Rudy Giuliani, a member of President Trump’s legal team, suggested that Trump was involved in the Department of Justice’s decision about the AT&T merger with Time Warner by saying Trump “denied the merger.”
“Whatever lobbying was done didn’t reach the president,” Giuliani said in an interview with the Huffington Post. “He did drain the swamp … The president denied the merger. They didn’t get the result they wanted.”
The comments come after it was revealed the telecommunications giant paid Essential Consultants, a company Trump’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen established and used to pay porn star Stormy Daniels $130,000 right before the 2016 election in exchange for her silence over an alleged affair with Trump, a total of $600,000 and outlined that Cohen would consult them on the potential merger with Time-Warner, according to a Washington Post report.
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders contradicted Giuliani, saying the Justice Department blocked the merger. “The Department of Justice denied the deal,” she said, according to CNN.
Giuliani later walked back his comments, telling CNN that Trump “didn’t interfere.”
On Friday, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said in a memo to company employees that hiring Cohen was a “big mistake.”
“Our company has been in the headlines for all the wrong reasons these last few days, and our reputation has been damaged,” Stephenson wrote. “Our Washington D.C., team’s vetting process clearly failed, and I take responsibility for that.”
AT&T revealed Wednesday that special counsel Robert Mueller’s team reached out to them and that they “cooperated fully” with the probe. Additionally, AT&T confirmed earlier this week it had hired Essential Consultants to “provide insights into understanding the new administration.”
AT&T reportedly hired Cohen shortly after Trump’s inauguration. The Trump administration blocked the AT&T-Time Warner merger in November.
