Iran Press / America: The US president hit back at his former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen who, in pleading guilty to eight charges including campaign finance violations on Tuesday Aug 21,2018 , directly implicated Trump in paying “hush money” to prevent two women speaking out about alleged extramarital affairs.
Trump lashed out at Cohen via Twitter the following morning, accusing his once-loyal confidant of making up “stories in order to get a ‘deal’ from federal prosecutors”.
He also posted a bitter message: “If anyone is looking for a good lawyer, I would strongly suggest that you don’t retain the services of Michael Cohen!”
Trump suffered twin setbacks on Tuesday when Cohen pleaded guilty in a court in New York, just minutes before Trump’s former campaign chief, Paul Manafort, was convicted of financial crimes in Alexandria, Virginia, that could see him jailed for the rest of his life.
The developments stunned Washington, dented Trump’s claim that the investigation by the special counsel, Robert Mueller, into Russian election interference is a “witch-hunt”, and revived speculation that he could face impeachment proceedings if Democrats win a majority in the House of Representatives in November’s midterm elections.
Appearing in federal court in Manhattan, Cohen – who worked for Trump for more than a decade – said that during the 2016 presidential campaign, the candidate directed him to make payments to two women who claimed they had sexual affairs with the president in exchange for their silence.
The payments to Stormy Daniels, a former actress and model amounted to illegal campaign contributions and were designed to influence the results of the election, Cohen admitted in court. He said Trump repaid him for the $130,000 in hush money received by Daniels.
On Wednesday Trump offered a characteristically combative response, insisting that the campaign finance violations that Cohen had pleaded guilty to “are not a crime”.
Cohen’s own lawyer, Lanny Davis, kept up the pressure in a series of TV interviews. He told NBC’s Today show that Cohen “said under oath the most damaging, definitive information yesterday – that the president of the United States directed him to commit a crime.”
Cohen would not accept a pardon, Davis added, even if Trump were to offer him one.
Politics watchers are tracking Cohen's case because he could potentially reach an agreement with prosecutors that would offer him leniency in exchange for his cooperating with Justice Department special counsel Robert Mueller's probe into whether the Trump campaign was involved with Russian attempts to skew the 2016 U.S. presidential race.
Video from Gurdian
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