and the trump organization cfo allen weisselberg, is that correct? >> that is correct. >> according to the criminal charges against you, you sent monthly invoices containing false information to an individual identified as executive one. weisselberg is executive one, correct? >> yes. >> the criminal charge against you then states that executive one forwarded your invoice to someone referred to as executive two, presumably donald trump jr., who is signing this check as executive two. correct? >> i believe so. >> as federal prosecutors laid out in their criminal charges, payments like this check resulted in numerous false statements in the books and records of the trump organization. and it's important for the american public to understand this. nothing to do with collusion. this is financial fraud, garden variety financial fraud. it was disguised as a payment for legal services to you. but this was not a payment for legal services, was it, mr. cohen? >> no, sir. >> it could give rise to serious state and federal criminal liability if a corporation is c

myself and allen weisselberg went back to his office, and i was instructed by allen at the time that they were going to do this over 12 installments. and what he decided to do then was to have me send an invoice in which case they could have a check cut, and then, yes, the answer would be yes to your follow-up question. >> and donald trump jr. obviously signed off on this? >> yes. it would either be eric trump, donald trump jr., and/or allen weisselberg. but always allen weisselberg on the check. >> i just want the american public to understand the explosive nature of your testimony on this document. are you telling us, mr. cohen, that the president directed transactions in conspiracy with allen weisselberg and his son, donald trump jr., as part of a civil criminal -- as part of a criminal conspiracy of financial fraud? is that your testimony today? >> yes. >> and do you know if this criminal financial scheme that the president, allen weisselberg and donald trump jr. being involved in is being investigated by the southern district of new york? >> i'd rather not discuss that question

and i was at the time with allen weisselberg where he directed us to go become to mr. weisselberg's office and figure this all out. >> did the president call you to coordinate on public messaging about the payments to ms. cliffords in or around february 2018? >> yes. >> what did the president ask or suggest that you say about the payments or reimbursements? >> he was not knowledgeable of these reimbursements, and he wasn't knowledgeable of my actions. >> he asked you to say that? >> yes, ma'am. >> great. in addition to the personal check for $35,000 in july 2017, is there additional corroborating evidence that mr. trump while a sitting president of the united states directly reimbursed you hush money as part of a criminal scheme to violate campaign finance laws? there. >> are 11 checks that i received for the year. the reason why 11, because, as i stated before, one had two checks. >> and you have copies of all of those? >> i can get copies. i'd have to go to the bank. >> so we will be able to get copies of all 11 checks that mr. trump provided to you as part of this cr

trump initially acknowledged the obligation, the debt, myself and allen weisselberg went back to his office, and i was instructed by allen at the time that they were going to do this over 12 installments. and what he decided to do then was to have me send an invoice, in which case they can have a check cut. and then, yes, the answer would be yes to your followup question. >> and donald trump jr. obviously signed off on this. >> it would either be eric trump, donald trump jr. and/oral an weisselberg. but always allen weisselberg on the check. >> and you think the executive was donald trump jr. >> yes. >> you knew that the payments were false and illegal, correct? >> i can make that conclusion. >> you told representative kelly that the president was aware of this scheme, is that correct? >> that's correct. >> i just want the american public to understand the explosive nature of your testimony in this document. are you telling us, mr. cohen, that the president directed transactions in conspiracy with all allen weisselberg and his son, donald trump jr., as part of a civil/criminal -- as p

allen weisselberg. alan garten of the trump organization, as well. >> who else knows that the president did this? >> allen weisselberg, ron lieberman, and matthew calamari. >> would don jr. or mr. weisselberg have more information about that? >> mr. weisselberg, for sure. >> "for sure." now, donald trump jr. and ivanka trump name checked by cohen. our cameras caught don junior at a conservative conference today, where he was basically trying to dodge any of those questions that many people have about what cohen said. you can dodge, you know, cameras, but you can't ignore investigators in the house when they have subpoenas. the house intel committee planning to call allen weisselberg, donald trump's cfo in, to testify. so this is what we are seeing and hearing from congress today. what we don't know is what else is happening with investigators who have even more tools in the southern district of new york. cohen hinting that they have investigations that are basically undisclosed. and he says he's in cons

the bottom signature i believe is allen weisselberg's. allen weisselberg. allen weisselberg.s signed by allen weisselberg. >> are there other people we should be meeting with? >> so allen weisselberg. >> chuck rosenberg, kaiser sosa the cohen hearings of the perhaps investigations out of the sdny. allen weisselberg i understand had narrow limited immunity around certain questions but not a cooperating witness. will he become one? why is he so important? >> he's important nicolle because he's been around the trump organization and mr. trump for a long time. these are the types of people who are important witnesses because they see stuff, they read stuff, they hear stuff, they just hang around. so weisselberg couldn't be having a good day yesterday. he's probably not having a particularly good day today either. and i imagine -- i should say there's a problem with him testifying before congress, which is that he very well may have a fifth amendment issue, meaning that a truthful answer to questions may tend to incriminate him. he would only want to testify with immunity. and thi

