The New York Times reports that Cohen plans to tell lawmakers that Trump initiated the $130,000 hush payment to Stormy Daniels meant to keep her quiet about the affair she says she had with Trump. While Trump has admitted to knowledge of the payments, he says he didn’t tell Cohen to make them.
There are also reports that Cohen is exposing the “catch and kill” method that orchestrated the event to take place. Basically, Cohen states that in the Trump administration, when a story would arise that could be potentially harmful, members of the administration were told to essentially figure out the content of the story, and make it disappear if it was a viable threat. But, it would be a lie to assume that all presidents have not had similar methods. Though it resulted in scandal, and illegal funneling of money, President Trump is no different from dozens of former presidents…he just wants to shove a few things under the rug.
Cohen also implicated Trump Organization’s Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Allen Weisselberg in the effort, saying that he too knew of the incident and Trump’s efforts to conceal the payments from the public in the lead-up to the 2016 presidential election.
Aside from just pure politics, Cohen has also accused Trump of being a racist, lying cheat.
Cohen questioned the morals of President Trump after Cohen claims he made racist comments in front of him, including “questioning the intelligence of African-Americans.” In the opening statement provided to the Times on Tuesday night, Cohen claims Trump, “once asked me if I could name a country run by a black person that wasn’t a ‘shithole.’ This was when Barack Obama was President of the United States.”
Committee Republicans will call Cohen a liar.
White House aides expect GOP members on the Oversight Committee, led by Ohio’s Jim Jordan, to aggressively go after Cohen’s credibility. The Times reports that Republican members will spend their allotted time “trying to paint him as a liar and accusing him of fabricating stories to help his cause.”
Jordan has said, “Our members intend to question Mr. Cohen about the crimes he pleaded guilty to, other criminal activity he participated in but refused to disclose, his international financial dealings, and a long list of other probative activities.”
Trump, who is in Vietnam meeting with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un in pursuit of progress on denuclearizing the Korean peninsula, attacked Cohen’s credibility in a tweet early Wednesday. The President tweeted “Michael Cohen was one of many lawyers who represented me (unfortunately). He had other clients also. He was just disbarred by the State Supreme Court for lying & fraud. He did bad things unrelated to Trump. He is lying in order to reduce his prison time. Using Crooked lawyer!”
Overall, Cohen’s arguments have little substance and information regarding the WikiLeaks scandal isn’t nearly an impeachable offense. While President Trump is on shaky ground, Republicans at the hearing continue to question the validity of content that Cohen has brought forward. Though it is fair to question the character and action of the President, this trial wasn’t necessary to see those flaws. Instead, it merely emphasized the problem with having a bigot elected to be President of the United States.
Don’t worry, 2020 is sooner than you think.