Judge Andrew Napolitano on Thursday took Rudy Giuliani to the woodshed for some recent missteps and ridiculed the assertion by the former mayor that the president didn't know what he was getting for his $130,000 to Michael Cohen.
Napolitano made the comments on Fox News' "Fox and Friends" the morning after Giuliani made news when he said President Donald Trump reimbursed his personal attorney Cohen but "didn’t know about the specifics of it."
"If Rudy wants the public to believe that Donald Trump reimbursed Michael Cohen $130,000 and didn't know what it was for, didn't know that it was going to silence Stormy Daniels, that is unworthy of belief," Judge Nap told the Fox panel.
"It's up to the American public whether they believe that somebody like Donald Trump would just pour money down a hole to Michael Cohen to settle problems without asking to whom the money was going and for what purpose. How would Michael Cohen know that Stormy Daniels needed to be silenced?" Judge Nap said.
With all parties saying Trump repaid Cohen from his personal funds, it's not an election issues for the president.
"But it does create a problem because the president has said he knows nothing about this. This is a problem between the president, his personal morality, his wife and his base on one side, and the president and the law on the other side," Napolitano said.
The judge also took Giuliani to task for negotiating with special counsel Robert Mueller in public and demeaning the Justice Department.
On Giuliani saying he would limit Trump's exposure to Mueller:
"I don't think it's wise to be negotiating in public and on television; it sometimes insults the other side," Judge Nap said. "Don’t taunt the alligator until after you've crossed the stream. I mean, don't say there's no way they're going to get him for more than 2 or 3 hours because they can subpoena (Trump) before a grand jury and Rudy, for all of his devotion to the president, will not be able to control that."
On Rudy calling the Justice Department "completely unhinged and out of control."
"That is a dangerous argument to make. … These people are doing the work of protecting our lives, our liberty and our property," Napolitano said. "For him to say our Justice Department is out of control or that the government is corrupt, it's an argument that's going to be used by criminal defense lawyers in legitimate prosecutions as if to say, don't believe the government anymore."
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