President Trump on Friday said former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani didn’t join his legal team until Thursday and “will get his facts straight” about a payment made to adult actress Stormy Daniels during the 2016 election, seemingly walking back what Giuliani told reporters earlier this week.
“This is a witch hunt. He understands this probably better than anybody … but when he made certain statements – he just started yesterday,” Trump told reporters at the White House prior to leaving for a trip to Dallas.
Minutes later, Trump made additional comments to reporters gathered at Andrews Air Force Base for his Air Force One departure, telling them Giuliani “wasn’t totally familiar with everything” that led his personal attorney to pay Daniels $130,000 to keep her from talking about an alleged affair with Trump in 2006.
Giuliani had told Fox News’ Sean Hannity in a bombshell interview Wednesday evening that Trump repaid Cohen in $35,000 installments for the money he wired to Daniels. In April, Trump said he was not aware of Cohen’s payments to Daniels, and Guiliani said Trump only learned about the payments about 10 days earlier. Giuliani also said he believed Trump repaid the money to Cohen without knowing the exact reason for the reimbursement.
Giuliani said in a series of subsequent interviews that he and Trump consulted before his appearance on “Hannity” and there was “no daylight” between them.
But the president told reporters on Friday that the former federal prosecutor would “get his facts straight” going forward.
“He just started yesterday. He’ll get his facts straight. He’s a great guy,” Trump said.
Friday was the first time Trump spoke publicly about the Cohen case since Giuliani spoke about it with more than a half-dozen national media outlets. The president said he plans to release a list soon of the dates surrounding the payment to Daniels in order to clear him of any wrongdoing.
“You’re going to find out, because we’re going to give a full list,” Trump said Friday, responding to a question about when he first learned of the six-figure payment to Daniels.
