cohen: mr. jordan, all i wanted was what i got, to be personal attorney to the enjoy the to senior year of my son in high school and waiting for my daughter to come back to new york. i got exactly what i want. mr. jordan: exactly what you want? mr. cummings: gentleman's time is expired. : thank youan schultz for being here today mr. cohen. as chair of the democratic national committee at the time of the hacks. when russia weaponize the emails had stolen. the possible and likely harm to the united states of america and our democracy. i have a series of questions i hope will connect more of these dots. is it your testimony that mr. trump had advanced knowledge of the russia wikileaks release of the d and density and seaside males? dnc emails? he had advanced notice that there was going to be a mr. cohen: dump mr. cohen: of emails but at no time did i hear the specificity of what those emails were going to be. ms. wasserman schultz: you do testified today that he had advanced knowledge of their emi

he had not flipped on cohen -- cohen had not flipped on the president yet. there was questions about whether or not trump's attorneys had conversations with cohen's attorneys about a pardon to potentially prevent him from going forward and cooperating with federal prosecutors. there had been reports suggestisuggest i suggesting cohen's attorneys discussed a pardon. republicans want to know if he perjured himself. we know there were a lot of questions about that. it's unclear exactly how he -- what he said in this classified testimony. that's been an area that members want to focus on. an area that potentially prosecutors want to focus on as well. cohen, of course, acknowledged last week that the southern district of new york is looking into one conversation the president had with michael cohen after cohen's properties were raided. >> lots of investigations going on. manu raju reporting for us from capitol hill. thank you. >>> let's talk more about the breaking news on michael cohen's testimony today. our crime and justice reporter shimon prokupecz is in the

, trump 35, cohen 50. he said, yeah, i'm the biggest liar in the world and i'm at 50. if he did this, would you not vote for him? if he did this, would you not vote for him? pedophilia -- i'm not saying he's a pedophile -- 50% of the population still voted -- i don't know his name anymore -- yeah, roy moore. all this stuff i would like to see in polling is what is the threshold for part of that base? what is the high crime that you go, okay, this is enough. >> i'll just say having worked on campaigns, there isn't one, because people won't tell you the truth. let me get to something else that he might be in trouble over. russia subpoenas documents from trump and regulators have subpoenaed his long-time insurance broker. this sounds a little wonky, but this speaks to the volume of incoming. we haven't said a word at 4:32 about congress yet. how does an organization, a white house, an individual field all of these investigations? >> it's incredibly complex, and we saw the president's team staff up as the cong

michael cohen is a convicted liar.sident has certainly lied and stretched the truth and we all know his record on that. with so many people with difficulty telling the truth, is it even possible to figure out conclusively where the truth actually lies? >> sure it is. and i would point to the -- to michael cohen showing up and handing over checks signed by the president backing up his statement that i was reimbursed by the president for paying hush money to stormy daniels. there is documentation, and again i don't want to get into too much detail, but he provided documentation to the committee, these are people who communicate by e-mail and they communicate by text. though the president does not, the president's people do. and again, i think there is much more to the story that -- part of the reason we're being quiet about exactly what happened in the testimony of michael cohen is that his testimony and the information that he provided will probably cause us to call in some of those people. and we don't want them to kno

cohen. there will be other evidence. they can talk to alan weisselberg, for example, who according to that recording participated in that conversation as well. the checks are some evidence. one thing you have to prove for campaign finance violations, it's a little different than other crimes, is that it was committed willfully. you have to show they not only knew what they were doing but that it was legal. a great way to show that is through some other evidence of con sealing wh conc conc conceal ing and they needed to cover it up in some way. >> is it fair to say he asked michael cohen and then he didn't know about it, does that go to the type of evidence you're talking about? >> yes. when someone is lying or covering up in an unusual way, some of it could be consciousness of guilt. i know what i did was wrong and yes, i lied about it. that could be evidence to prove that unlawful intent. >> i do i think what michael cohen testified to was significant for the details and evidence provided.

