Michael Dean Cohen (born 1966/67) is an American attorney who works as a lawyer and spokesperson for U.S. President Donald Trump. Prior to this appointment he was Executive Vice-President of the Trump Organization and special counsel to Trump. Cohen also previously served as co-president of Trump Entertainment and a member of the board of the Eric Trump Foundation, a children's health charity. He joined the Trump Organization after having been a partner at Phillips Nizer.
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Early life and education
Cohen grew up on Long Island. His mother was a nurse, and his father, who survived the Holocaust, was a surgeon. He received his B.A. from American University and his J.D. from Thomas M. Cooley Law School, a then-autonomous institution that has served as the law school of Western Michigan University since 2014. He is Jewish.
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Career
Cohen volunteered for the 1988 presidential campaign of Michael Dukakis, was a legislative intern for Congressman Joe Moakley, and voted for Barack Obama in 2008, though he later became disappointed with Obama. He also ran for New York City Council in 2003 as a Republican and briefly campaigned for a seat in the New York State Senate in 2010. He was a registered Democrat, until he officially registered as a Republican on March 9, 2017.
While an executive at the Trump Organization, Cohen was known as Trump's "pit bull." In late 2011, when Trump was publicly speculating about running for the 2012 Republican Party presidential nomination, Cohen co-founded the website "Should Trump Run?" to draft Trump into entering the race.
A video of an interview of Cohen by CNN's Brianna Keilar went viral, in which Cohen said "Says who?" several times in response to Keilar's statement that Trump was behind in all of the polls.
Cohen defended Trump against charges of antisemitism.
In 2015, in response to an inquiry by reporter Tim Mak of the Daily Beast concerning rape allegations by Ivana Trump about her then husband Donald Trump (later recanted), Cohen said:
"I'm warning you, tread very f---ing lightly, because what I'm going to do to you is going to be f---ing disgusting."
The unverified Donald Trump-Russia dossier that was published in January 2017 said that Cohen had met with Russian officials in Prague in 2016; Cohen denied this.
In late January 2017, Cohen met with Ukrainian opposition politician Andrey Artemenko and Felix Sater at the Loews Regency in Manhattan to discuss a plan to lift sanctions against Russia. The proposed plan would require that Russian forces withdraw from eastern Ukraine and that Ukraine hold a referendum on whether Crimea should be "leased" to Russia for 50 or 100 years. Cohen was given a written proposal in a sealed envelope that he delivered to then-National Security Advisor Michael T. Flynn in early February.
On April 3, 2017, Cohen was appointed a National Deputy Finance Chairman of the Republican National Committee.
In May 2017, amidst expanding inquiries into alleged Russian interference in the 2016 US election, two congressional panels asked Cohen to provide information about any communications he had with people connected to the Russian government.
He was a co-founder, along with Darrell C. Scott, of the National Diversity Coalition for Trump.
In October 2017, McClatchy DC reported that Cohen had sold four properties at above market values to unknown buyers. Experts on money laundering said that the sales raised red flags.
Payment to Stormy Daniels
In January 2018, the Wall Street Journal reported Cohen used Essential Consultants LLC and pseudonyms to pay, in October 2016 prior to the presidential election, adult film actress Stormy Daniels regarding an alleged affair she had with Trump in 2006. Cohen told The New York Times in February 2018 that the $130,000 was paid to Daniels from his own pocket, that it was not a campaign contribution, and that he was not reimbursed for making it by either the Trump Organization or the Trump campaign. The Washington Post later noted that, by stating that he used his own money to "facilitate" the payment, Cohen was not ruling out the possibility that Trump, as an individual, reimbursed Cohen for the payment. NBC News reported that Cohen initiated a private arbitration case against Daniels on February 27, 2018, and obtained a restraining order that states that Daniels will face penalties if she discusses in public her alleged relationship with Trump.
On March 5, the Wall Street Journal cited anonymous sources recounting Cohen as saying he missed two deadlines to pay Daniels because Cohen "couldn't reach Mr. Trump in the hectic final days of the presidential campaign", and that after Trump's election, Cohen had complained that he had not been reimbursed for the payment. Cohen described this report as "fake news".
On March 9, NBC News reported that Cohen had used his Trump Organization email to negotiate with Daniels regarding her nondisclosure agreement, and that Cohen had used the same Trump Organization email to arrange for a transfer for funds which would eventually lead to Daniels' payment. In response, Cohen acknowledged that he had transferred funds from his home equity line of credit to the LLC and from the LLC to Daniels' attorney.
On March 26, David Schwarz, a lawyer for Cohen, told ABC's Good Morning America that Daniels was lying in the 60 Minutes interview. A cease-and-desist letter was sent by Cohen's lawyer claiming Daniels' statements constituted "libel per se and intentional infliction of emotional distress" to Cohen.
Personal life
Before joining the Trump Organization, he bought several homes in Trump's buildings.
References
External links
- LinkedIn page
- Media related to Michael D. Cohen at Wikimedia Commons
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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