Donald Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen returned to the witness stand Monday for a third day of cross-examination, admitting that he defrauded Trump and his company out of money while maintaining that his former boss had signed the secret payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels. at the heart of the criminal trial of the former president.
Defense attorney Todd Blanche began his questioning of Cohen by focusing on the period when Cohen paid Daniels $130,000 to buy his silence on behalf of Trump. Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer and self-described “fixer,” spoke with Trump twice on October 26, 2016, the day Cohen transferred money to the account he used to pay Daniels.
Blanche suggested that there were other issues going on at the time that caught Cohen’s attention. Cohen acknowledged he was also busy trying to close a $7 million deal involving taxi medallions and an extortion threat involving Trump’s daughter, Tiffany. He said he spoke to Tiffany Trump twice on October 25.
When asked if he discussed the situation with Tiffany Trump with his father during the Oct. 26 calls, Cohen said no and that the calls were focused on Daniels. When asked during further questioning by prosecutor Susan Hoffinger if he had been “too busy in October 2016 to get Trump’s approval on the Stormy Daniels payment,” Cohen replied: “No, Mrs “.
Blanche had continued to question Cohen for about two hours into the morning, including on another issue for which he said Trump had reimbursed him in addition to Daniels’ sum – $50,000, Cohen said. he had paid to end a dispute with a technology company called Red Finch. Reimbursements were “grossed up” – doubled – to protect Cohen from facing tax pressure.
Cohen said the bill concerns efforts to rig a CNBC poll about the most famous businessmen of the last century. Cohen said Trump didn’t want to pay because, despite the company’s efforts, he was only ninth on the list. NBC News has contacted CNBC for comment.
Blanche asked Cohen if he actually paid $50,000 to Red Finch, and he admitted that he only paid the company about $20,000. Asked if that meant he “stole from the Trump Organization,” Cohen replied, “Yes, sir.”
Hoffinger asked him why he did that, and Cohen responded that it was because he was “angry” that Trump cut his annual bonus in 2016, despite his work to get salacious stories about the president’s death. elected official of the time. “It was almost like self-help,” Cohen said.
Cohen acknowledged doing legal work for Trump’s family in 2017 and also detailed the roughly $4 million he earned doing legal and consulting work for others that same year, while often doing little real work. Cohen acknowledged that he was able to land lucrative contracts through his position as the president’s personal lawyer at the time. Cohen told Blanche that the money was the most he had ever won in his life.
Continued live trial updates
As court opened Monday, the judge announced that closing arguments, which he had tentatively scheduled to begin Tuesday, would be pushed back a week because of the holiday weekend. They are now tentatively scheduled for Tuesday, May 28.
Trump looked visibly upbeat and animated Monday morning as two rows of prominent allies sat behind him in court.
Cohen, 57, is a key witness in Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s trial against Trump and the only one to directly tie Trump to the alleged business records falsification scheme.
Cohen paid Daniels the $130,000 in exchange for a nondisclosure agreement barring her from speaking about her claim that she had a sexual relationship with Trump a decade earlier, after they met at a tournament. celebrity golf. Trump denies this claim.
Cohen said Trump authorized the deal and assured him he would pay him back.
Prosecutors say Trump made it as part of a series of payments falsely recorded as legal fees in an attempt to conceal the real reason. He was charged with 34 counts of falsifying business records and pleaded not guilty.
Prosecutors had made it clear to jurors during his direct examination that Cohen had a history of publicly lying, and they elicited testimony about his guilty pleas in 2018 to various criminal charges, including some related to paying Daniels and another of lying to Congress. Cohen said he lied to protect his then-boss, Trump.
Cohen began testifying last week, and by late Thursday he had been on the witness stand for more than 14 hours.
Trump’s lawyer, Todd Blanche, questioned Cohen all day Thursday and part of Tuesday, informing him of inconsistencies in some of his past claims about Trump and lies he has admitted to on Trump’s behalf over years.
Prosecutors said Cohen was their final witness. It’s unclear how many witnesses Trump’s lawyers would call, if any.
One possibility that could prolong the trial would be for Trump to take the stand in his own defense. Trump said before the trial began that he would “absolutely” testify. He has since softened this position.
Blanche had also suggested he might call former Federal Election Commission Chairman Bradley A. Smith to testify on election laws, but also said he might not do so. He also said he may call other witnesses, whom he did not identify in open court. He said the witnesses’ testimony would be brief if they testify.
Prosecutors said if the defense ends up calling Smith, they could call a witness to refute his testimony. Their expert would also be brief, they said.
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