Trump hits back at lawyer’s hush money claims
President admits payouts to buy women’s silence came from him, but denies committing any crime
DONALD TRUMP last night denied that hush money payments, made to two women who claimed they had affairs with him, before the 2016 US election were illegal, insisting they had not come from campaign funds.
Mr Trump admitted that the payments to porn star Stormy Daniels and Playboy model Karen Mcdougal to buy their silence “came from me”, but dismissed suggestions of wrongdoing.
The account contradicts that of Michael Cohen, Mr Trump’s former lawyer, who pleaded guilty to breaking campaign finance laws over the payments on Tuesday.
Cohen claimed in court that he had facilitated both payments at the “direction” of Mr Trump and that it was an attempt to “influence” the 2016 election, buying the women’s silence before the vote.
The allegation – effectively implicating Mr Trump in a crime – triggered a firestorm in Washington, with congressmen asked if a sitting president could be indicted and if they would begin impeachment proceedings.
However, Mr Trump and the White House insisted the president had done nothing wrong and called into question Cohen’s motives.
Mr Trump suggested on Twitter that Cohen had decided to “make up stories” to secure a deal with prosecutors and reduce his jail sentence.
Sarah Sanders, the White House press secretary, said: “The president has done nothing wrong, there are no charges against him.”
At the core of the dispute are two payments made to women alleging affairs with Mr Trump before the election. Ms Daniels received $130,000 and Ms Mcdougal received $150,000. He denies the affairs.
Cohen admitted the payments broke campaign finance laws and pleaded guilty, saying the payments were an attempt to “influence” the 2016 election.
Mr Trump’s position on the payments has changed a number of times since they became public. First he denied knowledge of them, then his lawyer Rudy Giuliani admitted they occurred.
Speaking to Fox News yesterday, Mr Trump gave his fullest response yet to Cohen – admitting the money eventually came from him but denying anything illegal had taken place.
Mr Trump said of the payments: “They weren’t taken out of campaign finance. That’s a big thing. That’s a much bigger thing. Did they come out of the campaign? They didn’t come out of the campaign, they came from me.”
Mr Trump said he learnt of the payments “later on”, casting doubt on exactly when he became aware the money had been paid to the women.
Tuesday was described as the most significant day of Mr Trump’s presidency by commentators because two figures closely linked to him were convicted within minutes of each other.
Cohen, who worked as Mr Trump’s lawyer and fixer for a decade, admitted eight charges – five relating to unpaid tax, one relating to a house loan, and two relating to campaign finance laws. He faces more than five years in jail.
Paul Manafort, Mr Trump’s former campaign chairman, was found guilty of eight charges of tax and bank fraud. He faces up to 80 years in jail.
Cohen appears to be open to a plea deal. Lanny Davis, his lawyer, said his client had information that “should be of interest” to Robert Mueller, the man leading the Russian investigation.
By contrast Mr Manafort, who faces spending the rest of his life in jail, has refused to seek a plea agreement.
Discussing both cases, Mr Trump wrote on Twitter: “I feel very badly for Paul Manafort and his wonderful family. ‘Justice’ took a 12-year-old tax case, among other things, applied tremendous pressure on him and, unlike Michael Cohen, he refused to ‘break’ – make up stories in order to get a ‘deal.’ Such respect for a brave man!
“Michael Cohen plead[ed] guilty to two counts of campaign finance violations that are not a crime. President Obama had a big campaign finance violation and it was easily settled!”
That appeared to reference the 2008 Obama campaign having to pay a $375,000 fine for failing to notify regulators of a series of donations.
♦ The Democratic National Committee last night said it had thwarted an attempt to hack into a database containing information on tens of millions of voters across the US.
In a sophisticated attack, a fake login page was created in a bid to harvest usernames and passwords, and gain access to the database. It was not clear who was responsible for the attack.
President Trump’s opponents are in full cry. He is facing serious allegations that cannot be brushed aside as fake news. Some senior Democrats are declaring that “we’re in a Watergate moment”.
This latest crisis was prompted by two courtroom dramas. In one, Mr Trump’s former campaign chairman was found guilty of tax crimes and bank fraud. It is, however, a second case that carries the most risk for the President. Michael Cohen, Mr Trump’s former personal lawyer, who once said he would take a bullet for him, has pleaded guilty to paying hush money to two women just before the 2016 election. One of the women was a former Playboy model and the other an adult-film star.
Mr Cohen said that he made the payments at the “direction” of a candidate for federal office. He did not name Donald Trump, but his lawyer did, accusing the President of directing Mr Cohen to commit the crime of influencing the outcome of an election. Mr Trump had said previously he knew nothing about the payments.
These are turbulent and potentially perilous days for the President; in effect, he stands accused of conspiring to direct a crime but, even so, it is far from certain his approval ratings will collapse. A fightback has started. Mr Cohen is referred to by the President as “the rat”. Some of his supporters are pointing to Mr Cohen’s “pattern of lies and dishonesty”.
One talent that Mr Trump has demonstrated time and again is that he understands the beating heart of his base, his core supporters. Just before the 2016 election, a tape emerged of Mr Trump boasting that he could do anything he wanted with women because he was famous. His words “grab them by the p----” would have destroyed most candidacies and I remember there were fears inside his campaign that he had been fatally damaged.
Mr Trump dismissed it as “lockerroom talk”, and he went on to win 62 per cent of the votes of white women without college education.
From the start of his presidency, Mr Trump has assiduously nurtured his base by delivering on his campaign promises. He frequently tweets about what he has achieved as if ticking off a list. He often adds the word “win” to his claims of promises delivered. Taxes have been lowered; he has taken on China over trade; he has fought to bring back jobs to America; he may not have built the wall along the Mexican border but he has been a vocal opponent of immigration.
In 2016, he promised that the “forgotten people would be forgotten no more”. He tapped into their fear and resentment that they were not just being left behind but they were “deplorables” despised by the elites. His campaign slogan “Make America Great Again” drew on nostalgia for an older, different, less diverse America.
Evangelicals might not have liked lurid stories about Mr Trump’s private life, but they have been ready to forgive him if it meant nominating conservative judges to the Supreme Court or defending gun rights and delivering a fast-charging economy.
After Mr Cohen’s dramatic guilty plea, the President went to a rally in West Virginia. There were no hostile interruptions, no boos. His supporters were as passionate as ever. To many Republican voters, he has done exactly what he promised and his unconventional presidency is a hallmark of his authenticity.
Judgment on his presidency will come in the midterm elections in November. If the Democrats seize control of the House of Representatives, some will push to start impeachment proceedings but others will be more cautious.
I remember how Bill Clinton’s impeachment drained all the political energy from Washington. He had declared “I did not have sexual relations with that woman” and was impeached for lying under oath by the House, although later acquitted by the Senate. I recall how the country recoiled at the salacious details of his Oval Office encounters with Monica Lewinsky. Afterwards, Clinton’s approval ratings were back where they started.
For the current president, there are two key questions. What will the investigation by Robert Mueller into collusion with Russia unearth? And how will the Republican Party react to the current turmoil? The party has become the party of Mr Trump. The White House will be watching closely to see if senior Republicans begin distancing themselves from him.
One casualty of the Trump presidency has been truth. Papers have called out his lies and misleading statements. Polls suggest voters struggle to know what is fake and what isn’t. There will be many Trump supporters who will see this latest crisis as just part of the conspiracy against him; that a “deep state” has been plotting to undermine his presidency.
At stake here is a wider concern. What happens if there is an attempt to impeach Mr Trump while half of Americans continue to support him? The Trump presidency is set to test America’s democracy and institutions.