cohen one in the future. here is what michael cohen said about a pardon last week. >> my testimony certainly does not diminish the pain that i have caused my family and my friends. nothing can do that. and i have never asked for nor would i accept a pardon from president trump. >> and leading off our discussion tonight is lanny davis, an attorney for michael cohen. lanny davis, thank you for joining us tonight. appreciate it. i want to start with the pardon which we just introduced here. the "wall street journal" reporting was not that michael cohen personally requested a pardon but his lawyers at some point discussed the possibility of a pardon with president trump's lawyers and that rudy giuliani for one left open the possibility. is that accurate reporting? >> yes, the time period is what needs to be stressed. michael cohen lied for donald trump for ten years and is going to prison in part because of a lie to congress as well as the coverup scheme that donald trump is still paying for or was paying for whe

no. >> why did michael cohen make it if there were -- >> you'd have to ask michael cohen. michael's my attorney. and you'll have to ask michael cohen. >> do you know where he got the money to make that payment? >> i don't know. no. >> well, that wasn't true. eventually, the president's other tv lawyer, rudy giuliani, admitted that the daniels hush money had, in fact, been funneled to cohen through a law firm and repaid by the president. so the takeaway tonight, the president of the united states was not telling the truth while saying he didn't know about the payments to a porn star. we now know he was working as the president of the united states from the oval office while actually making payments to the porn star. as we've said before, this is not normal. joining us now with new information on the cohen story, cnn chief political analyst gloria borger. so, gloria, what have you been learning about the drafting of michael cohen's original testimony to congress? >> well, we have sourcing that says, first of all, michael cohen wrote his original testimony himself. it was the

cohen's experience.e spoke with the house intelligence committee today behind closed doors, but then they announcend he is coming back next week. had that been the original plan or was that a change made today? >> it was not the original plan. in a way, michael was more effective today than he even was yesterday when he exceeded all of our expectations in working with him, because today new information was developed that really could be game-changing and chairman schiff and everybody in the room who wasn't a partisan republican praised him for his honesty and forthrightne forthrightness, and the development of this new information is the reason he's coming back next wednesday. >> obviously you can't tell us into detail the nature of the testimony, that's why it was behind closed doors. >> right. >> but in general terms, when you say new information was developed, is this information that is core to the russia investigation or is this new information about the kinds of things he talked about in detail yes

let's talk about michael cohen. he claims the president made it clear he was expected to lie under oath to congress about that moscow trump tower deal and his legal team reviewed and edited the statement ahead of time. do you expect the documents to support that claim? >> they are expected to support it. michael cohen has problems with his own credibility having lied to congress. now he is explaining that lie and involving not only the president's lawyers but the president himself in his contention that the president by code by implicit encouragement lead him to lie and the important point here is we are reaching a moment of reckoning for the lawyers if there's a fraud or a federal felony that privilege goes out the window. they going to have answers now. they will have to give to congressional committees and to grand juries. >> what should congress do with this information? >> congress has to hear from those lawyers. it has to review the documents because they provide essential cooberation. there have others that h

as you know, the house intelligence committee, chairman adam schiff and cohen himself, by the way, cohen's cooperation will continue. he is supposed to begin his three-year prison sentence in may. will you ask him potentially to come back and answer more questions? >> there is conceivably an opportunity to do that. he was cooperative. he said that he would provide any additional information that the committee wants. so we'll see if it's necessary. >> in the public hearing last week, you asked cohen -- i reread the transcript of that. that was public. which attorneys reviewed and edited his previous false testimony. one of the reason he's going to jail for three years is he lied under oath before congress. he told you that jay sekulow and abby lowe, private attorney representing jared kushner and ivanka trump, he mentioned those two names specifically. do you understand if they make any substantive changes, those two attorneys to what he said before congress? >> that will become very clear once the transcript becomes public, wolf. that's all i can say. >> you're giving us a hint maybe there

she's been on the cohen beat for a long time. his team wanted this, it sounds like, from lanny davis's statement. >> reporter: that's right. as others have already pointed out this just goes to the level of cooperation that michael cohen is now willing to give with the various prosecutors that are looking into the many aspects of this investigation. that's going. i think it is important to note as we start going through the documents today the context of this in the cohen-trump relationship which we have been reporting on for so long now that in the beginning, there was this dynamic where michael cohen believed and hoped that the president and the white house and the people close to the president would have his back. that when the raid happened last summer in august, when the fbi raided his home, his office and hotel, there was a sense and a hope from michael cohen that he would get some kind of signal from the president whether it was from him directly or whether it was through his aide that he would show he had his back. that o

