Michael Cohen On Trump Probe: Everyone In The Company Lied For Donald

Michael Cohen is Donald Trump's former personal attorney. In August 2018, he pleaded guilty to eight federal charges, including campaign finance violations related to hush payments he made to adult film actress Stormy Daniels during the 2016 election. He also cooperated with the Manhattan District Attorney. the same office that convened that special grand jury against the

trump

organization after he spent more than a year in prison, wrote a memoir about his work for

donald

trump

titled disloyal and now hosts the podcast maya culpa with

michael

cohen

and now joins my. have you here and I thought maybe we could start with you explaining what is, I think, to some people, a new character in this story, I know I noticed in your congressional testimony, you talked about Jeff McConnelly, the controller, but who Is he and what role does he play in the organization?

So I guess the easiest way to explain it is to put it in an example and that would be assuming that he is like a small bank. Donald Trump would be the president of the bank. Alan Weisselberg would be the branch manager and Jeff McConnelly would be the teller. Every transaction that was made in and out of any bank went through Jeff Makani. He worked specifically and directly for Alan Weisselberg, so he's as interesting and revealing as he is. he's directly under weizenberg, he's a direct subordinate to wyle soberg, he's doing the kind of transactions that he runs so they all come from him even though he's not the kind of authority that signs off on that, oh that's it right, the only person.

The one who can approve anything would be Donald himself and it would come through Allen's desk, that's why I said that every transaction went through Allen's desk, but then they were entered or taken out of the bank accounts through Jeff McConney, so we. I'm looking at this, I mean what was going through your head when you saw that news about Makani and what it would mean for both Trump and Weisselberg, yeah, it's not good news, it's not good news for Donald, it's not good news for the organization. Trump and it's definitely not good news for alan weisselberg and this is why

everyone

is holding their ground, you want to stay on message which is what

donald

tells them to do until the moment they drop the bomb on you i.e.

Yes, it was like that for me. The truth is that in this case it will be the district attorney or the attorney general, whether for Jeff McConney or Alan Weisselberg. The problem is that they have so much documentary evidence in their possession that it doesn't matter what lies you try to promote. You're going to meet resistance because there are documents that show exactly the opposite, and of course, if you lie to them, they'll penalize you with another infraction and it'll be another crime, so things don't look very good for you, you know? Trump for Weisselberg or even Jeff McConnelly right now, well, I mean you're the only person in the world who probably has the best subjective access to the psychological experience of this particular squeeze.

I mean, they're kind of re -running the play here um and I'm wondering what you were like and what you were like as we look at Alan Weisselberg there and he obviously looks like an unhappy camper because he's being, you know, a journalist asking him and his eyes of the world. are on him, but can you explain what your own subjective experience of feeling that pressure was and how that drove your calculus in decision-making? Well, Chris, you have to remember that I didn't have the luxury that they have, which is days and weeks. and then mine arrived on a Friday night at 5:30 p.m. m. with a demand that if I didn't go and plead guilty on a Monday, they would file an 85 page indictment that would include my wife and I not going.

Even risk any opportunity there, but they come with so much pressure, they come with so much force that it doesn't matter who you are, it doesn't matter, you can't oppose it and that's exactly the pressure they're going to put on Weisselberg. when people say oh alan isn't going to fool alan no this is not about fooling people it's about telling the truth and the problem like i said and you used it in the clip

everyone

lied

for donald i wasn't just me, it was the whole

company

it was don jr ivanka eric jared you know, alan, whatever, um, the lawyers, everyone in the

company

lied

for Donald because that's how the company operated, so now, when you have someone like Alan who is trying to shut up, won't work because everyone around you will be forced to tell the truth and the truth doesn't ignore for any of its benefits, that's a great point and the point I was going to drive to. is that you know the pressure works because the underlying behavior here is a seems like a pretty systematic behavior here i.e. charitably in a gray area charitably unethical or maybe actually a criminal and you know it, so it's true, I mean, that's the problem here is the conduct within the registries and how people are operating on their own, it's quite problematic, yes of course it is problematic, but remember that Donald was very smart in terms of listening to the only person who I think he listened all his life all the time and that was Roy Cohn telling Donald to make sure. that you don't have fingerprints on anything, which is why Donald never had an email address, but then again, what's the problem?

The document is the document and the fact that it was sent to me or Rona Graf or Alan. garten or alan weisselberger whoever in the company it makes no difference it's about hey take this to donald ask him what he thinks you would take it to donald he would tell you what he thought and then you would do what they told you to do. go see who I most needed to see and that's how transactions work there, every transaction, from the acquisition of a pen to the acquisition of property, had to be approved by Donald first, let me ask you, uh uh.

I want to play this clip of Stormy Daniels. You gave an interview. Obviously, it was her-to-her payments that you were involved in, which were the kind of things that you pleaded guilty to in federal court that you were involved in. That gave them the influence they had and, uh, what she had to say today, listen. Have you been called to testify before this Manhattan grand jury? I haven't been called to testify yet, but I have been very communicative from the beginning. This thing that I would love nothing more than to have my day in court and give a statement and provide whatever evidence they need for me.

What do you think about that? Oh, good for her, you know she has the right to her voice, she has the right to be heard, uh. The bottom line is that I was watching social media all day today attacking her based on her job, you know, and what she does for a living, and I'm not really sure I understand why people have to equate what she she does. make a living by being honest, telling the truth and again providing documentary evidence that demonstrates the truth of what the district attorney and the attorney general are looking to, you know, obtain, so I don't really understand that you might not like what they she does, but that is neither here nor there when it comes to telling the truth, the information she seeks to provide is supported not only by other corroborating testimony but also by documentary evidence, so you know that this now it's really for the district attorney's office as a whole.

With Tish James, the attorney general's office, it's all about them producing and conducting an investigation the way they do and I'm pretty sure it won't be for the benefit of Trump, the Trump organization and many others. individuals because the truth does not help them