Is it impossible for Trump to get an impartial jury in the hush money trial? ... trends now
Of the 1.4 million adults who live in Manhattan, it will be almost impossible to find one who doesn't already have an opinion of Donald Trump.
But twelve of them will be chosen to ultimately decide his fate as the first former president to stand in a criminal trial that begins on Monday.
They will be picked from hundreds of eligible New York residents to sit for the historic case where Trump is accused of hiding a $130,000 hush-money payment to porn star Stormy Daniels to keep her quiet about their alleged affair in 2006.
If found guilty by the group of his peers, he could be sentenced to up to four years in prison over a saga that started 18 years ago, and has seen wall-to-wall press coverage not just in the Big Apple but around the world.
Will it be impossible to find a dozen people who don't already have prejudicial view of the presumptive Republican nominee for president? Experts who specialize in jury selection tell DailyMail.com it could be.
Jury selection in Donald Trump's hush-money trial in Manhattan begins on Monday. The process to pick a panel of 12 to decide the former presidents fate could be painstaking
Selecting an impartial and non-partisan panel in a scandal with such enormous publicity - and in a city made up mostly of Democrats - is a monumental task for the court, and could last anywhere between five days and two weeks.
The jury will be made up of people who live in Manhattan, can speak English, are U.S. citizens and have not been convicted of a felony.
Both sides want New Yorkers who can both help and listen to their case, but who aren't biased and may have already jumped to conclusions.
During the arduous process that starts Monday morning, the judge will ask each prospective member 42 questions aloud.
The topics range from their career and family life to what news networks they watch and whether they have been a member of a political organization.
Then there will be follow up questions, and the lawyers from each side will have a limited opportunity to challenge the jury pool.
Attorneys will have a chance to dismiss jurors and pepper them with questions before they allowed to sit on the trial that could last for up to six weeks.
Stormy Daniels with Donald Trump in 2006. She alleges they had an affair after meeting at a golf tournament
'I think the biggest challenge is going to be for judges and the attorneys to ascertain who's being deceptive and who's not,' Margaret Bull Kovera, a psychology professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, told DailyMail.com.
'This is the type of case in which people may lie to get on or off the jury.'
She said there is a possibility a juror could try and get selected driven purely by the chance to find Trump guilty or acquit him, without even hearing the evidence.
They also might see it as an opportunity to sell their story, despite the threat of anger from members of the public who don't agree with the verdict.
'The potential for prejudice is substantial,' Cornell University Law Professor Valerie Hans told DailyMail.com.
'Jurors may have already formed opinions about the case based on what they have heard from their favorite media; therefore it's going to be important to discover what those opinions are, and whether or not they prevent people from being fair and impartial.'
The potential jurors Trump's legal team and the Manhattan prosecutors will be looking for will be polar opposites.
Hans said Trump's team will be looking for conservatives who have supported him in the past and believe the prosecution is politically motivated.
Since he was first indicted, the 77-year-old billionaire who made his name in Manhattan as a real estate mogul has maintained that he is the victim of a witch hunt.
Meanwhile, prosecutors will want jurors who are