. >> michael cohen is a broken man. he's broken because he committed crimes and he's getting nailed for it and now he's doing everything to make things easier for himself. >> if michael cohen had the dime he would drop it, but he doesn't. it was all a lie. howie: what exactly did cohen prove about trump? the president walks away from his second sit-down withrun. -- certaindown with kim jong-un. president trump: we decided we wanted to walk. >> this was an embarrassing defeat for the president of the united states on the world stage. >> i think he did the right thing in walking away with no deal. my guess is donald trump invested way too much in terms of his personal relationship with kim. >> i think it's a positive step and not a setback. howie: does he deserve credit for rejecting a bad deal. nancy pelosi and alexandria ocasio-cortez warn moderate democrats after a gun control vote, they could face consequences. plus an exposee on facebook censors, they say they are so traumatized they are smoking dope, having sex in s

michael cohen, he's the fixer. he knows what's going on with the president for the last ten years, but because anything he says has to be corroborated, a lot of their questions were about other documents and witnesses who might robert cohen's very incriminating testimony against the president. >> paul, let me go back to you a minute, joe. at one point congressman meadows who ran for congress accusing president obama of not being born in the country, at one point saying the point of the election was to send him back to kenya or wherever. he had a black female hud executive standing there. she couldn't get to the microphone because she was not a member of congress sitting there, and she couldn't be a witness because there was a witness on the stand. so many, including me, said she was just there as a prop. how do you react to her being there and do you, as a republican, see her as having been used as a prop during this hearing? >> i'm a republican and i'm also an african-american man. i saw her being used as a prop.

cohen,t appears that he did.: "it appears he committed a crime," said the house committee chair elijah cummings. that does it for our coverage today.

cohen was offering?ank you for asking because if congresswoman spear hadn't asked that question yesterday i couldn't respond because of the ground rules of an intelligence committee briefing but yes, there will be an additional amount of information comparing the first draft that michael wrote and the reiterations called red lines that a collective group of lawyers called members of a joint defense agreement. and then the final iteration contained false statement not only by michael, that he did know russian moscow tower activity after the iowa caucuses. and let me just tell you one example. so donald trump would have a rally after the iowa caucuses the campaign begins, as we all know. and he'd be at a rally telling everybody no russia, no discussions, no collusion, no russia. and his rally crowd would cheer and believe him. within a few minutes he'd be walking out of that rally and he would turn to michael and say so what's going on in russia? what's going on in moscow? it was that blatant. and that muc

calling cohen a liar. >> as far as cohen is concerned, he's convicted, he's a liar. he's defrauded, at a high level. got a lot of problems. and, you know, it was very interesting, because he lied so much. >> yes! yes, the president -- the president just said something true. that's true. michael cohen is a liar. he's a completely unreliable character. but that's not our fault. we're the people on the outside of trump's insane tangle of lies, attempting to get to the truth. we have to deal with what trump has given us. and he has surrounded himself with liars. he's a liar, his kids are liars, every around him is a liar. the trump campaign organization is full of on-the-record liars who have been indicted or pleaded guilty for lying. president trump does not get to defend himself by saying everyone around me is an unrepentant liar. yes, that's the problem. and amidst this miasma of lies, we're the ones left trying to figure out the facts. what did he do? what did the president do? what crimes has he possibly committed or not committed? what exactly happened with the rus

cohen? these were all the sorts of issues that were brought before the intelligence committee today. mr. giuliani in a sense baited mr. cohen in our interview tonight. he said he would like to see this attorney-client privilege waived so he could discuss at length kind of lawyers that came to him to talk about pardons. and mr. giuliani insisted that the president or his team never offered pardons, but certainly there were discussions. and the context of those discussions is what is critical at this moment. >> help our viewers understand what would be the upside. what would be gained by rudolph giuliani in waiving such a privilege and talking openly about this? >> mr. giuliani said two to three attorneys who were part of the trump joint defense legal agreement, this team a wide world of trump associates who've entered into a legal collective of sorts, have an attorney-client privilege and he would like to talk more at length about those discussions. he claims attorney client privilege is prev