trump initially acknowledged the obligation, the debt, myself and allen weisselberg went back to his office, and i was instructed by allen at the time that they were going to do this over 12 installments. and what he decided to do then was to have me send an invoice, in which case they can have a check cut. and then, yes, the answer would be yes to your followup question. >> and donald trump jr. obviously signed off on this. >> it would either be eric trump, donald trump jr. and/oral an weisselberg. but always allen weisselberg on the check. >> and you think the executive was donald trump jr. >> yes. >> you knew that the payments were false and illegal, correct? >> i can make that conclusion. >> you told representative kelly that the president was aware of this scheme, is that correct? >> that's correct. >> i just want the american public to understand the explosive nature of your testimony in this document. are you telling us, mr. cohen, that the president directed transactions in conspiracy with all allen weisselberg and his son, donald trump jr., as part of a civil/criminal -- as p

trump, initially acknowledged the obligation that myself and allen weisselberg went back to his office and i was instructed by allen at the time that they were going to do this over 12 installments. and what he decided to do then was to have me send an invoice, in which case they could have a check cut. and then, the answer would be yes to your followup. >> and donald trump jr. obviously signed off on this? >> it would either be eric trump, donald trump jr. or alan weiss enberg on the check. >> they knew this payment was false and illegal, correct? >> i can't make that conclusion. >> you told representative kelly that the president was aware of this scheme, is that correct? >> that's correct. >> i just want the american public to understand the explosive nature of your current testimony in this document. are you telling us, mr. cohen, that the president directed transactions in conspiracy with allen weisselberg and his son, donald trump jr., as part of a civil -- as part of a criminal conspiracy of financial fraud, is that your testimony today? >> yes. >> do you know if this criminal f

maybe once or twice a year i'd go to that office and see rona graf and allen weisselberg. were sitting there. they know a lot. >> every time michael cohen was asked, who else would know about that? who was in the room? weisselberg was the name he constantly went back to. even in the '90s when michael cohen didn't even work for donald trump. he said i can tell you one person that would know about that, weisselberg. he was provided with limited immunity. >> tell us what that means. limited immunity in exchange for his cooperation with the southern district of new york. >> limited use immunity in order to testify in front of the grand jury about the hush money payments. that cooperation, as far as we know, may be all over. in order for him to testify in front of congress, they may have to offer him immunity for him to tell everything that he knows. whether he will agree to it, we don't know yet. >> he has no choice. if they give him immunity, he has to testify. the question is whether the committee will actually make that decision. >> go through and compel him to. >> same for

and i was at the time with allen weisselberg, where he directed us to go back to mr. weisselberg's office and figure this all out. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> mr. betos. >> mr. cohen, do you know lynn patton? i'm right here >> yes, sir. >> do you know lynn patton? >> yes, i do. >> i asked lynn to come today in her personal capacity to actually shed some light. how do you know miss patton. >> i'm responsible for miss patton joining the trump administration and the job she holds. >> i'm glad you acknowledged that, because you made some very demeaning comments about the president that miss patton doesn't agree with. in fact, it has to do with your claim of racism. she says that as a daughter of a man born in birmingham, alabama, that there is no way that she would work for an individual who was racist. how do you reconcile the two of those? >> as neither should i, as the son of a holocaust survivor. >> but, mr. cohen, i guess what i'm saying is, i've talked to the president over 300 times. i've not heard one time a racist comment out of his mouth in private. so how do

. >> alan weisselberg, allen weisselberg in the office with me was allen weisselberg. so allen weisselberg is the chief financial officer. >> allen weisselberg as you just heard cohen mention there is the top money man within the trump organization. he handles not only the company's finance but he oversaw the president's personal transactions like checks and other dealings. trump reimbursed him for hush money cohen paid to silent the story of stormy daniels. weisselberg has limited immunity in the hush money case but what does that mean for his role regarding the other allegations cohen brought up, ie, trump misusing his charity or filing false information to avoid taxes. all questions people will be exploring. barbra rez is back. how one woman changed the face of construction. she was an executive vice president at the trump organization working for donald trump for 18 years. >> on and off. >> on and off for 18 years. let's run through some of these names. we just talked about allen weisselberg. >> he came from brooklyn and he did the billing and the paying the bills.

