WASHINGTON — Michael D. Cohen, President Trump’s onetime personal lawyer and fixer, told congressional investigators this year that his discussions with the president’s legal team about a potential pardon continued longer than previously known, newly released transcripts show. In a pair of private interviews in February and March, Mr. Cohen told the House Intelligence Committee that he had conversations about pardons with Jay Sekulow, a lawyer for Mr. Trump, until his decision in July 2018 to withdraw from a joint defense agreement with the president and his allies and begin cooperating with the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III. Mr. Cohen said that Mr. Sekulow told him that the president’s team was considering possible pardons for him and other witnesses because they could help to “shut down the inquiries and to shut the investigation down.”Mr. Cohen’s explosive claims about possible pardons in exchange for loyalty comport with earlier revelations that lawyers for Mr. Trump raised the prospect of pardons in 2017 with lawyers of two other former advisers tied up in the case. But despite prosecutors’ reliance on him, Mr. Cohen has also faced persistent questions about the extent of his truthfulness.

Source: New York Times May 20, 2019 22:38 UTC