they only heard from michael cohen. they want to hear from more people before they decide if, you know, whether they should impeach trump because that would be a process that would probably tear up the country a little bit in terms of very divisive -- we're still talking about the nixon era in terms of, you know, he had to resign. so this is not an easy process and democrats want to think through their 2020 implications. maybe it would be better to run against a weakened trump in 2020 than someone who is off the table. >> those democrats in the house there hoping to use that testimony we saw from michael cohen as a road map for investigations going forward. from the people that cohen mentioned in his testimony which one can offer the greatest insight into the missing pieces of these investigations? >> i'm very fascinated by the people at the top of the trump organization that he listed. when i talked to my source at the white house they always told me that one of their biggest fears, not from -- was not from the campaig

now, it donald trump didn't tell cohen to make those hush money payments, if cohen just decided to pay stormy daniels, you know, all out of the blue, why did trump pay for it? cohen has the receipts, of course, and he showed them to congress. today's trump lawyer rudy giuliani tried to explain. >> we brought out ten months ago that he made the payments. it's our -- it's our view of it that the president didn't know about it at the time. and then the president when he found out about it made arrangements for reimbursement. >> nobody really buys that, and donald trump is well known to not spend a lot of money. he is considered by many of his former coworkers notoriously cheap. hundreds of people have actually sued him for not paying back what he owed. that means things he authorized like dishwashers, painters, bartenders, and, yes, quite relevant tonight, lawyers. former federal prosecutor john flannery was special counsel counsel to three investigations, and former attorney barbara mcquade knows her way around these issues. john, i see you moving around in your chair, but you're ready,

i disagree on what cohen said.s not a collusion story. it's a real estate story. >> tucker: i am aware of that. >> [overlapping talking]. >> you spent a lot of time talking about cats. >> tucker: i claim i made in the open. here you have cohen and the mueller investigation both debunking the so-called bombshell you ran in january. you are refusing to admit it's been bedunked. i paid two pieces of tape of michael cohen saying it's not true and you said it's still true on what count? >> michael cohen was saying in his way he was telling me to lie. i don't think there is dispute that cohen claims, you could say he was lying, he claims trump was telling him to lie. when this first went out you called it a hoax. >> tucker: that's not what your piece said. he told him to. >> cohen described in meetings. cohen described personal meeting with jay sekulow and trump. everyone is chasing for more details. it's hard to argue without a transcript of the meeting. trump said no russia, no deal. that's personal. talking about the

we saw house republicans ignore all of cohen's charges and fiercely attack cohen's credibility. we saw the hanoi summit with kim jong-un fall apart with no agreement. we saw an emerging controversy over how jared kushner received his top secret security clearance. we saw the house vote to reverse the president's national emergency declaration. yesterday we saw a president who seemed both energized by his crowd at a conservative conference and simultaneously unnerved by everything that's happening around him. in the longest speech of his presidency before an adoring cpac audience, mr. trump was eager or maybe desperate to talk about every success and every controversy and every grievance of his presidency. negotiating with china. i'm building the wall and we got rid of the individual mandate. religious liberty. lying james comey. socialism. the collusion delusion. those cara vans. a national emergency. we're being invaded by drugs, by people, by criminals. phony charges of russia, russia, russia, russia. >> the manic performance complete with expletives seemed like a fitting end

michael cohen disputed that.ichael cone was asked about this having to do with his account about the trump tour moscow project. here is what he said. >> so i lied about it, too. mr. trump made clear to me through his personal statements to me and through his lies to the country that he wanted me to lie. howie: cohen is saying he didn't directly tell me to do this, i interpreted this as his intent. guy: the "buzzfeed" story is problematic for "buzzfeed." they reported trump directed cohen to lie. cohen said i felt i knew what he wanted me to do which was to lie. it's plausible, but that's not what "buzzfeed" reported. there is an outstanding problem they have. the two reporters on that piece. one of them said they had seen documentation that proved this directive occurred. one of them said they had seen it and the other said they had not seen it. howie: even if he's telling the truth as he seize it, that's not what "buzzfeed" is reporting. clarence: the argument already started and continues. i call this issue a w