do they want to call allen weisselberg? if the weisselberg and donald trump jr. take the fifth, do they want to give them immunity? i mean, and doing an investigation is hard and tedious and could take a long time. and you know, elijah cummings and the leadership is going to have to make these decisions. but, there's clearly a grounds for a much more extensive investigation. >> carrie, just from a legal standpoint, what do you do? >> well, one of the things that i'm most interested from a legal and a national security standpoint is the interaction with wikileaks. and michael cohen said today that he believed that donald trump had advanced knowledge, regarding the release of hacked information, so it relates to the crime of hacking the dnc and unauthorized access into hillary clinton and her campaign's e-mails. cohen says trump knew in advance. and what's happening is that there is a two-week timeline in july of 2016 that is now becoming more clear when we connect information that is in the special counsel indictments of the russian agents, combined with now other

chairman, what do you -- >> allen weisselberg allen weisselberg, donald trump jr., weisselberg, will you talk to them? >> yeah, we probably will. there are certain areas we've got to be careful with because special counsel and southern district of new york and others have basically said that there are things that they're looking in to. there are a number of areas that we couldn't even get into and didn't get into that they're looking in to. this is -- i think that there are still a number of shoes to drop. >> so on the number of shoes to drop, right, and so many people obviously have been making such a huge deal about mueller and potential collusion but really isn't this about finances, sdny -- >> it's about new york. >> it's about new york. >> absolutely. maybe trump can't be prosecuted but the trump organization can be and it derives its liability for any crimes from the people who act within it, so that's well within the prospects i think for the southern district or the attorney general of new york. >> are you surprised and i know allen weisselberg allen weisselberg presumably ma

and or allen weisselberg but always allen weisselberg on the check. paymentknew that this was false and illegal, correct? >> i can't make that conclusion. >> you told representative kelly that the president was aware of this scheme. >> that's correct. >> i want the american public to understand the explosive nature of your testimony in this document. are you telling us that the president directed transactions in conspiracy with allen weisselberg and his son, donald civi -- aor, as part of a criminal conspiracy of financial fraud, is that your testimony? >> yes. >> do you know if this scheme that the president, allen weisselberg, and donald trump jr. are involved in is being investigated by the southern district of new york? discuss that not question because it could be part of an investigation that currently ongoing. >> i want the american public to understand that apart from bob mueller's investigation there is garden-variety financial fraud in your allegation and the ,ocument suggests the president his son and his cfo maybe be involved in a criminal

allen weisselberg was there this entire time. it goes back to the dad. >> yeah, i think allen weisselberg is somebody we need to talk to and donald trump jr. is someone it's looking like we need to talk to. i think we need to go back through all of the testimony from today, the lines of questioning, digest it and strategize from here. it with australia lot to take in. >> but you want to call don jr., allen weisselberg? >> i would like to. i don't get to make that call ultimately, but i think that's certainly where my head is at right now. >> just in terms of what stood out to you today, i mean obviously your advantage point is different than the viewers at home. what do you think were the most important takeaways? >> i guess it depends on what you're looking for. i mean, one of the big takeaways for me is it really does look like a sitting president committed a crime. very serious crime. while he was this the oval office. and all of the other pieces -- >> and that crime is the -- going through with the hush payments, reimbursing

the committees now, particularly in the house, where they are in control, will call allen weisselberg. they may call donald trump jr. they're going to -- you know, they're going to try and get to the bottom of this in public. >> yeah. >> because what they need to do is convince the public because impeachment, after all, is a political act. >> yeah. >> and, you know, trump in a way -- republicans say to me, who have talked to him about it, well, he kind of welcomes it because then he has a fight, and he can say you're trying to just take the election. >> last word, pamela. they're going to have a lot to work at, especially considering what he said about he inflated and deflated the value and all this stuff on his taxes or whatever. they're going to have a lot to look at coming up. >> right. as gloria said, one of the people you can imagine they're going to want to talk to in front of the committee is allen weisselberg. in fact, cummings alluded to that today because he is noekno as the financial gatekeeper. and his name kept coming up in the hearing by cohen. at one point he seemed to

allen weisselberg, allen garten with the trump organization as well. >> well, thank you very much for your testimony, and mr. chairman, this is a story of redemption. >> thank you. >> in your testimony you stated you began work for the trump administration as a lawyer dealing with real estate transactions. >> that's correct. >> prior to coming to congress, i served as a director two of different banks. i've seen hundreds of loan applications and to try to determine your credibility here today, i want to ask a few real estate transaction questions to see how, in fact, you operate. according to the southern district of new york prosecutors, you lied to banks to secure loans by falsely stating the amount of debt you were carrying. mr. cohen, my question to you, was it donald trump's fault that you knowingly committed a crime of deception to defraud a bank? >> no, it's not. >> was that fraudulent loan you obtained for the trump organization or for you personally? >> it would be for me, though i'm not familiar with which loan that you're referring to. i would like to say one thing. i would

