Michael Cohen Says Trump Knew About the Infamous Trump Tower Meeting with a Russian Lawyer Offering Dirt on Clinton: Reports
Michael Cohen is claiming that President Donald Trump knew about the meeting that his son, son-in-law, and campaign chairman had with a Russian lawyer during the 2016 campaign in order to seek political dirt from the Russian government on Hillary Clinton, according to a new CNN report.
The report cites anonymous sources with knowledge of the matter. They say that Cohen is willing to speak to Mueller about his knowledge of the event.
NBC News quickly confirmed the report.
President Trump has denied having any meeting of the knowledge at the time. But according to the CNN report, Cohen says that not only did Trump know about the meeting at the time, but he approved it.
The existence of the meeting was revealed in June 2017 when Donald Trump Jr. released the emails he had sent setting up the meeting. Trump Jr. set up the meeting with Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya after being told that she could provide dirt on Clinton as part of the Russian government's efforts to help his father's campaign.
“If it's what you say, I love it, especially later in the summer," Trump Jr. said in response to the offer. He then set up a meeting with Veselnitskaya along with Jared Kushner and Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, who has since been indicted as a part of special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation.
"I cannot comment," said Lanny David, Cohen's lawyer, in a statement about the new report. "And I have to wonder why the Trump people put that out. It was not from us."
It was not clear if the president's team had leaked the information, though some speculated that they might have done so in order to get the story out on their own terms.