cohen said behind closed doors. like to ask you about that when we come back. >> sure. >> we'll be right back. >> sure. >> we'll be right back e job from any one else. why accept it from your allergy pills? most pills don't finish the job because they don't relieve nasal congestion. flonase sensimist is different. it relieves all your worst symptoms, including nasal congestion, which most pills don't. it's more complete allergy relief. and all from a gentle mist you can barely feel. flonase sensimist helps block six key inflammatory substances. most pills only block one. and six is greater than one. flonase sensimist. when cravings hit, hit back.s greater than one. choose glucerna, with slow release carbs to help manage blood sugar, and start making everyday progress. glucerna. but i'm more than a number. when i'm not sharing ideas with my colleagues i'm defending my kingdom. my essilor lenses offer more than vision correction with three innovative technologies for my ultimate in vision clarity and protection togeth

michael cohen's attorney -- michael cohen directed his attorney to have these conversations after these were dangled in front of him. the question is whether or not he lied to congress, including in their concern from republicans who say that he did, in fact, lie to congress. jim jordan, the ranking ready on that committee, has plans to refer this to the justice department to investigate further. he told me earlier today. i caught up with elijah cummings who the oversight committee chairman who is concerned if anyone lied to his committee and plans to look into it further. >> i will nail you to the cross. i meant that. i have to look at it and see whether -- assuming there's inconsistencies. i gotta make sure they are true inconsistencies and not outright lies. >> reporter: he said i would nail you to the cross if you did lie to the committee. that's something he said he told michael cohen. he is not willing to say he lied to his committee yet. he wants to review everything, the transcript and perhaps any follow-up questions with cohen and his attorney about exactly that statement about

you looked at michael cohen. the public is obsess because they recognize an every-man quality in cohen >> cohen gave us a picture, a building -- believable picture of the mna. >> we are seed a humbled michael cohen. a lot of it rings true. >> i was very troughed of him. of i was really proud. sean what happened yesterday was a disgrace. -- you would think they would be more interested in the safety and security of people around the world. i thought politics was supposed to stop at the water's edge. that's what top democrats told us when obama was negotiating the deal that would give iran who wanted to wipe israel off the map, he was negotiating giving them 150-million dollars. he had a different opinion. >> the cost to our reputation in the world. we get a new president. we will find a reason to impeach him. >> it's unprecedented for a political party to interview to intervene to embarrass the president of the united states. >> some members of congress want to make progress with the hard liners in iran. it's unus

>> considering cohen was lying previously to protect the president, i'm more inclined to believe cohen. i can't speak to whether he had different lawyers negotiating on his behalf when he was -- when he was trying to cover up for the president, i would imagine there's probably something that was going on. what he said in the testimony in terms of i have never asked for a pardon, i don't know in terms of parsing words. that's not what i was focused on. at the end of the day, it's -- i'm never going to rely on just his wortd words alone to come t final conclusion. >> the chairman of your committee, congressman cummings, he says president trump is welcome to call him to discuss this. how do you think your committee is going to investigate? this is a serious charge. >> again, chairman cummings is incredibly deliberate about this. he will look into it. he will look at the witnesses, as giuliani mentioned, i suppose there are other witnesses that are possible. that are possibilities around this. >> do you think he will call the president and ask him to testify? >> i highly doubt the presiden

according to michael cohen's current lawyer, cohen had his ex-lawyer talk to the trump team including rudy giuliani about a possible pardon. michael cohen himself testified last week under oath that he never asked for a pardon. could he be in new legal jeopardy? what about the president's legal team? were they open for business on the pardon issue? >> cnn learned michael cohen handed over new documents to the house intelligence committee yesterday showing edits to the false statement he delivered to congress in 2017 about the trump moscow tower project. cohen told lawmakers that one of the president's lawyers edited his testimony, but, confusingly, lanny davis said cohen himself authored the false line. joining us with this and more we have republican susan collins of the senate intelligence committee. good morning. >> good morning, alisyn. >> a lot more material has come out from michael cohen in the past week. there are cancelled checks we have now seen paid from president trump to michael cohen. all of this reporting about requests for pardons. we don't know who made the overture,

