February 27, 2019

PRIDE OF THE DEPLORABLES (profanity alert):

Michael Cohen Plans to Call Trump a 'Con Man' and a 'Cheat' in Congressional Testimony (Nicholas Fandos and Maggie Haberman, Feb. 26, 2019, NY Times)

"Mr. Trump knew of and directed the Trump Moscow negotiations throughout the campaign and lied about it," Mr. Cohen will say. "He lied about it because he never expected to win the election. He also lied about it because he stood to make hundreds of millions of dollars on the Moscow real estate project." [...]

Mr. Cohen will also tell Congress that Mr. Trump had advance knowledge through his longtime adviser Roger J. Stone Jr. that WikiLeaks would publish hacked emails that would damage his opponent, Hillary Clinton.

"In July 2016, days before the Democratic convention, I was in Mr. Trump's office when his secretary announced that Roger Stone was on the phone. Mr. Trump put Mr. Stone on the speakerphone," his written remarks say. "Mr. Stone told Mr. Trump that he had just gotten off the phone with Julian Assange and that Mr. Assange told Mr. Stone that, within a couple of days, there would be a massive dump of emails that would damage Hillary Clinton's campaign. Mr. Trump responded by stating to the effect of 'wouldn't that be great.'"

Mr. Stone, who was recently indicted on charges that include witness tampering and false statements to Congress, has denied to reporters that such a conversation took place. The recent indictment against him made no mention of such a conversation, but it did state that a senior campaign official was directed to contact Mr. Stone around that period of time about what material WikiLeaks had.

And Mr. Cohen will reference a conversation he claims to have observed between the president's eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., and his father, which he believes happened around the time of a planned meeting with a Russian lawyer promising "dirt" on Hillary Clinton.

He does not claim to have heard a direct reference to the meeting. Instead, Mr. Cohen will say, he recalled this event after The Times revealed the June 2016 meeting had taken place.

"I recalled Don Jr. leaning over to his father and speaking in a low voice, which I could clearly hear, and saying, 'The meeting is all set.' I remember Mr. Trump saying, "O.K. good ... let me know,'" Mr. Cohen will say. [...]

Mr. Cohen will chronicle less legally dubious but unflattering encounters, as well, according to the prepared remarks. He plans to say that as a candidate, Mr. Trump directed him to write letters to his high school, college and other entities threatening them not to release transcripts of his standardized test scores.

He will claim that Mr. Trump asked him to put off reporters asking about his medical deferment from the Vietnam draft, telling Mr. Cohen privately that there were no medical records of the bone spurs that he has said affected his heel.

"You think I'm stupid? I wasn't going to Vietnam," Mr. Trump said, according to Mr. Cohen.

And he will assert that "it was my experience" that Mr. Trump inflated his wealth to garner attention, and deflated his assets to lower his tax bills. [...]

Detailing the hush money payments to the actress that Mr. Cohen was reimbursed for, he will state the affair as fact and will say that lying to Mr. Trump's wife, Melania, is something he deeply regrets. "She is a kind, good person," he will say. "I respect her greatly, and she did not deserve that."

Posted by at February 27, 2019 12:00 AM

  

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