In today’s testimony Cohen continued to walk the jury through his false invoices, which were attached to the checks to him that Trump signed. Cohen also detailed the numerous lies he told to protect Trump while he remained in what Cohen called the “Trump cult.” Cohen also testified as to Trump’s efforts to keep him from cooperating with investigators, and how that encouraged him to lie. It’s rather clear witness tampering by Trump that was never charged.
Direct examination concluded in time for the lunch break. The cross examination by Trump’s attorney, so far, has failed to rattle Cohen as he openly admitted to lying on behalf of Trump. When confronted with many positive things he said about Trump Cohen acknowledged saying them, and stated they were not lies because it was what he believed at the time.
During the day the NY Appellate Court denied Trump's gag order appeal stating:
"Merchan properly weighed petitioner’s First Amendment Rights against...the right of persons related...to the criminal proceedings from being free from threats, intimidation, harassment, and harm."
In the hallway Trump referred to politicians coming to the trial as “surrogates.” “I do have a lot of surrogates and they are speaking very beautifully.” The surrogates are saying things Trump couldn’t because of the gag order. If Trump is causing them to say these things, that is a violation of the gag order.
Today’s testimony wrap up.
-Testimony resumed with continued direct examination of Cohen from prosecutors. They started with a February 6, 2017 email from Trump Organization Controller Jeff McConney reminding Cohen to send the invoices for legal services for the payments he agreed to with Trump and Weisselberg.
-Asked if the invoices he sent were false records, Cohen answers “Yes ma’am.” He stated that the statement that they were for “services rendered” was not true, neither was it truthful that they were pursuant to a retainer agreement. Cohen testified that the invoices were simply to get the reimbursement for paying Daniels as previously agreed with Trump.
-Cohen testified that he met with Trump in February 2017 in the Oval Office to confirm the payment arrangements agreed to in the meeting that included Trump the month before (see yesterday’s update). The jury was shown a picture from that February Oval Office meeting.
-Cohen walked through each check he received as part of this, to include those personally signed by Trump. The jury is shown that the false invoice, falsely saying the check is for a retainer agreement, is attached to each check and was when it was signed. Each time Cohen is asked if the word “retainer” on that invoice attached the check Trump signed is true. Each time Cohen says it is not.
-In addition, each check had a check stub stating that the check was for a retainer agreement. For each check, and check stub, Cohen testifies that the stub is false because there was no retainer agreement and the purpose for the check was to reimburse him for paying Stormy Daniels.
-Cohen testified that despite $420,000 in checks from Trump in 2017, all supposedly for legal services performed in 2017, his work for Trump in 2017 was “minimal.” Overall, Cohen estimates he spent less than 10 hours on legal matters in all of 2017 for anything to do with Trump or his family. He didn’t bill separately for any of it because: "I didn’t expect to be paid on it. It wasn’t enough work to have me send an invoice.”
-After the final installment in December 2017 totaled $420,000, Cohen testified that he never received anymore money from Trump.
-Cohen said he did more work for Trump in 2018 than in 2017, but also didn’t bother to bill it.
-However, the cachet of being Trump’s personal attorney netted him other big clients who paid him millions in legal services.
-Cohen testified that he continued to lie for Trump, out of loyalty to him.
-Cohen acknowledged lying to Congress about Trump’s business dealings in Russia: "Because I was staying on Mr. Trump’s message that there was no Russia, Russia, Russia, and again in coordination with the joint defense team that’s what was preferred."
-Cohen testified that he also lied when telling the media that he made his payment to Daniels without informing Trump. He talked to Trump about that lie and Trump said, “That’s good, good.”
-When the WSJ story broke Cohen worked with Stormy Daniels’ attorney (Keith Davidson) to get the much discussed denial from Daniels and he told Trump he was getting that denial.
-Cohen states he knew the statement from Daniels (denying any tryst with Trump) was false because he was the one who crafted it. He knew the statement that she did not receive any hush money was false, “Because I’m the one who paid for it.”
