President Trump kept a low profile ahead of his campaign rally Tuesday, as one of his former associates was convicted of financial crimes and another was entering into a plea deal on offenses that included campaign finance violations involving his presidential bid.
Right as jurors in the trial of former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort reached a partial verdict, headlines blared that the president’s longtime personal attorney Michael Cohen entered into a plea deal with federal prosecutors, potentially affording him a limited jail sentence of three to five years for financial crimes that included campaign finance violations, bank fraud, and tax evasion.
Cohen had been investigated by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York for months over these allegations. The New York Times reported late Sunday that investigators were specifically looking into more than $20 million in loans to taxi businesses that Cohen owned and operated with a business partner. Manafort’s trial was the first related to the investigation into Russian meddling and possible collusion with the Trump campaign.
But it was news of charges involving a campaign finance violation that caught the attention of most legal experts on Tuesday.
“That’s the count to watch closely: payoffs to Stormy Daniels, payoffs through the National Enquirer, questions of whether quieting potential sources of embarrassment constitute illegal campaign activity,” said former U.S. Attorney Kendall Coffey, adding that Cohen’s plea deal “created a bad week for the White House” and may ensure the special counsel investigation “keeps going.”
[Opinion: Cohen’s plea could land Trump in the witness chair]
Cohen told friends last month that he was open to cooperating with the U.S. attorney’s office and special counsel Robert Mueller as part of the ongoing federal probe into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian officials.
“My wife, my daughter, and my son have my first loyalty and always will. I put my family and country first,” he told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos in July.
Tuesday’s plea agreement did not contain details about assisting the special counsel’s team, according to Fox News, but that does not preclude Cohen from cooperating in the future.
“They could absolutely say there’s no cooperation deal yet, and it would literally be true, but there’s a wink and a nod understanding that there’s probably going to be cooperation down the road,” Coffey said, adding that Mueller’s team is currently less likely to advertise cooperation with Cohen as they’re still “trying to entice Trump into an interview.”
No matter the terms, a plea deal between Cohen and federal investigators is likely to be seen as a huge threat to the president, whose legal team has struggled to provide definitive answers about his knowledge of a $130,000 payment to adult film star Stormy Daniels that was arranged weeks before the 2016 election to keep her from speaking out about their alleged affair.
Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani claimed earlier this summer that the president reimbursed Cohen for the payment, despite his client’s claim to the contrary, and added that it was “not campaign money” that was originally funneled to Daniels. Trump subsequently told reporters that Giuliani needed to “get his facts straight.
That Cohen surrendered himself and pleaded guilty Tuesday should worry the president and his team of lawyers, according to legal experts that warned of trouble for Trump if his former personal attorney and Manafort both become cooperating witnesses.
“Prosecutors could be saying, ‘Let’s get a guilty plea in place, see what kind of prison time there is, and then continue discussions about cooperation’” with Cohen, Coffey said.
Manafort, who joined the president’s 2016 campaign to help fend off a contested nominating convention, had spent four days awaiting a verdict at a federal court in Alexandria, Va. on 18 counts of tax evasion, bank fraud, and the failure to disclose foreign bank accounts. He is still scheduled to face a second trial in the D.C. District Court next month on charges of witness tampering, conspiracy to defraud the United States, failure to register as a foreign agent, and making false statements.
But Tuesday’s verdict — Manafort was found guilty on eight of the 18 charges he faced — could lead the former Trump aide to negotiate a plea deal ahead of his second trial. Doing so could potentially allow him to avoid a significantly lengthier prison time and reduce the money and time federal prosecutors would have otherwise spent attempting to prove his guilt in court.
The White House did not respond to a request for comment about Tuesday’s verdict in the Manafort case.
Trump allies claimed the latest developments involving Cohen and Manafort prove that Mueller and his team are ultimately trying to topple the president using his longtime associates and potentially his family.
“They’re going up the food chain: Manafort, Cohen, Don Jr., Jared [Kushner],” said former Trump campaign adviser Sam Nunberg, who claimed he wasn’t sure what Cohen might have to offer but “am happy he made some kind of deal.”
