Posted on 10/24/2023 1:07:20 PM PDT by thegagline
Cohen, during his testimony earlier today, tried to distance himself from "hush money" payments made to ex-Playboy model Karen McDougal — despite having previously admitted involvement in a guilty plea with federal prosecutors.
"I never paid Karen McDougal," he said Tuesday, while testifying that he had “complicity” in making hush money payments to Trump’s more well-known alleged lover, former porn star Stormy Daniels.
Trump's former personal attorney and "fixer" also claimed from the stand that he has never evaded taxes — despite pleading guilty to that charge as well at a 2018 hearing in Manhattan federal court. *** McDougal and Daniels were allegedly paid in 2016 to keep quiet about their claims that they had affairs with the then-Republican presidential candidate. Trump has long denied their claims.
The alleged payments are a key part of the Manhattan district attorney’s upcoming criminal trial against Trump. *** Cohen testified this morning that Trump coached him and others at the Trump Organization to “reverse-engineer” phony figures about the value of Trump’s real estate empire to meet the ex-president’s preferred totals.
“I was tasked by Mr. Trump to increase the total assets based upon a number that he arbitrarily elected, and my responsibility … was to reverse-engineer the various different asset classes and increase those assets in order to achieve a number that Mr. Trump had tasked us with,” Cohen said on the stand. ***
Cohen said he manipulated the totals on Trump’s financial filings with the help “predominately” of former Trump Org CFO Allen Weisselberg, who is a co-defendant in the New York attorney general’s civil suit.
AG counsel Colleen Flaherty then asked Cohen to clarify how he and Weisselberg decided what totals to include in the financial filings.
“Whatever number Mr. Trump told us to,” Cohen responded. ***
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
Cohen is an inveterate liar. Unfortunately, Judge Engoron probably won’t see it that way.
“Cohen testified this morning that Trump coached him and others at the Trump Organization to “reverse-engineer” phony figures about the value of Trump’s real estate empire to meet the ex-president’s preferred totals.”
Speaking as someone in the real estate industry, that’s not how this works. That’s not how any of this works. You can’t simply assign an “arbitrary” value to an asset and then come up with a post hoc justification for it. There are auditors who will demand backup, and if you can’t provide the backup, then your numbers are going to be scrutinized top to bottom.
I have dealt with many lawyers over the years, and the only ones who ever had any involvement in financial matters were the two who were also CPAs.
Who in their right mind would ever let their lawyer prepare their financial records? That’s like asking your accountant for medical advice.
And the lending institution didn’t do a valuation, and inspection? Review Trump Inc financials?
Mr. Trump has been under audit with the IRS for 8 years.
This is all male bovine excrement.
5.56mm
Agreed. However, I’ve had numerous clients ask me to do things outside the purview of me being their counsel.
Yes, Cohen is a proven liar. He went to prison for lying as he was charged with lying to Congress under the federal false-statements statute.
If the rat faced man (notice Chris Christie resembles an obese Cohen) cannot prove his statements, his statements should carry no weight toward the inquiry at hand, other than to pursue perjury charges against him.
What a joke...Cohen said the numbers were inflated to get a better position on Forbes list of rich folks.
“Cohen, Weisselberg, and Engoron“ is a good name for a Jewish law firm.
Cohen is an inveterate liar. Unfortunately, Judge Engoron probably won’t see it that way.>>> Trump really knows how to pick em.
Exactly. If any other politician chose people like Cohen, Pence, Barr, Bolton etc etc, they would be rightly excoriated as deep staters.
There is no honor among thieves, as they say.
The whole case is ridiculous, because no one was hurt at all. There is language in the statement that basically says, do not trust these estimated, and banks never do trust the estimates they receive from a borrower. In fact, I believe they downsized them from the estimates provided, and even with them downsized they approved the loans.
Pence, Barr, Bolton
Barr and bolton were employed by Previous Repub Administrations and Pence was the Chairman of the House Repub conference.
TRUMP HAS BEEN UNDER IRS AUDITS SINCE HIS FIRST RETURN EVER FILED
MUCH more than 8 years.
Yes, and to make a case that he could buy the Buffalo Bills. even though the judge agreed that that incident is well past any SOL, and no part of any legal case.
Actually, the bank did their due diligence and reversed their early reply and said they WOULD fund Trump.
Could be. My point was that even the judge agreed that the deal was outside the scope of the case before him.
If nothing else, Trump has surfaced the names and activity of scores of deep state swamp creatures. No one can say anymore that the deep state doesn’t exist, and that Washington is not a cesspool of corruption.
The judge is a liar and a fool, as are many of the judges currently involved in all these lawfare cases against Trump.
These judges need to end up in prison when everything is done. Justice won't be served until all these attempts to illegally harass Trump are punished.
This guy could say the sky is blue and I’d look out the window to be sure.
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