-Cohen admitted a 2018 letter to the FEC (in response to an FEC Complaint letter about the $130,000 contribution) was misleading and that he wrote it "to protect Mr Trump, stay on message, demonstrate my continued loyalty." Cohen wrote in that letter to the FEC:
"In a private transaction in 2016, before the U.S. presidential election, Mr. Cohen used his own personal funds to facilitate a payment of $130,000 to Ms. Stephanie Clifford. Neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with Ms. Clifford, and neither reimbursed Mr. Cohen for the payment directly or indirectly."
-Cohen claimed the letter was technically true because Trump himself repaid him and not the Trump Organization or Trump Campaign.
-Cohen testified that Trump told him not to worry about the FEC inquiry because Jeff Sessions, Trump’s attorney general, would take care of it.
-The jury was shown a February 2018 Signal app message from Trump attorney Jay Sekulow to Cohen stating: "Client says thanks for what you do.” Cohen testified that “client” meant Trump.
-Just two months later in April 2018 Cohen was in his hotel room when the FBI arrived with a search warrant for his phone and other electronic devices. Asked if the FBI seizure frightened him, Cohen responded, “Yes, ma’am.”
-Cohen called Trump and left a message about the raid. Trump called him back and assured Cohen: “Don’t worry. I’m the president of the United States. There’s nothing here. Everything’s going to be OK. Stay tough. You’re going to be OK.”
[NOTE: That alone is witness tampering by the President]
-Cohen further testified: "I was scared ... I wanted some reassurance that Mr. Trump had my back, especially as this dealt with issues that related to him."
-Cohen testified that the witness tampering worked: “I had the president of the United States protecting me. His Justice Department should go nowhere. So I felt reassured and I remained in the camp.” Asked if that meant he would continue to lie for Trump, Cohen answered, “Yes ma’am.”
-Others close to Trump reached out at the time and told Cohen: “you’re loved. Don’t worry. He’s got your back. Most powerful guy in the country if not the world. You're going to be OK.”
-Cohen was shown a series of tweets by Trump, such as one stating:
“Michael is a businessman for his own account/lawyer who I have always liked & respected. Most people will flip if the Government lets them out of trouble.” Cohen said he interpreted the message as: “Stay in the fold. Stay loyal. I have you, you’re a fine person. Don’t flip.”
Cohen stated the messages “reinforced my loyalty and my intention to stay in the fold.”
-Cohen described being quickly introduced to Robert Costello, a criminal defense attorney with close connections to Rudy Giuliani. Costello described himself as “a great way to have a back-channel communication to the president in order to ensure that you’re still good and you’re still secure.”
-It turned out this back channel was necessary because Trump’s reassuring call to Cohen right after the search warrant was the last time they directly talked. Apparently, Trump decided Cohen was too hot to deal with directly.
Cohen testified: "The back channel was Cohen to Bob Costello to Rudy, Rudy to President Trump.”
On April 21, 2018 Cohen received an email from Costello (shown to the jury) stating:
"I spoke with Rudy. Very very Positive. You are ‘loved.’ If you want to call me I will give you the details. I told him everything you asked me to and he said they knew that. There was never a doubt that they are in our corner. Sleep well tonight. You have friends in high places."
Cohen testified that the friend in high places was Trump.
-The jury was shown a June 13, 2018 email from Costello to Cohen stating:
"Since you jumped off the phone rather abruptly, I did not get a chance to tell you that my friend has communicated to me that he is meeting with his client this evening and he added that if there was anything you wanted to convey you should tell me and my friend will bring it up for discussion this evening."
The friend = Rudy Giuliani and “his client” = Trump. Asked why Costello didn’t just use the names Cohen answered: “to be covert, it's all backchannel. I-spy-ish."
-With media reports hinting that Cohen might flip in the Mueller investigation Costello attempted to assure him that he was still loved, sending an email:
"It seems clear to me that you are under the impression that Trump and Giuliani are trying to discredit you and throw you under the bus to use your phrase. I think you are wrong because you are believing the narrative promoted by the left wing media. They want you to believe what they writing. Many of them are already writing that you are cooperating.”
Cohen described this as part of “pressure campaign” to keep him loyal.