and allen weisselberg. and see for that example 5 b. the president of the united states thus wrote a personal check for the payment of hush money as part of a criminal scheme to violate campaign finance laws. and you can find the details of that scheme directed by mr. trump in the pleadings in the u.s. district court for the southern district of new york. so picture in scene. in february of 2017, one month into his presidency, i'm visiting president trump in the oval office for the first time. and it's truly you a inspiring. he is showing me all around and pointing to different paintings. and he says to me something to the effect of, don't worry, michael, your january and february reimbursement checks are coming. they were fedexed from new york. and it takes a while for that to get through the white house system. as he promised, i received the first check for the reimbursement of $70,000 not long there after. when i say conman, i'm talking about a man who declares himself brilliant but directed me to threaten his high school, his colleg

and allen weisselberg. see, for example, exhibit 5-b. the president of the united states thus wrote a personal check for the payment of hush money as part of a criminal scheme to violate campaign finance laws. you can find the details of that scheme directed by mr. trump in the pleadings in the u.s. district court for the southern district of new york. so picture this scene, in february of 2017, one month into his presidency, i'm visiting president trump in the oval office for the first time. it's truly awe-inspiring. he's showing me all around and pointing to different paintings, and he says to me something to the effect of, don't worry, michael, your january and february reimbursement checks are coming. they were fedexed from new york and it takes a while for that to get through the white house system. as he promised, i received the first check for the reimbursement of $70,000 not long thereafter. when i say con man, i'm talking about a man who declares himself brilliant but directed me to threaten his high school, his colleges, and th

allen weisselberg, who we know has also testified before the special counsel. if allen weisselberg since there and says, "yes, president trump president trump," okayed the hush money payment which would be a campaign finance violation, we don't know. that's a big "if." if he backs up what cohen says, it has added credibility. >> marie: chris, marie harf here. i wonder if we might see testimony from other people michael cohen has been referring to today. i will put a democrat asked him if they were of the people we should call before this committee and to give a whole list of people including david packer from ami, allen weisselberg, and others. do you think that would be one of the consequences of this hearing today? >> chris: it'll be interesting to see. those oversight committee has specifically said they aren't getting into it -- although they touched on it a bit today, into the russia investigation. that is under the purview and jurisdiction of the house intelligence committee. but i agree with you. i thought it was very interesting on one of those democrat

. >> allen weisselberg. allen weisselberg. in the office with me was allen weisselberg.weisselberg is the chief financial officer. >> cfo, has been counting money for trump since it was his father running the business. now, when there are this many politicians talking in front of a camera, all right, it's going to be telling not just what they say, but you have to start listen for what isn't being said. on the republican side, like i said, no curiosity about what cohen was saying, no pushing for mfgs about wrongdoing. not one of them was able to defend the actions of the president of the united states. all of them called cohen unbelievable entirely. even though, remember, cohen took several opportunities today to bootstrap their defense of the president. he admitted he had no proof of collusion. he wouldn't say that trump told stone to talk with wikileaks. he said mr. trump would never hurt his wife. and as for the major theme for gopers today, all that counts is credibility and cohen has none. listen. >> if you lied, you are a liar. >> everything's been made of your lie

and in terms of the money trail, donald can be hurt, i believe, a great deal by allen weisselberg. >>knows every single financial transaction? >> i do believe that he got more and more involved as time went on, and donald trusted him. he was almost a family member. >> how bad could that be for trump, jack, when you think about allen weisselberg who has been granted immunity? >> oh, it's serious stuff, and i think juliette hit it on the head, trump doesn't care about the country but he cares about himself and he cares about his family's liberty. the sorts of things that the southern district is going to be investigating, i would assume, would include violations of the foreign corrupt practices act. remember, there was that "new yorker" story about trump wrongdoing in the former soviet republics to help people paying off local officials to get trump buildings built. there is the intriguing issue of the deutsche bank subpoena. remember, deutsche bank is the only financial institution that would touch trump when no one else would. there are all the questions surrounding money laundering.

and allen weisselberg. and see for that example 5 b. the president of the united states thus wrote a personal check for the payment of hush money as part of a criminal scheme to violate campaign finance laws. and you can find the details of that scheme directed by mr. trump in the pleadings in the u.s. district court for the southern district of new york. so picture in scene. in february of 2017, one month into his presidency, i'm visiting president trump in the oval office for the first time. and it's truly you a inspiring. he is showing me all around and pointing to different paintings. and he says to me something to the effect of, don't worry, michael, your january and february reimbursement checks are coming. they were fedexed from new york. and it takes a while for that to get through the white house system. as he promised, i received the first check for the reimbursement of $70,000 not long there after. when i say conman, i'm talking about a man who declares himself brilliant but directed me to threaten his high school, his colleg

and allen weisselberg, the cfo of the trump organization. and then there's the hacked democratic national committee e-mails. cohen is expected to testify that donald trump newspaper about the hacking of the e-mails before they were made public and welcomed their release. he says "s in july, 2016, days before the democratic convention, i was iin mr. trump's office when his secretary announced that roger stone was on the telephone. mr. trump put mr. stone on speakerphone and mr. stone told mr. trump that he j had just gotten off the phone with julian assange and that mr. assange told mr. stone within a couple of days there would be a massive dump of e-mails that would damage hillary clinton's campaign. mr. trump responded by stating to the effect, wouldn't that be great." now remember, the question of how much the president knew about those e-mails before they were released is key to robert mueller's investigation into any ties between russia and the trump campaign. and finally, michael cohen is expected to tell congress that the reason he lie

