Republican Rep. Jim Jordan charged Wednesday that President Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen’s public testimony to the House Oversight Committee was a setup orchestrated by Lanny Davis, a former spokesman and lawyer to former President Bill Clinton, in a plot to impeach Trump.
Davis has served as Cohen’s attorney and adviser in recent months. Jordan, R-Ohio, said it was not a coincidence that “the first announced witness for the 116th Congress is a guy who is going to prison in two months for lying to Congress.”
[Watch: Michael Cohen testifies before House Oversight Committee]
Jordan argued in his opening statement at the hearing that the decision by Chairman Elijah Cummings, D-Md., to allow lawmakers to ask about the Russia investigation proves his point. Cummings said he would allow such questions because Cohen mentioned Russia in his opening statement.
“This is a Michael Cohen hearing presented by Lanny Davis,” Jordan said. “That’s right. Lanny Davis choreographed the whole darn thing, the Clinton’s best friend, loyalist, operative. Lanny Davis put this all together.”
“Certainly it’s the first time a convicted perjurer has been brought back to be a star witness in a hearing. And there’s a reason this is a first, because no other committee would do it. … But the Democrats don’t care. They don’t care. They just want to use you, Mr. Cohen. You’re their patsy today. They’ve got to find somebody somewhere to say something so they can try to remove the president from office.”
Jordan also argued that billionaire Tom Steyer, who is pushing for Trump’s impeachment, also played a role in Cohen’s appearance before the committee, and ranted about Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign connections to Fusion GPS, a firm that hired Christopher Steele to compile opposition research on Trump. Steele later compiled a dossier on Trump’s alleged connections to Russia.
“So now Clinton loyalist, Clinton operative Lanny Davis has persuaded the chairman of the Oversight Committee to give a convicted felon a forum to tell stories and lie about the president of the United States so they can all start their impeachment process,” Jordan said. “Mr. Chairman, we are better than this. We are better than this.”
Cohen appeared behind closed doors before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Tuesday, and is scheduled to privately testify to the House Intelligence Committee on Thursday.