michael cohen's attorney is supportive of this. i mean, he goes so far as to say it will help michael cohen and his desire to continue to cooperate here. why? >> well, it's really interesting. they redacted everything. surely there are some things that michael cohen has already testified about and that were contained in the sentencing documents for michael cohen that are already in the public realm and could have been left unredacted. prosecutors felt strongly that this is ongoing, that they have work to do and people and facts that they don't want out which means that it looks like they are planning to charge more people. he told prosecutors they needed to come back in may to identify again why at that point these documents can't be unredacted than they are now. everyone seems to be on top of this. prosecutors must have convinced the judge that it would jeopardize the investigation to unredact this material. i think they are looking to charge some more folks in this. >> when you look at some of the details that we are getting here

cohen yesterday ahead of time. were you brought in to discuss strategy of how they would approach that? >> i think jim jordan did an excellent job as a ranking member. i thought the committee did an excellent job of getting to the point. just like any committee, one thing i do is -- the leader, i meet with all the committees. but most of it's all left to them to work. this is their expertise. this is what they do. this is what they focus on. yes, sir. >> this is what they focus on. >> when do you expect to name members of the select committee on climate security? some democrats -- >> i already named before i walked out here. it's today. >> could you share them with us? [laughter] >> last question. >> the u.s. trade representative said yesterday that he may not need congress to sign off on any type of understanding between the u.s. and china in regards to a trade deal. do you think that congress should have the opportunity to weigh in? >> if it's not a treaty, then the constitution says we don't. i support the presi

it came down to michael cohen.ven at this late date people thought he was the linchpin and he was. according to the dossier, he was the guy who went to prague and had a secret meeting with the russians. he had all of they w informatio. the only way yesterday's hearing make sense was if they were trying to interrogate this russian collusion theory. it doesn't make sense to ask questions about donald trump as a businessman because that's not proper for government oversight. it's not seamly to have congressional investigators with an attorney-client privilege. the only way it makes sense to give the goods on the russian inclusion theory. he did exactly the opposite and yet you don't hear people realizing what happened. >> tucker: when they raided his office, i remember thinking, if i'm not committing any felonies, someone raided my lawyer's office or tortured my wife, this is an intimate person in trump's life. he doesn't have the goods and they have all of this documents. and all of these communications. and i'm like

he knew michael cohen for ten years. >> well, he did, but, for example, michael cohen said oh, i have want a job in the administration. >> that's not relevant to the crime, the alleged criminality. he had a check. it was in front of us, we saw it. >> it's not. >> did donald trump sign that check or not? >> i don't know. here's the thing, from the standpoint of cohen it goes back to his credibility and the whole administration thing, he was lobbying for the chief of staff job. everybody be knows that. that's nothing new. >> that's not -- let me go to fernand. this what is republicans are doing essentially. they're trying to say that things that aren't relevant to the actual evidence that was brought to the table by michael cohen, are what we need to talk about. something about boxes, whether or not he's going to write a book or wanted a job. is that relevant in your view, fernand, to what donald trump signed a check to pay off stormy daniels and to reimburse michael cohen for doing so while he was president? >> of course it's not relevant. i take exception with one of the things that m

whitaker did not deny that the president called him to discuss michael cohen -- the michael cohen case and personnel decisions in the southern district. two, while he was acting attorney general, mr. whitaker was directly involved in conversations about whether to fire one or more u.s. attorneys. three, while he was attorney general -- acting attorney general, mr. whitaker was involved in conversations about the scope of the southern district of new york u.s. attorney berman's recusal and whether the southern district went too far many pursuing the campaign finance case in which the president was listed as individual number one. those are the three takeaways from our -- from today. >> what do you mean that he did not deny -- the president -- he did not deny the president's involvement -- or the president interest ee e-- >> he did not deny it. >> the top republican on the committee had a very different ta takeaway from the same closed door session with whitaker. take a listen to what he told manu raju a short time ago. >> mr. nadler said the president -- whitaker did not deny the presid