. >> trump organization chief financial officer allen weisselberger was mentioned several times.edia outlets reported he received immunity to testify before a grand jury in new york during the course of the investigation into the hush money payments. three people with knowledge of that matter tell nbc news that weisselberg is not cooperating and has never been a cooperating witness and has proved limited details in the course of his testimony. a person close to the trump organization telling nbc news that weisselberg is still with the trump organization and defends trump and the company. >> michael cohen was grilled about president trump's alleged history of tax fraud and offered up names of who he believes would have access to that information. >> to your knowledge did the president ever provide inflated assets to an insurance company? >> yes. >> who else knows that the president did this? >> allen weisselberg, ron lieberman and matthew calamari. >> and where would the committee find more information on this? do you think we need to review his financial statements and tax return

and he said that he mentions allen weisselberg, he has immunity from the southern district of new yorkly that means that he is cooperating with them? or is that too much of a leap? >> look, it is possible, at the end of the day will not be one or two individuals. they will have to conduct a thorough investigation. wherever their truth leads, that is the destination. if he means that the president stays in office and has done nothing wrong, that is one conclusion. or he is tripped up. he surrounded himself by some awfully interesting people who have been indicted. so what does this say about the character of the president? what does it say about the president's judgment? what does it say about him? who is the commander-in-chief today? and when he was in charge of the trump organization, what did he order people to do? it is interesting that he paid for the painting allegedly with foundation money. >> dana: those things would be to character issues. and i think that people's feelings about the president already baked in. the question is the legality issue? >> good question, great questio

he named david pecker, dylan howard of a.m.i., allen weisselberg, the cfo of the trump organization. of those men, to whom do you want to speak with the most and what is your most pressing question for them? >> i think we should follow absolutely every lead that he gave us and law enforcement should follow every lead that he gave them. >> of those men, i'm interested because we heard elijah cummings say we definitely want to have -- we think we will bring in allen weisselberg who has limited immunity agreement. what would your most important question be to him? >> weisselberg, he was mentioned more than anyone. his name kept coming up. so if i were to single one particular person it would be him. he seems to have been involved in the tax insurance possible fraud, the campaign finance violations and the ethics violations. i would have to -- there are so many leads. i guess i would go to the russian collusion interaction area to question him. >> i'm interested finally congresswoman in where congress goes from here. what did you learn yesterday that was most critical to where you believ

>> allen weisselberg is the chief financial officer. >> you got to quickly give us as many names as you can so we can get to them. >> yes, ma'am. >> is ms. rona, what is -- >> rona graph is the, mr. trump's executive assistant. >> and would she be able to corroborate many of statements you made here? >> her office was directly next to his and she's involved in a lot that went on. >> and mr. cohen, when the president's lawyers were having the discussions with the office of government ethics in 2018, did they reach out to you to talk with you about these payments? >> no, ma'am. >> >> and did you share with them otherwise in any other conversation? >> i do not recall, no. >> can the committee obtain more information about these facts by obtaining testimony, documents, from the white house, the trump organization, and the president's attorneys? >> i believe so. >> mr. chair, i think that those are the individuals that we should be speaking with. and i yield back at this time. >> the committee will now stand in recess, again, we will come back, listen up, 35 minutes. 35 minutes, after the la

trump did or did not order the payments and violate campaign finance laws. >> i've spoken to allen weisselbergthing up with funding. >> if you're not guilty of a crime, what do you need immunity for, right? >> trump his disparaged giving insiders immunity for testimony, and weisselberg's deal is only in regard to cohen. but the president's foes believe if the relationship is extended, he could open the door to many secrets about trump's empire. >> nobody knows where the money has gone better than he does as the cfo of the trump organization. >> reporter: as cfo weisselberg likely has knowledge of trump's tax returns, documents traditionally released by all presidents but not this one. >> they're under audit. they have been for a long time. >> reporter: weisselberg could have information about allegations of shady business deals, possible misuse of inaugural funds and the financial dealings of the now defunct trump charity. he's handled personal finances for the trumps, too. so far the president says he believes weisselberg has not betrayed him. >> 100% he didn't. he's a wonderful guy. >> repor

