The Senate Intelligence Committee has asked President Trump’s longtime personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, to testify in an open hearing on Oct. 25.
The invitation was extended on the same day that Cohen was supposed to give an interview to the committee. The committee hastily called off that interview after Cohen released a prepared opening statement to the media.
“The committee expects witnesses in this investigation to work in good faith with the Senate,” Chairman Richard Burr, R-N.C., and ranking member Mark Warner, D-Va., said in a statement after the interview was canceled.
Cohen’s attorney, Stephen Ryan, told The Washington Examiner that the invitation was accepted.
The prepared statement by Cohen denied any involvement in participating with any members of the “Russian Federation” either to hack any entity or to interfere with any election, and argued that the Russia investigations were based on politics more than fact.
“I’m also certain that there are some in this country who do not care about the facts, but simply want to politicize this issue, choosing to presume guilt – rather than presuming innocence – so as to discredit our lawfully elected president in the public eye and to shame his supporters in the public square … this is un-American,” Cohen wrote.
In late August, emails were released that showed Cohen had discussed the possibility of the Trump business organization working on a Trump Tower-like project in Moscow. The emails dated back to November of 2015.
Critics and political opponents of the president said the emails were proof against President Trump’s numerous statements that he never had any business dealings in Russia. For example, a tweet when Trump was president-elect on January 11 said, “Russia has never tried to use leverage over me. I HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH RUSSIA – NO DEALS, NO LOANS, NO NOTHING!”
Cohen and the Trump organization have said that they signed a nonbinding letter of intent to pursue the project, but later dropped it.
