In an exclusive interview, Michael Cohen’s lawyer, Michael Monico reveals for the first time a 2017 check signed by key Trump figures allegedly linked to criminal payments to Stormy Daniels.
Monico walked "The Beat" host Ari Melber through why he thought the check is important: "When Michael Cohen went to see the president for the first time in the White House in February of 2017 and the president, as you may recall his testimony, that he looked at all the lovely art. And the president was proud of the whole scene and it was very awesome as Mr. Cohen said. The president said to Michael at that time, 'You will be getting the two checks soon.' The two checks meaning the two $35,000 checks. Because as you may recall, Alan Weisselberg said that instead of paying the entire [money] in one lump sum, he wanted to pay it over the course of a year, $35,000 even each... month.. And so, this check, the $70,000 check, which is signed, according to my client, by Alan Weisselberg and Donald Trump, Jr., that this check was the first check."
The check, according to Monico, was not presented at the recent hearing. "We didn't have it at the time. We have it today." The check was issued from the Donald J. Trump revocable trust, "a revocable trust that was theoretically begun so that the president would have some separation between his life as a politician and his life as a civil servant."
Monico, a former federal prosecutor, believes that the checks his client Cohen presented into evidence to Congress "would be the most damning legally." "The fact that the president of the United States wrote a check as president to Michael Cohen that was part of a scheme to violate campaign finance violations and to violate the rights of the American [people]."