'Wishful thinking': CNN's Paula Reid dumps on Trump's belief that jury will acquit him

Former President Donald Trump may believe jurors in his criminal hush money trial will acquit him, but sources close to his team tell CNN analysts they're bracing for a guilty verdict.

Reporter Paula Reid discussed with anchor Kaitlan Collins Trump's optimistic view on his historic New York City trial on Wednesday as the jury prepared to enter into their deliberations.

"[Trump] always has this idea that he personally can sway people," Collins told Reid, "that he could be acquitted by these jurors."

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"I think that's probably wishful thinking based on everything that we know," Reid replied. "It's an extraordinarily stressful, miserable thing to be a criminal defendant—I think a lot of people tell themselves that."

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Reid went on to detail why exactly she believes the seven men and five women tasked with issuing a verdict in Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's falsifying business records will return with a conviction for the former president.

But rather than cast her gaze backward on the weeks' worth of evidence presented by prosecutors and testimony delivered by witnesses who contend Trump covered up hush money payments to bury salacious stories during his 2016 presidential campaign, Reid pointed CNN viewers' attention ahead to the former president's lawyers most hoped-for conclusion.

"They believe the best hope, the likely hope for them is a deadlocked jury," Reid said. "But what they're concerned about is that the jury comes back and they are deadlocked."

This seemingly contradictory desire and concern centers on New York State statute's Allen Charge which mandates a judge send deadlocked jury back to deliberations to try to reach consensus again.

"There's a concern that if the jury gets that instruction, that they may feel pressure—the weight of this case, the historic nature of the resources that have been expended—and they may then try to compromise," Reid explained. "They're especially worried about the checks that [Trump] signed, so they believe that even if the jury comes back initially on their deadlock, they're not out of the woods."

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