we've reported that executive one who is named in the documents is allen weisselberg, the company's long-timeknow michael cohen is going to testify tomorrow and has already told prosecutors that weisselberg was involved in trying to cover up this stormy daniels payment. we also have reported that sdny since michael cohen's guilty plea broadened the organization to look at the trump organization and possible campaign finance violations by the company. i think the degree to which the president is implicated in the investigation into the company remains to be seen. he of course has turned over management of the company to his adult sons and mr. weisselberg and does still retain ownership of the company. i think the degree to which he was involved in organizing that reimbursement and when he signed those checks could be really important here. >> rebecca ballhaus, reporter for the "wall street journal." this hush money story in particular, thanks for helping us understand your reporting. appreciate you being here. >> thank you. >> we got much more to get to tonight. stay with us. e got much more t

allen weisselberg is cooperating with robert mueller. >> is he though? >> from what we understand he's cooperating. i don't think he's fearing prosecution for himself. >> we know weisselberg knows a lot. >> that's it. we just don't know what he knows. so i'm hesitant to speculate what he knows. it's really he said/he said at this point. we will see what the report says when it comes out. >> i want to share what the republicans said yesterday when they were asked to speak and had questions. we have a little mash-up for you. >> fraudster, chief, convicted felon and in two months a federal inmate. >> he's going to prison for lying to congress and he's the star witness to congress. >> you're a pathological liar. >> convicted liar, lying to congress. a criminal. >> oakie doke. did republicans -- listen, they took their time to call michael cohen a liar, which we know he is. he's going to jail. did they miss an opportunity to actually defend president trump against the allegations? because i actually didn't hear much of that. >> no, and they missed that opport

. >> reporter: allen weisselberg the long time chief financial officer of the trump family business. ou know if this criminal financial scam that which isle ba weisselberg and donald trump jr. is being investigated? >> i'd rather not answer because it could be part of an investigation that is ongoing. >> reporter: now democrats say that they could bring weisselberg and the president's son in for questions. trump's son has denied knowing about the payments and also denied talking to roger stone about wikileaks. >> did you ever talk to him about wikileaks? >> no. >> reporter: but michael cohen contradicted that as well. >> it was a short conversation and he said mr. trump, i just want to let you know that i just got off the phone with julian assange and in a couple of days there is going to be a massive dump of e-mails that will severely hurt the clinton campaign. >> reporter: wikileaks and stone both deny the call. the hearing was at times a spectacle. republicans taking jabs at cohen's credibility for previously lying to congress. >> you're a pathological liar. you didn't know truth f

and allen weisselberg, his top accountant at the trump organization, reimbursing michael cohen for his $130,000 hush payment to stormy daniels that he made before the election. however, these checks were signed by donald trump and by his son, a top executive at the trump organization, after he was already president. so that takes the potential financial crime here and the potential campaign finance crime into the period when he was president and we heard a lot of democrats talking about that as a key element not only for the financial crime. there's a potential -- rather financial fraud aspect of it. there's also potential campaign finance aspect. was that an over the limit contribution made to affect the outkuchlt election? michael cohen certainly suggested -- stated as much but he didn't offer as much evidence that donald trump knew or thought of it as that, and it's important for him to know for a violation of that kind to be knowing and willful in order for it to be an actual potential crime as opposed to a civil infraction. that said, we do have another key element from those chec

in the trump org chief financial officer allen weisselberg. >> i was involved in several of these catchodes. he asked me to pay off an adult film star with whom he had an affair. he was concerned with the effect that it had had on the campaign. he had told me that he had spoken to a couple of friends and it's 130,000. it's not a lot of money. and we should just do it. everything had to go through mr. trump. he knew about everything, yes. >> what did the president ask or suggest that you say about the payments? >> he was not knowledgeable of these reimbursements and he wasn't knowledgeable of my actions to keep him far away from it as possible. >> cohen's evidence and testimony proves that donald trump lied for so long about this. part of that we knew. but it also raises important new questions about how all that went down. >> -- check sent while president trump was in office with donald trump's signature on it. to reimburse mr. cohen for the hush money payment. six months later the president denied anything about it. is there any doubt in your mind that president trump knew exactly what

and allen weisselberg. and see for that example 5 b. the president of the united states thus wrote a personal check for the payment of hush money as part of a criminal scheme to violate campaign finance laws. and you can find the details of that scheme directed by mr. trump in the pleadings in the u.s. district court for the southern district of new york. so picture in scene. in february of 2017, one month into his presidency, i'm visiting president trump in the oval office for the first time. and it's truly you a inspiring. he is showing me all around and pointing to different paintings. and he says to me something to the effect of, don't worry, michael, your january and february reimbursement checks are coming. they were fedexed from new york. and it takes a while for that to get through the white house system. as he promised, i received the first check for the reimbursement of $70,000 not long there after. when i say conman, i'm talking about a man who declares himself brilliant but directed me to threaten his high school, his colleg

