President in legal jeopardy?
In two courtrooms 200 miles apart on Tuesday, President Donald Trump’s almost daily attempts to dismiss the criminal investigations that have engulfed his White House all but collapsed.
Trump has long mocked the investigations as “rigged witch hunts,” pursued by Democrats and abetted by a dishonest news media. But even the president’s staunchest defenders acknowledged privately that the legal setbacks he suffered within minutes of each other could open fissures among Republicans on Capitol Hill and expose Trump to the possibility of impeachment. In Manhattan, Michael Cohen, the president’s former lawyer, admitted in court that Trump directed him to break campaign finance laws by paying off two women who said they had sexual relationships with Trump. And in Alexandria, Va., a jury found Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, guilty of eight counts of tax and bank fraud — the most significant victory yet for the special counsel, Robert Mueller.
A president who has labored under the cloud of investigations from almost the moment he took office, Trump now faces an increasingly grim legal and political landscape. Mueller is methodically investigating whether Trump and members of his campaign conspired with a foreign power to win the election — and whether the president tried to obstruct the investigation from the White House. And the president is months away from congressional elections that could hobble the second half of his term.
Democrats seized on the judgments against Manafort and Cohen — they both face years in prison — to argue that Trump was suffused by a culture of graft and corruption, an argument that could prove powerful for an already galvanized party in the midterm contests.
Inside the West Wing, aides to Trump — numbed and desensitized by breathless news cycles blaring headlines about the president’s behavior — said privately Tuesday afternoon that they were having trouble assessing how devastating the day’s legal events might be.
Trump’s advisers spent hours working on a statement that was attributed to his lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, but privately several said they could not come up with something to explain away Cohen’s admissions beyond calling him a liar.
As he landed in Charleston, W.Va., for a rally with supporters Tuesday night, a grim-faced Trump sidestepped questions about Cohen. He defended Manafort as a “good man” who had been ensnared in an investigation that ranged far beyond its original mandate.
“It had nothing to do with Russian collusion,” Trump told reporters. “We continue the witch hunt.”
Later, the president largely ignored the dramatic courtroom events during a raucous rally in which his fervent supporters cheered the president’s usual rants about trade, illegal immigration, Democratic obstruction and the news media.
“Where is the collusion? Find some collusion,” he said before shifting topics to declare that illegal immigration is “the beating heart” of the coming elections.
The effect of Manafort’s conviction and Cohen’s guilty plea on the investigation itself was unpredictable, according to legal experts. But Democrats said it put the lie to Trump’s argument that Mueller was engaged in a political investigation.
“It shows that Mueller and prosecutors in New York are conducting a professional investigation, following the facts where they lead, and obtaining serious felony convictions,” said Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the senior Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee. “They also dramatically increase the likelihood that both men cooperate with the government.”
Schiff said Cohen’s admission that he violated campaign finance laws in paying hush money to two women “adds to the president’s legal jeopardy,” though Trump’s advisers played down the likelihood that a sitting president would be indicted for such violations.
“There is no allegation of any wrongdoing against the president in the government’s charges against Mr. Cohen,” said Giuliani, Trump’s lawyer, in a statement. “It is clear that, as the prosecutor noted, Mr. Cohen’s actions reflect a pattern of lies and dishonesty over a significant period of time.”
Cohen was blunt about the president’s culpability as he stood in court and admitted his guilt: “In coordination with, and at the direction of, a candidate for federal office,” Cohen said he conspired with a media company to keep secret Trump’s affairs with Stephanie Clifford, a pornographic film actress known as Stormy Daniels.
“Mr. Cohen, when you took all of these acts that you’ve described, did you know that what you were doing was wrong and illegal?” the judge asked. Cohen answered, “Yes, your honor.”
The startling charge directed at the president carried echoes of President Richard Nixon, who was named an “unindicted co-conspirator” in the special prosecutor’s investigation of Watergate.
And it raised the prospect that Trump’s presidency could be at risk by impeachment in Congress even if the sprawling Russia investigation never definitively concludes that there was collusion or obstruction of justice.
Cohen worked for decades as Trump’s personal lawyer and fixer. He was privy to the innermost details of the president’s business dealings and personal life — once saying he would take a bullet for him.
While Mueller’s investigation grinds on — reaching into the murky depths of Russian money laundering or Russia’s shadowy efforts to hack the 2016 election — Cohen’s case throws a white-hot spotlight on the behavior of Trump and his closest confidants.