I find this one of the most bizarre stories of the last year—needless to say, that’s saying something!
I can’t decide between
A) Cohen really is that much of an idiot
B) He’s getting ahead of this coming out
C) He’s sacrificing himself to give Trump some respite from other bad news.
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we can get back to who paid for it later…at the moment, I would like on the record why Mr. Cohen paid a port star 130K, now that he admitted he did.
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I like multiple choice quizzes like this where all the answers are correct
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You figure it out, let me know. My reaction is still my first one when I read this last night: WTF?!?
And also, I hope this doesn’t interfere with the entire criminal organization known as the Trump administration going down in flames; I’ve been really looking forward to that.
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Cohen’s statement states that he used his own money to facilitate the payment and that he was not reimbursed by the Trump campaign which leaves a whole universe of people who could have reimbursed him. The headlines say “Trumps lawyer paid Daniels out of his own pocket”. Wrong! Josh, your folks can do better than this.
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Does the Trump non disclosure agreement cover lawyers? I say we ask Ms Daniels about the veracity of this statement.
Ask her what services were rendered
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remember when Dowd claimed he wrote that bizarre text?
ETTD.
these guys are totally mobbed up - lieutenants, capos, etc.
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Hard to know what’s worst here.
- that trump was screwing a porn actress shortly after the birth of his son
- that trump paid her hush money to keep the news from the publi
- that his lawyer expects us to believe the nonsense he just put out
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None of this makes sense. If he asked for a non-disclosure agreement to protect trump, he was paying Daniels for her silence on behalf of representing a client (not a friend), as Daniels had no connection to Cohen otherwise. He’s hiding how he was reimbursed, which by itself seems proof of skirting campaign finance laws and probably a few other laws as well. He paid to keep her quiet and he didn’t do it out of the goodness of his heart.
Even if he paid her to keep quiet out of his own pocket, it was still an in-kind contribution on behalf of trump, whether it came from his own bank account, a private slush fund, PAC money or some other source. My guess is he paid for it with hush money under the table, didn’t report it on his taxes, or was money paid as a political contribution to the candidate and never reported it. Since he wasn’t considered on the trump campaign officially he wasn’t required to include the payment on any FEC filings because the campaign was responsible for that. Either way, it was essentially an in-kind contribution even if he never received remuneration because the value of that can be easily determined as there was literally a dollar amount attached to the NDA. Cohen is such a shifty disreputable character. He lies as easily as he breathes, which is why trump thinks so highly of him.
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Lets not bicker and argue about who killed who…
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Even the amounts are similar:
President Nixon, during a lengthy meeting in the Oval Office on March 21, 1973, told White House counsel John W. Dean III that “you have no choice but to come up with the $120,000” demanded as blackmail payment by one of the Watergate burglars, according to an edited transcript of the meeting.
I would have thought that inflation would make these kinds of hush money payments much more costly today.
The rest of the conversation is also eerily familiar:
In the ensuing discussion, the President went on to suggest that his personal attorney. Herbert W. Kalmbach, could be relied on to raise the money, that payments to the burglars could be made under the cover of a Cuban defense committee and that the facts could be concealed from a grand jury.
ETA:
Kalmbach was convicted and served 191 days in jail for his part in the scandal, and lost his license to practice law for a time…
Paying attention, Mikey?
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Every Republican is a liar of necessity, whose ideas are so universally bad that they’d garner 25% support max, if truthfully expressed. Rump’s enablers are truth tellers of necessity, who lie until they might perjure themselves. Cohen must be one of the lawyers who doesn’t want Rump speaking with Mueller, for fear he won’t know when the truth is necessary.
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"Neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with Ms. Clifford, and neither reimbursed me for the payment, either directly or indirectly,”
Trump welshes again, this time to his own lawyer.
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Cue John Kelly saying the payment was handled “just fine” in 3… 2…
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Huge tracts of land.
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It’s like when you and your friend are traveling, and you go through a drive-through to get a drink. And your friend buys the first time, and then the next time you stop, you pay. Sometimes, one of you pays as much as a dollar more than the other one paid.
It’s like that. Exactly like that. Exactly.
The deal was, that Trump would pay off the next hooker. Any questions?
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So does someone have some shit of him or is he getting a pay off to suddenly reveal. I guess he could have finally woken up to what a shitty president Donald is, but if he knew Donald at all he knew that all along. So seem like something must have happened to make him feel the need to reveal all of a sudden like this.
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His slippery verbiage doesn’t end there. This is masterful obfuscation. Notice that nothing, not the tiniest part of anything he says makes mention of Trump himself, or that alleged affair. And this clever quip…
"“Neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with Ms. Clifford, and neither reimbursed me for the payment, either directly or indirectly,”
Sounds pretty comprehensive, and it’s probably true. I’m sure he’d like that to be the end of the conversation. Except… it is based on the presumption that there are only two possible parties involved. Trump org. or Trump campaign.
This hush money payment may have been “facilitated” using his cash, and it’s probably true that neither Trump Org or Campaign reimbursed it in any way (because Cohen is smart enough to know that’s not a paper trail you want to leave open to legal wrangling).
Does he say anywhere that The Dotard didn’t reimburse him directly or indirectly? No he does not. So after reading between the lines, it looks to me like Cohen forked over a wad of cash to silence the Stormy (which is likely why she has since reversed her claim of an affair), then Orange Daddy Warbucks paid him back. With interest no doubt.
Cohen makes it seem that because neither the Trump Org or Campaign got involved, there’s nothing more to see here, move along. But um… why did he pay her $130,000? To be quiet? About what? I wish people would pay me off for non-existent reasons too! But it doesn’t work like that, does it.
So here’s the real picture:
We have a ‘Precedent’ in the White House who was humping a porn star while his wife was pregnant with their son, and whose lawyer paid off said porn star to the tune of $130,000 to keep quiet about it. And then the lies started.
It’s really that simple.
How is this any different in concept to the Monica Lewinsky scandal? President has sex with porn star, lies about it, essentially saying, “I did not have sex with that woman!”… oh please put him under oath!
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If he is saying he pays over $129k to people who have not had sex with Trump so they won’t talk about it, he can always send me a check.
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A close Trump advisor paying out of his own pocket? Has Donald taught him nothing?
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