Is Trump Throwing Michael Cohen Under The Bus With ‘Tiny Fraction’ Jibe?

Michael Cohen Image by Gettty Images

By Dave Goldiner April 26, 2018

Is this what President Trump throwing you under the bus sounds like?

Trump pointedly distanced himself on Thursday from the legal troubles of his longtime personal attorney Michael Cohen, saying he had done nothing wrong and Cohen did only a “tiny fraction” of his overall legal work.

“This doesn’t have to do with me. Michael is a businessman. He’s got a business. He also practices law,” Trump said in an interview with Fox News. “And they’re looking at something having to do with his business. I have nothing to do with his business.”

Asked how much legal work Cohen did for him, Trump said, “As a percentage of my overall legal work, a tiny, tiny little fraction.”

The remark seemed similar to Trump’s downplaying of the stature of other top aides who were later acrimnoniously ousted from his orbit, such as onetime campaign chief Paul Manafort and firebrand White House political supremo Steve Bannon.

Trump also appeared to contradict himself when he conceded that Cohen represented him in the “crazy” Stormy Daniels case. She is an adult-film star who says she had a one-night stand with Trump in 2006.

Trump earlier denied any knowledge of a $130,000 payment made by Cohen to Daniels before the 2016 election.—With Reuters

Mr. Trump and Mr. Cohen previously represented to the American people that Mr. Cohen acted on his own and Mr. Trump knew nothing about the agreement with my client, the $130k payment, etc. As I predicted, that has now been shown to be completely false. #basta

— Michael Avenatti (@MichaelAvenatti) April 26, 2018

Dave Goldiner is the Forward’s director of digital media. Dave is a veteran journalist who has spent two decades working at newspapers in the United States and Africa. A native New Yorker, Goldiner wrote for the New York Daily News, where he covered some of the biggest stories of our time, including the attacks of September 11, along with thousands of stories of hope and heartbreak. He also studied and worked in Southern Africa and has written for publications in South Africa and Zimbabwe. He holds masters degrees in journalism and public administration from Columbia University. Dave can be reached at [email protected], or follow him on Twitter @davegoldiner

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO