Michael Cohen admits he paid tech firm to rig online polls for Donald Trump in 2014 and 2015
- Donald Trump’s ex-lawyer Michael Cohen reportedly had a tech firm fake votes for Trump in polls of potential presidential candidates and top business leaders
- Cohen is said to be reconsidering his plan to testify publicly to Congress in February because of intimidation by the president, an adviser said
US President Donald Trump’s estranged former lawyer said on Thursday he paid a technology company to rig Trump’s standing in two online polls before the presidential campaign.
Michael Cohen, who is said to be reconsidering his plan to testify publicly to Congress next month because of intimidation by the president, tweeted that “what I did was at the direction of and for the sole benefit of” Trump.
“I truly regret my blind loyalty to a man who doesn’t deserve it,” he said.
Cohen was responding to an article in The Wall Street Journal that said Cohen stiffed the owner of the technology company out of tens of thousands of dollars he promised for work that included using a computer script to enter fake votes for Trump in a 2014 CNBC poll asking people to identify top business leaders and a 2015 poll of potential presidential candidates.
Donald Trump ‘not worried’ about ‘rat’ former lawyer Michael Cohen testifying before Congress
The company owner, John Gauger, told the newspaper that Cohen promised him US$50,000 for the work but instead gave him a blue Walmart bag stuffed with between US$12,000 and US$13,000 in cash, plus a boxing glove Cohen claimed had been worn by a Brazilian mixed-martial arts fighter.
Cohen disputed he paid cash, telling the paper that “all monies paid to Mr Gauger were by cheque”. He offered no further comment.
Federal prosecutors referred to a payment to Gauger’s company – though not by name – when Cohen was charged last summer with violating campaign-finance laws by arranging hush-money payments to two women who claim they had extramarital affairs with Trump.
They said in a charging document that Cohen had been reimbursed by the Trump Organisation for payments to the women, plus US$50,000 for “tech services” that he requested in a handwritten note.
Messages seeking comment were sent to the Trump Organisation Thursday.
Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, said the president “had no knowledge” of any effort to manipulate polling data on his behalf.
He called Cohen a “liar” and a “thief” for seeking reimbursement for more money than he’d paid Gauger’s company, RedFinch Solutions LLC.
Gauger is also the chief information officer at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia. His lawyer declined to comment.
Cohen was recently sentenced to three years in prison after pleading guilty to tax crimes, bank fraud and campaign violations that were not related to his dealings with Gauger and the technology company. He is expected to report to prison in March.
Lanny Davis, an attorney who has been advising Cohen on his media strategy, said in an interview with MSNBC that some remarks made by the Republican president about Cohen amounted to witness tampering and deserved to be criminally investigated.
“There is genuine fear and it has caused Michael Cohen to consider whether he should go forward or not, and he has not made a final decision,” Davis said.
Last week Cohen agreed to appear before a congressional panel on February 7.
Additional reporting by Reuters
