Donald Trump’s Been Using Same Legal Strategy for Almost a Decade: Cohen

Ex-President Donald Trump has been using the same legal strategy for nearly a decade, his former fixer Michael Cohen testified during Trump’s criminal trial.

Since leaving the White House, Trump has become embroiled in numerous lawsuits, including four criminal indictments, one of which is unfolding in Manhattan Criminal Court. For the last four weeks, the former president has been standing trial, accused of 34 felony charges tied to hush money paid ahead of the 2016 presidential election. Trump has pleaded not guilty.

Cohen, Trump’s friend-turned-foe, is the star witness in the case. On Monday, Cohen was called as one of the final witnesses for the district attorney’s office, and while testifying, he said that Trump’s been relying on the same legal strategy since 2016.

Although Trump’s legal problems vary widely, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee has purportedly deployed the same tactic to fend them off: delay. Legal commentators have said that Trump and his legal team have been attempting to delay his legal issues until after the 2024 election, given the number of lengthy, last-minute filings and appeal requests.

Cohen on Monday testified that Trump’s pattern of pushing for delays in his legal headaches started before his presidency.

While on the stand, Cohen said that while he was tasked with resolving the issue of adult-film actress Stormy Daniels, the former Trump lawyer had no intention to actually see his promises through.

Cohen testified that less than a month before the 2016 election, he was informed that Daniels—who alleges to have had a sexual encounter with Trump in 2006—was shopping around her story. As the man who became famous for doing almost anything to protect his then-boss, Cohen identified Daniels as posing a “disaster” of a threat to Trump’s presidential campaign.

Cohen said that when he spoke to Trump, he was simply asked to “get control” over the situation and “just get past the election,” because if Trump won, he’d be the president and it wouldn’t matter, and if he lost, he wouldn’t care. “Following directions,” Cohen said that he simply tried to keep pushing off actually having to pay Daniels, then agreed upon $130,000 for the life rights to her story about Trump.

Cohen had worked out a deal with Daniels’ then-lawyer Keith Davidson, signing an agreement that included a punitive damage clause that Cohen drafted up and would require Daniels to pay $1 million every time she violated terms of the contract.

However, asked by prosecutor Susan Hoffinger if he ever planned to meet the October 14, 2016, funding deadline, Cohen said he did not, and that he was just trying to get until after Election Day, which fell on November 6.

He said he was doing what Trump had ordered him to do, which was “continue to delay, delay the execution of the documents, continue to delay the execution of funding.”

Cohen testified about one instance when he used the Yom Kippur holiday as yet another excuse not to pay Daniels the hush money. His account offered another narrative to the story Davidson told while he was on the stand two weeks ago.

During his testimony, Davidson said Cohen told him he couldn’t send the payment because his office was “for all purposes” closed for the Jewish holiday, which Davidson suspected was another effort from Cohen to “kick the can down the road until after the election.”

Cohen on Monday said this was the truth, telling the court, “My intent was to delay, as per Mr. Trump’s demands, and I clearly did not send funds to Mr. Davidson.”

However, the former Trump fixer would ultimately pay the $130,000 from his own pocket after Davidson informed him that the nonpayment had led Daniels to declare the settlement void and that Daniels was planning to sell her story to The Daily Mail.

“Because of the urgency that was happening … I ultimately said, ‘OK, I’ll pay it,'” Cohen said.

Cohen added that Trump had been “appreciative” and told him, “Don’t worry, you’ll get the money back.” But Cohen said he would not have done it if Trump hadn’t given him assurance about being reimbursed.

“I was doing everything I could and more in order to protect my boss—which is something I had done for a long time—but I would not lay out $130,000 for an NDA needed by somebody else,” Cohen said on the stand.

In January 2017, Cohen had still not been reimbursed and brought the matter to former Trump Organization Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg, who told him “let’s do it” and ultimately agreed with Trump that with other outstanding costs to Cohen, The Trump Organization would pay Cohen $35,000 a month for a year.

Cohen will return to the stand Tuesday to continue testimony on how he was paid and on the prosecution’s core allegation that Trump falsified business records documenting those payments to Cohen to hide another crime.