US President Donald Trump is finding himself in hot waters following the guilty plea of Michael Cohen, his lawyer. While Cohen has been charged with eight offenses of fraud and campaign finance violation, he clearly said he completed all tasks on Trump’s direction.
Interestingly, Cohen once said that he would take a bullet for the President. What surprised Washington even more than the confession of fraud by Cohen was the fact that he, on the orders of Trump, had paid hush money to two women with whom Trump had alleged affairs over a decade ago. While Donald Trump’s image during his pre-Presidency days was that of a billionaire who got what he desired, never did the American citizens expect the President’s lawyer confessing to such actions during his time in the office.
However, now that the cat is out of the box, Michael Cohen will not remain silent. Why he turned against Donald Trump is yet to be revealed but reports claim he is cooperating with the probe undertaken by Robert Muller, Special Counsel for the United States Department of Justice. Muller served as Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) from 2001 to 2013.
Furthermore, the day Michael Cohen pleaded guilty on August 21, 2018, Trump’s former campaign chief, Paul Manafort was found guilty of federal tax and bank fraud. The investigations are now underway to determine whether Trump campaign secretly collaborated with Russia to affect the results of the 2016 US Presidential Elections. Conversely, Michael Cohen is also believed to be under investigation for the same accusation. If Cohen or Manafort do provide clandestine information to the authorities that prove Trump campaign’s links with Russia, this will simply create doom for Trump’s presidency.
Moreover, while many angles of the criminal charges are under scrutiny against Cohen and Manafort, the US law authorities are also probing the Trump Foundation. Although the investigations will reveal more in the days to come, Cohen’s statement has placed a sword over Trump’s credibility as a businessman and a politician, and have put him in a legal chaos.
Earlier, Donald Trump had referred to Robert Muller’s Russian probe as the “the single greatest witch hunt of a politician in American history”. However, now that Cohen has accepted his felonies, the ‘hoax’ and the ‘witch hunt’ might go against Trump and his statement may haunt him
Some speculate that Cohen developed close ties with Russia in 2015-16 when he worked with Felix Sater, a Russian-American businessman on the Trump Tower project in Moscow. Now that the reports are surfacing, it is known that in August 2016 Cohen helped arrange $ 150,000 US dollars for Karen McDougal and in October 2016 helped arrange 130,000 US dollars for Stormy Daniel to keep them silent for having an affair with Donald Trump.
Days after becoming the President, Trump denied any and all allegations of paying hush money to anyone. However, problems for Donald Trump keep surfacing. In February 2018 The New Yorker published an investigation into Karen McDougal’s relationship with Trump and in March 2018 Stormy Daniels sued Trump and Cohen to overturn the non-disclosure agreement. Since Cohen used the Trump Organization’s email to negotiate with Daniels, Robert Muller subpoenas the Trump Organization, therefore, putting Trump’s corporate business in jeopardy as well.
Now that Michael Cohen is standing against Donald Trump, the cards are stacked against the US President. Despite such a ruckus, Donald Trump sent a Tweet saying, “Michael Cohen pled 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!”
A fine of 375,000 US dollars was imposed on Obama’s 2008 campaign by the Federal Election Commission after the campaign failed to provide a 48-hour notice for nearly 1,300 contributions amounting to over 1.8 million dollars.
Donald Trump, recently, also took on the FBI and insulted the security service when the FBI raided Cohen’s office and seized records relating to payments made to Stormy Daniels. Trump called this raid to be a disgrace and tweeted that, “Attorney-client privilege is dead!”
Finding himself surrounded with questions and his past actions looming over him, Donald Trump has been verbally assaulting Michael Cohen ever since his guilty plea. Trump said that “If anyone is looking for a good lawyer, I would strongly suggest that you don’t retain the services of Michael Cohen!”
Trump even went on to say that Cohen is making up stories of hush money to get a deal from his prosecutors. Earlier, Donald Trump had referred to Robert Muller’s Russian probe as the “the single greatest witch hunt of a politician in American history” citing that the ‘Trump campaign collusion’ with Russia is a hoax.
However, now that Cohen has accepted his felonies, the ‘hoax’ and the ‘witch hunt’ might go against Trump and his statement may haunt him. Furthermore, if the Democrats win a majority in the House of Representatives in the November 2018 midterm elections, Donald Trump may face possible impeachment. What started as the reign of the forty-fifth President of the United States could end disgracefully for Trump.
The writer is a columnist and author of You Rise Today
Published in Daily Times, August 27th 2018.