The Only Discernible Crime In Trump Trial Is Michael Cohen Admitting To Stealing $30,000
The only discernible crime in Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s lawfare case against former President Donald Trump is that the star witness, convicted liar Michael Cohen, admitted Monday on the stand that he stole from the Trump Organization because he was “angry.”
Cohen admitted that in 2017 he asked Trump Organization Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg for $50,000 to pay back tech firm RedFinch. Cohen paid the firm $20,000 but pocketed $30,000 for himself because he was “angry” that he didn’t get the bonus from Trump that he thought he deserved, according to Deadline.
“You stole from the Trump organization, right?” Blanche asked according to MSNBC.
“Yes, sir,” Cohen testified.
“You did steal from the Trump Organization based upon the expected reimbursement, correct?” Blanche pressed.
“Yes, sir,” Cohen testified, according to MSNBC.
Cohen later testified that the amount he stole was double than what he originally claimed because he was given money to account for taxes.
In fact, Cohen’s admission is “more serious of a crime than falsifying business records,” CNN’s Senior Legal Analyst Elie Honig said.
“The money that Michael Cohen stole from under Donald Trump’s nose by his own admission, was part of the $420,000 that Michael Cohen was reimbursed for Stormy Daniels,” Honig explained. “So the heart of the prosecution’s case is, that whole setup where they were going to repay Michael Cohen $420,000 to reimburse him for Stormy Daniels, that was all done to pay Stormy Daniels. Trump knew it, Trump knew every penny — that’s why he’s guilty. Now it turns out Trump is getting robbed by his own guy.”
Fox News contributor Jonathan Turley also called the development a hit “below the waterline for Cohen but also the prosecutors.”
“They had a man admitting to a major larceny but never charged Cohen. That made Cohen not only their man, but allowed him to keep stolen money,” Turley posted on X.
At the heart of this lawfare case against Trump is claims that payments allegedly made to Cohen to purchase the silence of on-screen prostitute Stormy Daniels should have been classified as campaign expenses rather than legal fees. Former Biden Department of Justice official Matthew Colangelo claimed during opening statements of the trial that “this was a planned, long-running conspiracy to influence the 2016 election, to help Donald Trump get elected through illegal expenditures to silence people who had something bad to say about his behavior.”
But Cohen’s testimony has only further driven a hole into Bragg’s allegations.
Cohen testified last week that when allegations first surfaced in 2011 about the affair, Trump was concerned that the story would hurt his family.
“The first thing that President Trump said to you was that his family wouldn’t like [the story] very much?” Blanche asked.
“That’s true,” Cohen testified.
Brianna Lyman is an elections correspondent at The Federalist.
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