Michael Cohen, Donald Trump’s ex-lawyer, is giving dramatic testimony before the House Oversight Committee and has told the congressional panel the president “is a racist, a conman and a cheat”.
Cohen said: “I am ashamed that I chose to take part in concealing Mr. Trump’s illicit acts rather than listening to my own conscience.”
He also says Mr. Trump knew that political consultant Roger Stone was in discussion with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange about the site’s access to stolen Democratic National Committee emails.
Cohen says that he lied previously to protect the president. But: “I am not protecting the president anymore.”
Cohen says the Trump Moscow tower project would have been the largest building in Europe.
Cohen added that Donald Trump wanted his wealth to rise each year on the Forbes list of richest people.
He says that Mr. Trump’s employees were instructed to inflate the worth of his assets in order to do so.
Cohen notes that the Access Hollywood case came out right before Karen MacDougal and Stormy Daniels became issues for the campaign.
He confirmed that Donald Trump wrote him a cheque from his personal account to reimburse him for hush money payments to Stormy Daniels. The cheque was cut while Mr. Trump was president.
Cohen says that the payments were designed to be made over 12 months, and described as a retainer of services. Cohen said there is no retainer agreement, however.
He added that “nothing went on in Trump world” or the campaign without the president being aware of it.
That means, he said, that Mr. Trump was aware of meetings between Russians and the Trump campaign with regards to email hacks from the Hillary Clinton campaign.
Cohen says that the president said that he did not receive a surgery for bone spurs, which says allowed him to stay out of the Vietnam War.
“I find it ironic Mr. President that you are in Vietnam right now,” he said.