last week on this program michael cohen's attorney lanny davis told us that during cohen's closed doortimony before the intelligence committee in the house, cohen, quote, developed new information. that basically necessaitated hi to come back for the committee this week. the new information developed by cohen in that closed-door session was quite explosive. well michael cohen's encore performance before the house intelligence committee was today and this time to everyone's surprised it involved enough checked bags for a family of five on an international fliegts to bangkok and we believe all of the luggage into the committee room, we believe in that luggage was documents that cohen had promised to bring with him today to support the allegations that he has made against the president and the president's business. what was in those suitcases? joining us now is the only person i can think to ask who might actually tell me anything about it. emily jane fox, national correspondent at "vanity fair." thank you for being here. do you know what is in the suitcases? >> i don't know. maybe a blan

and it jogged something in cohen's memory. and he said, wait a minute, i have some financial documents. i think they're in the boxes that were returned to me from the southern district of new york from when federal agents executed search warrants on his homes and office. and so he went down to the storage facility in his apartment building that happens to be a trump-owned apartment building. and he started going through boxes. and there were -- >> i learn in your report today, it's not just a trump-owned building. who else lives in the same building with michael cohen? >> funnily enough, jared and ivanka keep an apartment -- >> jared and ivanka trump, their new york apartment is in the same building as michael cohen. >> it is. they spend most of their time in washington now. they do have a shared apartment. >> so he goes down to the basement of this building -- >> and there are nine boxes that were returned to him. he goes through box number 1. it's kind of junk. box number 2, kind of junk. box number 3, it is jackpot. and wha

it is not just michael cohen's testimony or hearsay michael cohen had tapes that came out july of last year which he discussed with president trump how should we structure this and president trump said to cohen that you should talk to alan. >> alan can be in multiple interests of multiple investigations. >> well, potentially far more leverage than michael cohen. michael cohen joined in 2006, trump treated him as an enforcer. weisselberg has been there since the 1970s. he prepares the president's personal income tax returns and the person signing off most of the deals at the trump organization of substance or size. he has long standing institutional knowledge that investigators are looking into things beyond campaign finance, looking into things like tax problems or insurance fraud. alan weisselberg has a front row seat. >> which why he'll insist on immunity before he testifies. >> do you think he'll sit on immunity? >> they'll probably have to give it to him, that's right. >> let's listen to michael cohen describing his first visit to the white house. donald trump assured him the reimb

did michael cohen?gree and he's a liar and you have to take that at face value and i thought and i agree with peggy noonan on this, it was the portrait of the president he painted particularly in his opening statement that i thought perhaps is more damaging in the end than any particular thing on which he exonerated the president. talking about the president looking at him and saying if i was going to go to vietnam, do you think i'm stupid? the president who he says never indicated he loved the country or wanted to make it better. this is a guy who spent years and years at his side. i think there is a lingering, cumulative impact of that intimate portrait and damning a portrait by someone so close to the president. i do think we'll get to impeachment at some point because i don't think democrats will hold themselves back before 2020, and i don't think it matters and nothing will drive this president from office and you have to think of him. he's not nixon. he's marion barry. a guy who loves -- he loves

>> i tend to believe cohen on this. he may not know.he fact that you are under audit, doesn't stop you from releasing your tax returns. your lawyer may recommend you not release your tax returns. he could have done it. he had been lying about this all along. >> red flag? are those red flags? >> i think they are red flags. we know he doesn't want to release his tax returns. i think it's because he doesn't want financial experts, he doesn't want tax lawyers, he doesn't want reporters looking through his tax returns and finding out what is going on with him. how much he is worth, which is a big issue, the value of his various assets. one of the things cone accused him of is raising the value of his assets when he was making insurance claims and then lowering the value of them when he was paying taxes. it raises the question of what value he has been putting on them when he filed federal forms when he ran for president about his assets. i think there's a real problem for him if he does release his taxes. it looks like now that at least the

michael cohen testified last week.nowledge did the president provide inflated assets to an insurance company? cohen said yes. >> under oath, michael cohen implicated the president in potential insurance fraud, bank fraud and other fraudulent activity with regard to his charity. cohen said the president inflated his assets to insurance companies as well as in order to get a loan from a bank. so i think this is really of concern for the white house, because we were talking earlier about this notion of executive privilege. when it comes to the president's business, there's no real claim for executive privilege. there's another aspect that concerns them. the special counsel has certain limitations with respect to the scope of the mueller investigation. when it comes to prosecutors in the southern district of new york, there's no real clear mandate. they can pursue inquiry that comes to their attention. there's a lot to follow up on. >> i can only imagine how angry the president must be that new york, new jersey, all these