are we talking about the chief financial officer of 40 years at the trump organization, allen weisselberg? >> i don't mean to be overly broad. i think it would be fair, most people if they heard the testimony that we did today, would say that it would be fair to bring any of those people in front of the committee for questioning. >> there are now reports that weisselberg is going to be coming before your committee. can you confirm that? >> i can't. i will leave that to adam to follow up with you on. >> i'm sure we will get that fairly soon. let me ask you about a report just posted in "the new york times." they are reporting the former white house chief of staff john kelly wrote a memo that president trump, quote, ordered him to grant jared kushner a top secret security clearance and former white house counsel don mcgahn wrote a memo outlining the concerns the cia had raised about kushner getting that security clearance. what's your reaction to this report? >> that is very disturbing. there's a reason that clearances are held or not given. so the president to just ignore all of that infor

he said to chairman cummings that donald trump directed him and the trump organization cfo allen weisselberg to, quote, go back to his office and figure out how to make the $130,000 payment, but in his testimony he says mr. trump directed me to use my own personal funds from the home equity line of credit to avoid any money being traced back to him that would negatively impact the campaign. and in response to a question about him paying to set up the fake twitter account account, @womenforcohen that he didn't direct the commission of that twitter account. he said i didn't set that up and it was done by a young lady that works for the firm when, in fact, he did ask the i.t. firm red finch to set it up according to the owner of red finch. finally, he said he didn't want a job with the administration, even though the attorneys with the southern district of new york stated that this was a fact when asked about this they said i wouldn't call them liars, but that statement is not accurate. mr. chairman, i think maybe more importantly is what we should have been doing today. mr. meadows and i sent

allen weisselberg. >> allen worked frd donald's father. allen had one of the first officers when trump moved into trump tower. he has a staff which is weird for anybody at a trump organization. >> why is that? >> because people don't -- he runs a very lean operation. >> the only person with staff is supposed to be trump. >> this isn't a criticism of the trump administration. but you do your work and you have to do the work of five people when you work for donald trump. and he's somebody that the president greatly trusts. also he's handled all the finances. now, another issue -- >> if he got subpoenaed and he was coming to capitol hill, how nervous would donald trump be? >> he would personally hate it. allen prepares all the final statements. >> and they go over what to say. >> i could have to send trump reports of certain things. allen has to send him updates. >> i want to bring up the name of matthew calamari. said who could give us more information about potential insurance fraud? tell us who he is. >> matthew, by the way, very disliked

allen weinstein, the -- allen weisselberg. >> dana: i don't think he can testify.s immunity. >> juan: i think he will be called and i think other people in the same orbit in terms of finances, the deals made, the kind of corruption that cohen suggestion suggested. >> jesse: now they are investigating private business deals from decades ago? >> juan: the doors open. the key here to me is forget what michael cohen said because you can call him a liar. but you can't forget the documents he produced. he produced documents that showed that as president of the united states while in the office, the president was involved directly in paying off this porn star and that's a crime. >> jesse: personal expenditure. i said that so many times. >> juan: you can be the lawyer. >> greg: campaign finance, that's what we're talking about. >> kennedy: a couple things, it was funny when michael cohen was asked whether or not he wanted a job in the white house and he said no, absolutely not. >> jesse: i think we have it on tape. can we hear that? >> wanted to work in the white house. >>

. >> this is signed by not only donald trump jr but the cfo of the trump organization, allen weisselbergperating with the special counsel. >> he has immunity, unlike donald trump jr, and that could open these two men up to possible exposure but what are they telling special counsel and federal prosecutors. it's not a crime to live publicly that they make sure it is straight or supported by the evidence when speaking with robert mueller investigators or new york investigators. >> you can see the 42 members of congress gathering and beginning some of the questioning with each one getting five minutes in order to question michael cohen. this could be an extraordinary hearing today with many questions, and is there anything out of bounds they cannot discuss? >> there is agreement that michael cohen is not supposed to talk about the ongoing special counsel investigation into the 2016 election. out of respect for robert mueller they agreed not to question him and as we son the opening statement he is referring to wikileaks and trump tower. i spoke with sources on why he can talk about that and

>> well allen weisselberg is number one, and the big question is who's executive number two? >> look, yeah we know the trump part was incontrollcontrolled b small group of individuals. but this is something we should have a clear answer to tomorrow. >> did you want to say something? >> yes, but not about that. >> executive two, so no idea? >> well, you know, it's got to being someone who's over the cfo in some fashion. it's got to be one of the high level executives, probably one of the children. eric, donald junior, potentially ivanka. >> the committee, do you think they're going to ask about that? >> it's not clear to me how much cohen will know about this. there's one donor he has an involvement with. they'll probably ask about him. he wasn't part of the campaign formally. he didn't go into the administration, so i think they probably will try to ask about it a little bit, but it's not exactly clear what cohen will know. >> that's a bit of a fishing expedition. we already know specifically about the hush money payments and false testimony. the inaugural, i would take a sho

