In the era of Trump, it is hard to think of someone in his administration who has not been fired or charged with federal offenses.
The most recent Trump affiliate under fire is Michael Cohen.
Cohen is an attorney who works personally for Trump, but prior to his appointment, he worked as the Executive Vice President of the Trump Organization and worked special counsel to Trump as well. Previous to this, Cohen also served as co-president of Trump Entertainment and a member of the board to the Eric Trump Foundation, a children’s health charity.
In sum, Cohen has had multiple Trump ties prior to serving as a personal attorney to the president.
On Monday, April 9, a raid was conducted by FBI agents on Cohen’s offices and home.
The following Friday, April 13, the Department of Justice officially announced in a court filing that Cohen was “under criminal investigation” which investigated “acts of concealment” and “fraud” as part of an “ongoing grand jury investigation.”
Prior to the raid, prosecutors had obtained search warrants on multiple email accounts owned by Cohen.
During the raid, Trump was partaking in a photo-op back at the White House where he surrounded by senior military leaders in order to curate a response to the suspected chemical gas attack in Syria.
“I just heard that they broke into the office of one of my personal attorneys,” Trump said. “Good man. And it’s a disgraceful situation. It’s a total witch hunt.”
“It’s an attack on our country,” Trump said. “It’s an attack on what we all stand for.”
According to CNN, the FBI seized documents related to adult-film star Stormy Daniels who had been paid $130,000 to keep quiet about her alleged affair with Trump in 2006 years before his presidency.
Trump, as one could accurately guess, has denied any such knowledge of the affair Daniels alleges.
Earlier on Friday, April 13, Cohen had filed a motion which asked a federal judge to block the Department of Justice’s access to the documents seized in the raid until he was able to review them in order to determine what would be protected by attorney-client privilege.
After the raid, Cohen had been asked by the court to reveal with whom he had done legal work for in the past year. Similarly, those same individuals also would have been aware of the documents which were seized on April 9, the day of the raid.
Cohen then responded that he had worked for three people: Trump, Elliott Broidy, and an unnamed person.
Trump, of course, is the President of the United States, and Elliott Broidy is a Republican National Committee (RNC) fundraiser.
Cohen and his lawyers tried to prevent the public naming of the third unknown client and had hoped to write the name on a piece of paper and hand it to the judge to read privately.
However, Judge Kimba Wood ordered Cohen to say the client’s name in the open court. Cohen revealed Sean Hannity as the third client.
Of course, the question asks itself; what is Sean Hannity, a well-known Fox News host, doing that involved him with Cohen as a client?
Hannity seems to insist that his legal discussions with Cohen have been solely limited to the subjects of purchasing real estate.
“I’ve said many times on my radio show: I hate the stock market, I prefer real estate,” Hannity said. “Michael knows real estate.”
Aside from the perils of Hannity, during a visit with freshly-elected French President Emmanuel Macron, a reporter asked Trump whether or not he plans to pardon Michael Cohen.
He responded by calling the reporter’s question stupid.
Macron’s reaction of raised eyebrows and an uneasy smile can sum up the majority of the reactions to the Cohen affair currently circulating the newsrooms across the nation.
LOL: Watch Macron's face after Trump calls a reporter out for a "stupid question." pic.twitter.com/UrSMNJuo42
— Tim Young (@TimRunsHisMouth) April 24, 2018