-So what finally led Cohen to give up that loyalty? He testified that it was his family. His wife, daughter and son all said to him, “Why are you holding on to this loyalty? What are you doing? We’re supposed to be your first loyalty."
-"I made a decision based again on the conversation I had with my family that I would not lie for President Trump anymore.” —Michael Cohen explaining his August 21, 2018 guilty plea.
-That guilty plea stated, and Cohen again testified, that he made the deal with Stormy Daniels “at the direction of Donald J. Trump” and “for the benefit of Donald J. Trump.”
-The next day Trump tweeted an attack on Cohen:
“If anyone is looking for a good lawyer, I would strongly suggest that they don’t retain the services of Michael Cohen.”
In another tweet Trump boosted Paul Manafort because “unlike Michael Cohen, he refused to break.”
-Cohen testified that he was sentenced to 36 months in prison.
-Cohen described testifying to Congress before starting his prison sentence and apologizing to Congress and the American people. Cohen testified today that he “suppressed information that the citizenry had a right to know about the individual who was seeking the highest office in the land.”
-Cohen testified that he “paid the back taxes, paid the fines, paid everything and served time in prison,” and remains on supervised release.
-Cohen closed his direct examination with some final words about his actions on behalf of Trump:
“I regret doing things for him that I should not have — lying, bullying people in order to effectuate a goal . . . to keep the loyalty and to do the things that he had asked me to do, I violated my moral compass and I suffered the penalty, as has my family.”
-That pretty much wrapped up Cohen’s direct.
-On cross examination Trump’s attorney comes out swinging asking Cohen if he ever called Trump’s attorney a “crying little shit.” Cohen quickly replied, “sounds like something I would say.” That answer would become a familiar refrain. The question and answer was objected to and stricken from the record.
-Cohen admits prosecutors often contacted him (through his attorney) politely asking him to not publicly comment on the case.
-The jury is shown a profane rant by Cohen on Tik Tok where he called Trump a “dictator douchebag” and Trump belongs in a “little cage where he belongs like a fucking animal.” Cohen again acknowledges making the statements, calmly saying “Sounds like something I said.”
-They danced around the question of whether Cohen wants Trump convicted. Cohen stated, “I would like to see accountability. It’s not for me. It’s for the jury and this court.” Eventually Trump counsel pinned him down asking: “yes or no. Do you want to to see President Trump convicted in this case?” Cohen responded, “sure.”
-Cohen acknowledged making money off anti-Trump merchandise including a shirt showing Trump behind bars.
-Cohen admitted he once admired Trump.
-Trump’s attorney confronts Cohen with a statement that Trump wanted to make the country great again, and asks if Cohen was lying when he said that. Cohen answered that, "At that time, I was knee-deep into the cult of Donald Trump, yes. I was not lying, it's how I felt."
-Confronted with more statements endorsing Trump, and his character, Trump’s attorney asks if those statements were lies. Cohen similarly states “that’s how I felt, so yes it would be the truth.”
-For all the “sleepy Joe Biden” talk Trump’s attorney had to move seats to once again wake a sleeping Trump up during the cross examination.
-Cohen acknowledged changing his views about Trump.
-Trump’s attorneys presented a line of questions suggesting that Cohen cooperated with the NY prosecutors hoping to get a reduction in his federal sentence. Cohen acknowledged asking the NY prosecutors to write a letter to support a motion to reduce his sentence based on his cooperation. The NY prosecutors were open to doing so but never did because the Federal prosecutors said they wouldn’t be receptive to it.
-Asked if he called Trump a "boorish cartoon misogynist” and "Cheeto-dusted cartoon villain" Cohen acknowledged that “sounds like something I would say.”
[NOTE: I know the defense is trying to paint Cohen as an irrational Trump hater but stuff like this is funny and is likely to serve to mostly humanize him with the jury, particularly when his response is to casually admit it].
-Cohen stated he has never met Chief Prosecutor Bragg in person.
-Cohen admitted making about $3.4 million on his two books over the last two years.
That wrapped things up. Wednesday is off for the jury and so cross examination will resume on Thursday. Friday is also a down day as the judge gave Trump the day off to attend his son’s High School graduation.
