Hicks told jurors that Trump was very focused on media coverage, and directed the messaging of the campaign, even though press statements sometimes bore her name. “We were all just following his lead,” she said. “He knew what he wanted to say and how he wanted to say it.”

Hope Hicks, a former top aide to Donald Trump, testified on Friday that staffers on his 2016 presidential campaign were alarmed when they learned that a tape in which he made lewd comments about women was about to be made public.

Hope Hicks, a former aide to Donald Trump, was called to take the witness stand by prosecutors on Friday in the ongoing criminal hush money trial against the former president. Hicks previously served as White House communications director and was a key adviser during his 2016 presidential campaign and in the White House.