Documents provided by Stormy Daniels’ attorney indicate that the LLC that Michael Cohen supposedly created to funnel money to adult film star Stormy Daniels appears to have served as a much larger purpose: As a hub for payments that may have ultimately gone to Donald Trump, as well as paying off Trump’s hush money to Daniels.
A shell company that Michael D. Cohen used to pay hush money to a pornographic film actress received payments totaling more than $1 million from an American company linked to a Russian oligarch and several corporations with business before the Trump administration, according to documents and interviews.
Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg made the New York Times last week with news that he had been interviewed by special counsel Robert Mueller.
Federal agents working with Mr. Mueller stopped Mr. Vekselberg, a billionaire businessman, at a New York-area airport this year, searched his electronic devices and questioned him, according to people familiar with the matter. They confronted him after he stepped off a private plane about two months ago, according to one of the people.
Exactly why Vekselberg was singled out for this treatment was something of a mystery. He was known to have attended Donald Trump’s inauguration, and his ownership of multiple companies made him a potential target, but there appeared to be no special reason for the billionaire to get pulled in for FBI questioning shortly after stepping off a plane.
But on Tuesday evening, Michael Avenatti, lawyer for Stormy Daniels in her legal conflict with Trump and Cohen, provided an answer.
From all appearances, Donald Trump has a very good reason to be upset about the raid on Michael Cohen’s office—because it certainly appears that Cohen’s shell company was acting as a hub for both Russian oligarchs and American companies to feed bribes to Trump associates, and quite possibly to Trump.
Since that post, both the New York Times and NBC News have sorted through the documents provided by Avenatti, and the news looks absolutely astounding.
If true, Avenatti's claims, made in a dossier posted to Twitter, could add a new dimension to the federal investigation into Cohen. NBC News has reviewed financial documents that appear to support Avenatti’s account of the transactions.
In addition to half a million dollars paid into the company by Vekselberg, other good old fashioned bribes arrived from American firms that were in the midst of business actions that needed approval by Trump.
AT&T made four payments of $50,000 each to Essential in late 2017 and early 2018. In a statement, AT&T said it engaged the firm in early 2017 to "provide insights into understanding the new administration. They did no legal or lobbying work for us, and the contract ended in December 2017.”
Pharmaceutical giant Novartis paid $400,000 into Cohen’s shell company—a company with no staff, no researchers, no resources—at the same time their company CEO was meeting with Trump. In all, over a million dollars flowed to a company that, on paper, would seem to have not one possible thing it could do to justify those payments.
It’s too early to be certain, and there may be some other explanation. But it better be a good one. Because it certainly appears that Michael Cohen was acting as a bag man for Trump, picking up fat bribes for people who wanted favors from the White House.
How exactly did AT&T or Novartis find this employee-free, unadvertised company? What made them think that putting money into a P.O. box for “Essential Consulting,” which actually had no consultants, would produce results? Perhaps Rudy Giuliani can explain it to Sean Hannity.
And if Robert Mueller stopped Viktor Vekselberg some time ago—it appears that Mueller has known about Cohen’s bribery hub for weeks. Possibly months.
