Towering ego of the ‘pit bull’ who savaged master
MICHAeL Cohen is a shady character even by the dubious standards of the company that Donald Trump has sometimes kept.
The son of a surgeon father and nurse mother, Cohen, 53, was brought brought up on Long Island, on the edge of New York.
He originally practised lucratively as a New York personal injury lawyer, joining the Trump Organisation in 2005. Cohen also ran a taxi business on the side, holding valuable licences, known as medallions, that he would lease to drivers of New York’s yellow cabs. The value of such medallions hit £1million each in 2013. Cohen held 32 of them. .
He rapidly earned a reputation as Mr r Trump’s ‘pit bull’ who – ironic as it may seem m now – was famous for r his unswerving loyalty y to his boss.
Although he said he supported Barack Obama in the 2008 election, - he went cold on n his presidency and d became a cheerleader r for Mr Trump’s political ambitions.
In the foreward to his book, Disloyal, Cohen says: ‘I had agency in my relationship relationes with Trump. I made choices along the way – terrible, heartless, stupid, cruel, dishonest, destructive choices, but they were mine.
‘During my years with Trump, to give one example, I fell out of touch with my sisters and younger brother, as I imagined myself becoming a big shot. I’d made my fortune out of taxi medallions, a business viewed as sketchy if not lower class. On Park Avenue, where I lived, I was definitely nouveau riche, but I had big plans that didn’t include being excluded from the elite.
‘I had a narrative: I wanted to climb the highest mountains of Manhattan’s skyscraping ambition, to inhabit the world from the vantage point of private jets and billion-dollar deals, and I was willing to do whatever it took to get there. Then there was my own considerable ego, short temper, and willingness to deceive to get ahead, regardless of the consequences.’ As a spokesman for the Trump 2016 election campaign, Cohen sometimes dispensed with a any niceties. When a r reporter asked him about t the rape allegations once le levelled at Mr Trump by first wife Ivana, Cohen told the journalist, on the record: ‘I ‘I’m warning you, tread very f* f****** lightly because what I’ I’m going to do to you is f* f****** disgusting.’
After Mr Trump was el elected, he retained Cohen as his personal lawyer. Cohen ha handled the allegations by women who either accused Mr Trump of sexual misconduct du or said they’d had affairs wi with him. Porn star Stormy Daniels, who said she had a brief relationship with Mr Trump in 2006, claimed Cohen paid her hush money. ex-Playboy Playmate Karen McDougal accused the lawyer of colluding with a gossip magazine, the National enquirer, to buy her story about her own affair with Mr Trump and then ensure it was never published.
But in 2018, Cohen and Trump went their separate ways.