: I dont know what the truth is here, but if you look at the evidence as alleged in the very detailed complaint filed by the attorney general that talks about these overstatements of value of properties. And then he comes in and testifies that those numbers were low. I think he lacks credibility when he answers questions that way. And when a judge makes a finding about whether the statements of financial worth were overstated, I think theyre going to find, based on the evidence, that they were. Does that amount to perjury? I think he will defend himself by saying that thats his genuine belief.

Why would Trump testify at all? I understand the need to grandstand, or that hes talking to a different audience other than whos in court. But he does have something to lose. So what does he have to gain exactly by testifying?

Hes not testifying voluntarily. He was called as a witness by the attorney general. Now, he does have an option, which is to, on a question-by-question basis, invoke his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination. And in fact, at his deposition in this case, he did exactly thathundreds of times. But in this forum, he probably calculated that invoking the Fifth Amendment so publicly would be a bad look for someone whos running for president. Unlike a criminal case, where the fact that you invoke your Fifth Amendment right cant be used against you in any way, in a civil case, the judge can draw whats called an adverse inference against you. And so, the judge could assume that because he declined to answer the question, the answer would have been bad for him.

The former president has repeatedly shown up to court to sit in on the trial, even though hes not required to. And again, hes also facing four criminal trials. Its fair to say hes enraged by all of the cases. Why do you think hes been so involved in this one and so clearly livid by it?

I imagine that his whole identity is tied up in these properties and in his public persona as one of the richest people in the world. And this case threatens to undermine that appearance. So, he is there fighting hard, and he is also there to create this circuslike atmosphere. He probably did what he wanted to do, which was concede defeat in this civil case and fire up the strategy on appeal that this judge had it in for him, but preserving his reputation in the court of public opinion. He believes that these numbers are right. And you cant prove that he believed he was wrong. That was the calculus. And if thats the strategy, then he probably succeeded.

Much of Trumps testimony revolved around defending his alleged wealth, saying that his properties are actually undervalued, that theyre worth is far greater than whats even in his financial statements, the same statements that hes accused of fraudulently inflating. So what does it indicate to you that he appears to be doubling down in this way?

Doubling down is really the only way Donald Trump can save face here and say to his voters, I did nothing wrong. Theyre out to get me. Its a witch hunt. But just to demonstrate the absurdity of this: One of his properties was overvalued by a factor of 23, in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Certainly there is some room for differences of opinion in the valuation of real estate. Say, for example, you owned a home that was valued at $100,000 and you get different appraisers. Maybe some say its $90,000, maybe some say its $110,000. But no one would believe that the value of that $100,000 home is $2.3 million. Thats the kind of escalation were seeing here. And so for Trump to come in and say, Oh, its accurate, or In some instances its actually undervalued, or They failed to take into account the value the Trump brand name adds, is really ludicrous.

His sons, Don Jr. and Eric Trump, basically both testified that they deferred to their accountants, that they werent really directly involved in putting together the financial statements for the company.The former president seemed to contradict some of that in his testimony. At one point, he said, I would look at financial statements, I would see them, and I would maybe on occasion have some suggestions.

Its important that he says he did look at them. The idea that any of these three, by the way, werent paying attention to these numbers when they were being inflated, in at least one instance, by a factor of 23 strikes me as unusual. Certainly, accountants do their work. They pull together numbers, and then they would have a final signoff. If they are not looking at the numbers, theyre not doing their jobs. They had high-level positions in the company, and theres a reason they have to sign off on them. If all they did was completely defer to the accountants, there would be no reason for them to have to sign off on them.

Trump, on the other hand, wants to maintain the veneer that hes this hands-on businessman. And so for him to admit, I dont really look at the numbers, I just rely on the accountants, would be an admission he just couldnt live with. So, he tried to walk a fine line there.

