FOX NEWS EXCLUSIVE: President Trump rips Cohen, says disgraced lawyer tried to ’embarrass me’
Trump, in Fox News interview, says he never ‘directed’ Michael Cohen ‘to do anything wrong’
President Trump, in his first interview since Michael Cohen was sentenced to prison, told Fox News on Thursday that he never directed his former fixer to do anything wrong and called Cohen’s allegations to the contrary an attempt to “embarrass” him.
“I never directed him to do anything wrong,” the president told host Harris Faulkner in an exclusive interview on Fox News’ “Outnumbered Overtime.” “Whatever he did, he did on his own.”
In the interview with Faulkner at the White House, Trump said he believes Cohen cut a deal with prosecutors to “embarrass me” in an attempt to get a lesser sentence.
“It’s a terrible system we have,” Trump said of such a deal.
Prosecutors echoed Cohen’s claim that Trump orchestrated payments to former Playboy model Karen McDougal and adult film actress Stormy Daniels.
But Trump insisted in Thursday’s interview that the Cohen payments were “not a campaign finance violation.” He has previously tweeted that they were a “simple private transaction.”
“What he did was all unrelated to me except for the two campaign finance charges that are not criminal and shouldn’t have been on there,” Trump said of Cohen and the campaign-finance charges. “They put that on to embarrass me.”
The president also took aim at the practice of taxpayer-funded settlement payments being paid to congressional staffers who accuse their bosses of harassment, asking why that’s not considered a campaign contribution.
“What about Congress where they have a slush fund and millions and millions of dollars is paid out each year?” he said. “They have a slush fund. Millions, they don’t talk about campaign finance, anything. Have you ever heard of campaign finance laws? Have they listed that on their campaign finance sheets? No.”
I never directed Michael Cohen to break the law. He was a lawyer and he is supposed to know the law. It is called “advice of counsel,” and a lawyer has great liability if a mistake is made. That is why they get paid. Despite that many campaign finance lawyers have strongly……
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 13, 2018
….stated that I did nothing wrong with respect to campaign finance laws, if they even apply, because this was not campaign finance. Cohen was guilty on many charges unrelated to me, but he plead to two campaign charges which were not criminal and of which he probably was not…
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 13, 2018
….guilty even on a civil basis. Those charges were just agreed to by him in order to embarrass the president and get a much reduced prison sentence, which he did-including the fact that his family was temporarily let off the hook. As a lawyer, Michael has great liability to me!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 13, 2018
Speaking to Faulkner, the president also addressed John Kelly’s departure as White House chief of staff, and his search for a replacement.
“I want somebody that’s strong but I want somebody that thinks like I do,” he said. “It’s my vision. It is my vision. After all, at the same time, I’m open to ideas.”
Asked what he loves about being president, Trump said, “I love getting things done for the people” but acknowledged it’s “a nasty job because I get hit so hard, so unfairly by so many.”
Fox News’ Kristin Brown contributed to this report.