President Donald Trump early Saturday, in an apparent reference to news that his former attorney Michael Cohen had taped a conversation with him concerning payments to a former Playboy model,
tweeted that the action was "perhaps illegal," but denied any wrongdoing on his own part.
He also called raids of Cohen's home, office and hotel room earlier this year "inconceivable" and "almost unheard of."
"Inconceivable that the government would break into a lawyer’s office (early in the morning) - almost unheard of," the president tweeted. "Even more inconceivable that a lawyer would tape a client - totally unheard of & perhaps illegal. The good news is that your favorite President did nothing wrong!"
On Friday, The New York Times reported that Cohen secretly recorded a conversation with Trump two months before the 2016 presidential election. Lawyers and others familiar with the recording said Trump and Cohen discussed payments made to former Playboy model Karen McDougal.
She claims that she started an affair with Trump in 2006, just after his wife, Melania, had their son, Barron.
McDougal sold her story to The National Enquirer for $150,000, but the tabloid, which was friendly to Trump during his campaign, held back the story in a "catch and kill" move that silenced her and her claims.
The Justice Department, as part of its investigation into Cohen, is working to determine if he was involved in paying off women making claims about Trump, and whether that violated any campaign finance laws.
Cohen has already admitted to paying former adult movie star Stormy Daniels (whose real name is Stephanie Clifford) $130,000 during the 2016 campaign, after she claimed to have had an affair with Trump.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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