you have allen weisselberg, jeffrey goetzoel.rheard a conversation between candidate president trump and don junior, he thinks it was about the trump tower meeting with the russians. >> who were the family members you briefed on the trump tower moscow project? >> don trump jr. and ivanka trump. >> if donald trump and son donald junior are involved in the russia deal, is it possible the whole family is compromised with a foreign adversary in the months before the election? >> yes. >> did that sound to you like house members are teeing up to call the kids in? >> they're certainly interested in the kids. i think they are a little bit concerned and worried about doing it knowing that it will cross that red line that donald trump long ago said involved his family. so as they look and see whether to begin calling the kids or do they start with some of the business associates of donald trump first, i think they work their way up to the kids. both donald trump jr., eric, and ivanka, ivanka being in the white house raises other issues of

it's a very small sort of nuclear hierarchy with his children, used to be michael cohen, allen weisselberge chief financial officer who has gotten limited immunity to testify. there are other people. but i would say, it's less than a dozen. donald trump knows all of them very well. he clearly has some indication that something is going on here. it would bother him because instead of one witch hunt as he calls it, he is going to say there are many. >> matt whitaker is going to testify before the house judiciary committee friday. who knows how that is going to explode. >> right. this is one of the first tastes of democrats having control of the committees and being able to ask questions that republicans perhaps didn't ask in the last congress. it will be interesting to see whether whitaker provides new information or if he tries to sort of stick with the line that has been out there from the trump justice department. >> you heard the congressman say that if he doesn't answer certain questions, the democratic majority thinks he must answer, they will on the spot file some sort of subpoena. >>

>> i believe david becker, dillon howard, barrie lavigne of a.m.i., allen weisselberg, allen garden ofmp organization as well. >> thank you for your testimony and mr. chairman this say -- is a story of redemption. >> thank you, ma'am. >> mr. cohen, in your testimony you say you began as a lawyer dealing with real estate transactions for mr. trump, is that correct? >> that's correct. i served as a director of two different banks and i've seen hundreds of loan applications and i wanted to ask you a couple real estate transaction questions to see how in fact you operate. according to the southern district of new york prosecutors, you lied to banks to secure loans by falsely stating the amount of debt you were carrying. mr. cohen, was it donald trump's fault you knowingly committed a crime of deception to defraud a bank? >> no, it's not. >> was that fraudulent lone for the trump organization or you personally? >> it would be for me though i'm not familiar with which loan you're referring to. >> the bank usually finds out. did they cause you to defraud the bank for your own personal bank. >

long-time personal attorney michael cohen and the trump organization's chief financial officer allen weisselbergcooperating with the same federal prosecutors in addition to rick gates, a trump campaign deputy who also worked on the inauguration. so it's not clear where this is coming from but they got a lot of people that might be telling them something about the inauguratio inauguration, among the documents prosecutors want is anything regarding donations to the committee made by or on behalf of foreign nationals. joining me now is rebecca, one of the "wall street journal" reporters who has been on this story. rebecca, thank you for joining us on such short notice and thank you for your reporting on this. >> thanks for having me. >> first of all, the southern district of new york is looking for these documents. do you have any indication whether the committee is willing to hand them over? >> it seems that they are. the committee put out a statement earlier tonight saying they just received the subpoena and reviewing it but it was their intention to cooperate. >> the subpoena coming from the sou

>> allen weisselberg, ron lieberman, and matthew calamari. >> where would the committee find more informationhink we need to review his financial statements and tax returns in order to compare them? >> yes, and you would find it at the trump org. >> democratic senator bob menendez is a member of the banking and finance committees and the top democrat on foreign relations and joins me now from the capitol. welcome, thank you so much, senator. do you have a roadmap from this testimony yesterday and the testimony before house and senate intel? >> i think it provided a lot of insights, a lot of legitimate questions, and a foundation for going ahead and seeking the tax returns. not only for potential financial crimes, but for understanding, for example, why president trump seems to have no backbone to stand up to vladimir putin at the end of the day. and i think those are all legitimate critical questions that lead us to say the tax returns need to be reviewed in order to determine whether or not there are entanglements that are problematic. >> now, you and your colleagues also sent a letter befor

i've actually come up and i've spoken to allen weisselberg about how to set the whole thing up, with -- >> so what are we going to do? >> -- funding. yes. and it's all the stuff, all the stuff. because, you know, you never know where that company, never know where he's going to be -- >> maybe he gets hit by a truck. >> correct. so i'm all over that. >> that was juicy. remember that one? that was a good one. congressman jackie speier says she thinks there are more tapes and she thinks the house intel committee will hear them. >> michael cohen taped many conversations with donald trump. i'm confident that we're probably going to be listening to other tapes, at some point. >> so if you're wondering just how much all of this has gotten under the president's skin, even while he's half a world away in vietnam, for his summit with kim jong-un, there's this really disgusting, disgraceful, vile, nasty -- anyone got any other adjectives for me? unbelievable, despicable, low-down, in the gutter, ghetto, trashy example of last-minute witness intimidation from a member of team trump. congressman