Pleading the 5th won’t save Trump family members in Judge Engoron’s courtroom

Appearing on MSNBC on Sunday morning, former U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade explained that, should Donald Trump and his three children who will be taking the stand in a Manhattan courtroom in the coming weeks attempt to plead the 5th, it could make matters worse for them.

Speaking with fill-in MSNBC host Charles Coleman Jr., McQuade noted that the testimony before Judge Arthur Engoron is part of a civil trial and the use of the constitutional amendment regarding self-incrimination is applied differently than in a criminal trial.

With Donald Trump, Donald Trump Jr., Ivanka Trump and Eric Trump about to face a grilling by prosecutors working for New York Attorney General Letitia James. McQuade stated the use of the 5th allows the judge in this case to assume the worst.

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"One of the things that's really interesting, Charles, in a civil case, is whether a witness chooses to invoke their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination," she began.

"It's not that they're going to be incriminated here, it's that anything they say under oath could be used against them in some subsequent criminal case," she added. "If they believe they have exposure, they can invoke it. But what's different about a civil case from a criminal case is that in this case, Judge Engoron could use that invocation to draw an adverse inference against the witness."

"So if they refused to answer a question, he can assume the worst about what the answer would have been," she elaborated. "I think that's what I'll be looking for most as these witnesses testify this week."

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