Trump attorney says Cohen ‘completely collapsed’ on stand in hush money case
An attorney for former President Trump suggested on Sunday the former president’s defense team no longer needs to question Michael Cohen’s testimony after he “completely collapsed” on the stand last week.
Cohen, Trump’s onetime fixer and attorney, took the witness stand last week in the former president’s hush money trial and was later grilled by Trump’s defense team during cross-examination.
“Michael Cohen, I believe, has just completely collapsed on the stand under withering cross-examination by President Trump’s trial team,” attorney Will Scharf said on “Fox News Sunday.” “So, at this moment, I don’t think there’s any further need to call into question Michael Cohen’s credibility because I think he has none.”
Cohen was widely expected to be the prosecution’s star witness for the hush money case, in which Trump faces 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. The charges center around reimbursements made to Cohen for a payment he made to adult film actress Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 election to stay quiet about an alleged affair.
The former president has pleaded not guilty to the charges and has denied any affair.
“Fox News Sunday” anchor Shannon Bream asked Scharf about the potential for Robert Costello, a former legal adviser to Michael Cohen, to take the stand. Last week, Costello told Fox News that he believed he should be called to testify, and he alleged that Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s legal team was not interested in the exculpatory information he provided.
Scharf suggested testimony from Costello would deal a final blow to Cohen’s credibility.
“I think based on Costello’s public statements and also his testimony before Congress, he would absolutely undercut any remaining credibility of Michael Coehn and therefore, key parts of the prosecution’s case,” he said.
Scharf, also a Republican candidate for Missouri’s attorney general, argued the prosecution has so far “abjectly failed to prove their case” against the former president.
“I think any fair jury reviewing the record, would immediately and unanimously vote to acquit in terms of whether witnesses will be called, including President Trump,” he said. “That’s something that the defense team is going to have to think about after the prosecution rests. But as of now, to me this looks like a directed verdict or at the very least, an absolute acquittal just based on the prosecution’s total failure to prove anything, even approximating the crime.”