His defense more was, Yes, I looked at them because they were right. And if anything, they were undervalued. And then his other line of defense is that the banks dont care anyway, and its their job to do their due diligence. And if they thought there was something wrong with them, they should have said so. That, as a matter of law, the judge has already rejected. That is victim blaming. The reason you have to attest to a value is because it matters. It is a material representation. There are other borrowers out there who correctly assessed their worth, and as a result they didnt get loans that you got. So, there was a competitive advantage obtained by the Trump Organization by misrepresenting these things.

On Monday, Trump rested after testifying for four hours, and the defense didnt cross-examine him. Why not?

There might be two reasons for that. One is: If I were his lawyer, I would just be so relieved to get him off the stand and be done. Stop talking before you say something that is prosecutable. If you cross-examine him, it also opens him up to redirect by the attorney generals office. So, they may not want him to have to open his mouth again. The other reason is if they do want to use him as a witness in their defense, they can do that in their own case. They dont need to just cross-examine him now, which limits them to the scope of the direct questions.

Im not surprised by Donald Trumps belligerent speech. Because thats what we expect from him, at least in political spheres. But are you surprised that its happening in a court of law and that it could repeat in criminal cases?

I am surprised to see him use this belligerent tone in court, but perhaps I shouldnt be. Donald Trump has shown us who he is for a long time, but Ive never seen anything like it. Certainly from time to time a witness might get irritated by a question thats asked by the prosecutor and might lose their temper a little bit. But typically, their lawyer will call for a break and calm them down and try to get them to answer the questions. But with Trump, his supporters like it that hes sticking it to the man. And so maybe that kind of strategy can work for him at trial.

Something thats been very glaring in this trial is that both Trump and his attorneys have repeatedly criticized the judge. And on Monday, Trump attorney Alina Habba suggested that the judge had decided the case before we even walked up the stairs.This is a bench trial. The judge is the only person making a ruling here. What do you make of this decision to repeatedly attack the judge?

Ive never heard anything like this, with the statements that she made about how the judge is bullying her and being mean to her. Judges own their courtrooms. They get to call the shots in the courtroom. So, to complain about it usually falls on deaf ears. But to go outside while the case is pending and say these things publicly is just absolutely unheard of, especially because the judge still has to decide the case. It really just supports that theory that shes more about winning the PR battle than she is about winning the case.

Trumps team hasnt just targeted the judge. Theyve also gone after his clerk, Allison Greenfield. And the attacks on Greenfield are what prompted the judge to issue multiple gag orders against Trump. Who is Greenfield, and why is she being targeted?

The only reason that Greenfield is being targeted is because of this photo that she posted on social media depicting her with Chuck Schumer. I dont think theres anything wrong with someone posing in a photo with the senator for their state. But the Trump team pounced on this as an opportunity to portray her as a Democrat and someone who is biased against the case. I dont know that theres any real basis to suggest that she is unfair or that she even has any influence in the case as the law clerk. A law clerk has a job to serve the judge, to help the judge in court, to do research when the judge needs it, to look things up on the computer when the judge needs it, to pass notes about the case. And so I think the Trump team has exploited this photo to suggest that theres something improper here about the role of the clerk, that she is somehow pulling the puppet strings and that she is part of this deep state operation that is hosting this witch hunt for Donald Trump.

The whole thing about the notes. Theyve taken issue with the fact that a law clerk would pass notes to the judge. That has stood out as very bizarre to me.

Sometimes lawyers will exploit the information gap that exists between laypeople and people who spend a lot of time in court. Ive seen lawyers, for example, say, In my 40 years of practicing law, this is the most outrageous thing Ive ever seen. And you think to yourself, Are you kidding me? This goes on all the time. But jurors dont know that. And so, you start seeing them nodding along that somethings outrageous when its incredibly routine. And so the same thing, this idea of a clerk passing notes to the judge, I suppose if someone has not been in court before, they may not realize that. And so to the extent they hear Trumps lawyers saying this and getting outraged about it and putting it on the record, it may carry some weight with them. They may see that as evidence of improper behavior. When anybody whos ever spent a minute in court knows that clerks do that all the time. Sometimes they whisper in their ear. Its gamesmanship and an affront to the rule of law.

