NEW YORK (AP) — As some New Yorkers headed to the beach for Memorial Day weekend, some camped outside the courthouse where Donald Trump’s criminal trial resumes next week, hoping to snag a seat in the crowd before it starts. courtroom for closing arguments.
A handful of people were already in line on Friday for Tuesday’s hearing.
Among them were professional sitters with pup tents — and Richard Partington, 43, of East Hampton, New York, who sat on the hard sidewalk with a sleeping bag, pillow and blanket, plus a journal to write in. He said he was in line for Thursday’s court appearance.
“I think a lot of people didn’t even realize you could go into the courtroom,” Partington said. “And now that the news has spread, there’s just a lot more interest.”
Most seats in the courtroom where Trump is on trial are reserved for lawyers, members of Trump’s entourage, security personnel and journalists. But a handful of seats are open to the general public. With news cameras banned from the trial, only people in the courtroom or in a nearby overflow room with a video link could watch.
In the early days of Trump’s hush-money trial, winning one of those few public seats required an early start and some dedication. Things have only gotten harder since then. More and more potential spectators are showing up as the first-ever criminal trial of a former U.S. president nears its conclusion.
On the 16th day of the trial — May 13 — audience members Joe Adams and Ruth TeBrake told the AP that they had gotten a seat in the overflow room by lining up at 6:30 the night before.
“I’ve never done anything like this since I was young, since the ’60s,” says TeBrake, a native of Hilton Head Island, South Carolina. “There was electricity in the air.”
Adams, from Provincetown, Massachusetts, said they used the bathroom at a nearby bar during their overnight stay and tipped the bartenders $20 each for granting permission.
Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for president, has been charged in a 34-count indictment with plans to bury allegations of extramarital affairs that occurred during his first White House campaign in 2016. He has pleaded not guilty and has denounced the proceedings as a politically motivated witch hunt.
Partington, a part-time teacher at a private school, said he has been in the trial courtroom four times and in the overflow room another four times since testimony began on April 22.
“It’s such a learning experience,” he said. “Trump was president and he could be president again, so learning more about him is just interesting.”
Partington said he hasn’t talked much about the trial with his friends or family — only with his fellow trial watchers waiting to enter the courthouse.
“To be honest, I’m mostly talking to people here who have been part of the experience because they can relate to it, you know, what it’s like to be in the courtroom and all that stuff,” he said.
The Trump trial is not the first that Partington has attended. He also attended a few hearings of the trial of fallen cryptocurrency magnate Sam Bankman-Fried, which was held in a federal courthouse around the corner from the state courthouse where Trump is now on trial. Partington said he also found that “very interesting.”
Impressions of the Trump trial so far?
Judge Juan Merchan “has done a very good job,” Partington said. “I think he held a really orderly courtroom.”
But he doesn’t blame Trump for the fact that he sometimes seems to fall asleep.
“I don’t know how he maintains any kind of energy through this whole thing,” Partington said, citing long days in court and fluorescent lighting that “just makes you tired.”
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Associated Press journalist Julie Walker contributed to this report.