michael cohen is indeed a lawyer. but you have all these public statements from donald trump himself saying that, oh, michael cohen didn't do anything for me. he was just this guy i let hang around. he didn't really do anything. as usual, on the record, we have trump statements that sort of contradict a trump theory of defense. the other issue is if you're a lawyer in a retainer agreement, those things are written. i've seen retainer agreements for lawyers. they're pretty simple. >> yes. >> there's got to be a retainer agreement that you produce or there isn't. if allen weissleberg can't produce that retainer agreement, i don't know how he justifies signing these checks. >> well, then we'd be shocked again to discover that members of the trump trio are lying about what's occurred here. you know, it's interesting that that irrevocable trust is in place here. it was essentially this fig leaf that was established to give the appearance that the trump family was insulating the trump family businesses from the white house

michael cohen was donald trump's fixer.mind the american people, michael cohen is going to prison because he did two felonies. one was hush money illegal payments. he inflated assets to secure loans. that's bank fraud. with donald trump, it looks like he did the same thing. donald trump wrote the checks for these hush money payments and based on public reporting, he inflated his assets to get loans from deutsche bank. >> he committed perjury, lying to congress. that's a federal crime. he begins his three-year sentence may 6 in a federal penitentiary in upstate new york. do the redactions on these pages -- there are 20 pages that are fully blacked out, do they indicate that the hush money payment scheme in this investigation is still ongoing? >> absolutely. you have ongoing investigations. we know from documents provided by michael cohen that donald trump is implicated. he is viindividual one. >> what new questions does all this raise, the new information we got today about michael cohen's lobbying for foreign entities? >> we also know from the search warrants that about a month before the

cohen's attorney does tell cnn that it was cohen himself that authored the initial false line about the timeline. joining us now, ann milligram, former new jersey attorney general. and alex burns, national correspondent "the new york times" who has a big scoop on joe biden today. we'll get to that in a home. first, ann, i want to talk about michael cohen. did michael cohen lie to congress when he says he never talked about pardons when his lawyer announced, yeah, he asked his original lawyer to ask about pardons? and number two, what kind of legal soup does this put the president's team in potentially? because at a minimum there appear to be discussions about pardons here. >> right. so i think we've all had this theory or this question of whether or not the president was discussing pardons through his lawyers. one of the interesting things here is michael cohen said i never had that discussion. he doesn't say my lawyer never had that discussion. and this is one of the things i think frustrates us to no end about people because obviously your lawyer's speaking for you and if your lawyer

it's about michael cohen. we're used to dealing with people who have lied and then they come around and have seen the light. when you get the second chance like he has now, there is no third chance. when lanny davis is trying to do damage control, i give lanny davis credit for a good try. michael cohen said i would not ever, never would i accept a pardon. never means never. this is like when president clinton said it depends what the definition of is. he said he wouldn't accept a job at the white house that is easily proven to be a lie that i think michael cohen's credibility is shattered. >> shouldn't the president take that off the table? can that not be read as at least offering that possibility? because the president has tweeted things about witnesses who are cooperating witnesses, welcoming witnesses who do not cooperate. it gets to the question of an intent at least to interfere in an ongoing investigation. >> i don't think so because the president has the prerogative to pardon. he has not pardoned anybo

so what is next for cohen? the president's former lawyer begins a three year prison term on may 6. >>> former trump campaign chairman paul manafort will be sentenced today in virginia federal court. manafort was found guilty of defrauding banks and failing to pay taxes on millions of dollars he earned as a political consultants in ukraine. prosecutors have asked for up to 25 years in prison, potentially a life sentence for the 69-year-old. and tens of millions in financial penalties. the case was the first brought to trial by robert mueller as part of his russia investigation. >>> democrats are divided over controversial remarks made by freshman congresswoman ilhan omar of minnesota and that is testing nancy pelosi's ability to unify her party. democratic sources tell cnn that the debate surrounding representative omar is messy, and tempers are flaring. it is now unclear whether a resolution condemning anti-semitism will come to a vote. >> many expressing sympathy, but many others still expressing -- >> i want