So far, the judge has issued two gag orders against Trump and his attorneys. Trump has been fined roughly $15,000 for violating these orders. How common are these types of gag orders?

Not common. Sometimes in a very high-profile case, a judge might blanketly put a gag order in place against both parties because they dont want the case to be tried in the press; they want it to be tried in the courtroom. This case is a little different because Donald Trump is running for president. And judges in all of his cases have been really reluctant to be too restrictive in preventing him from talking about the cases. But here, when they went after his clerk, I think that really upset him because a clerk is not a person who seeks fame, who seeks to be well-known, but they are really essential to the proper functioning of the court. And we have seen sometimes when Donald Trump casts aspersions on people, they become targets. So, the judge has made it a point not to make statements about his staff in an effort to protect them. But its really highly unusual that you would have to enter an order for singling out staff. Ive never seen a party or a lawyer go after staff like that before.

So the prosecution rests this week. Do you think that theyve proved their case?

Well, Ive always been reluctant to make a decision about a case when I havent been in the courtroom because we see reporting, but we dont see every single statement. What we really see is the more interesting and the more explosive moments, like the Trump brothers and Donald Trump himself testifying. I dont know that any of those three really moved the needle at all either way. This case is largely a documents case. Regardless of the baggage that he has, Michael Cohens testimony is going to be persuasive, where he says, They asked me to reverse-engineer the numbers. And so when we gave those numbers to the accountants, they were inflated. From outside appearances, it looks like they have proved their case. But again, Im reluctant to really make a representation because unlike the judge who has seen every minute of this case, heard every word of testimony, I have had to rely on whats reported in the press to do that.

Get more news from Mary Harris every weekday.

Given what weve discussed about Trump possibly using this trial as a PR move, if the judge indeed rules against Donald Trump, how big of a blow would it be to him, do you think?

Hes got the appeal thats left. Well see that come next. But if he were to lose on appeal and lose his properties, not only would he have to pay $250 million, which is a significant amount of money, but hed have to remove his name from all of these properties. Itd be a big blow for him. His father had a real estate empire, but it was limited to Queens. And getting into Manhattan, which is considered the fancy, sophisticated part of New York, has always been a big part of his image. And so I think it would be very humbling for him to lose those properties and lose the ability to do business in Manhattan.

He did testify at one point that he became president because of my brand.So it seems that a great deal of his identity is at stake.

A huge part of his persona is all about his brand. Think about the show The Apprentice, where he created this image of himself, only betterof being wealthy and a decisive businessman. It certainly obscured all of his failed ventures, like his casinos and his university. His name on these big splashy buildings is very much a part of his identity as uber-successful businessman that propelled himself to the presidency, a self-made billionaire who started with only millions from his father. It would be a real blow to his carefully crafted persona.

Trump has four more trials coming up. Criminal trials. Assuming he takes the same belligerent and even rule-breaking tone, what does this case tell us about what we can expect for those other cases to come?

This case tells us that we should expect four circuses to come, that Donald Trump will not go quietly, that he will not be like most litigants and follow the rules. That he will work to blow it up. Thats been his MO from the start. Hes a disrupter. And he will do everything he can to disrupt the even administration of justice. And all of those prosecutors need to be prepared to deal with that.

In this civil case in New York, money is the punishment. Brand identity, and potential loss of that, is a punishment. But in those other cases, prison time is on the table. Could that force Donald Trump to try a different strategy?

He seems to have one strategy, which is to always be on the offensive. It seems to have worked for him most of his life. And my guess is he wont change that strategy now. For him, the best defense is a good offense, and I think were going to continue to see that.

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Donald Trump civil trial in Manhattan: Maybe he's not trying to win ... - Slate