Michael Cohen is back.
The disbarred lawyer has spent a lifetime marketing his curious skill set: a moral and ethical flexibility that allows him to do things that others would find revolting. A legal thug who threatened students, journalists, and others on behalf of his former client. He then turned against Trump to cut a deal for himself after being criminally charged for fraudulent conduct. He has now turned against the New York prosecutors who sought to rehabilitate him to prosecute Trump.
For full disclosure, I have been a critic of Cohen for years, dating back to his time as a thug for Donald Trump, when I chastised the New York bar for failing to act against him. While the media once despised Cohen, he became a darling of the press when he turned against Trump.
Cohen’s North Star has always been pure, unadulterated self-interest. Neither loyalty nor decency has deterred Cohen from making false statements or serving the interests of his changing patrons.
His conduct as an attorney was a disgrace to the bar for years, as he gamed the system for his own benefit. Michael Cohen was long known as the “fixer” for former President Trump — a legal thug who threatened students, journalists, and others on behalf of his former client.
His signature has been to threaten lawsuits against critics. He even sued Trump and failed.
When his fraudulent business conduct led to criminal charges, it was clear that he was again entertaining best offers. Cohen reinvented himself as a redemptive sinner and received financial support from Trump critics.
Throughout this process and after his conviction, he continued to be accused of lying.
He claimed urgent medical needs for release from prison. Of course, he previously claimed health problems for failing to appear to testify, only to be spotted out on the town for a fancy dinner.
During the Trump trial, Cohen was again accused of lying. He spent two days insisting that he had been a liar but had lied to help former President Donald Trump.
Cohen has lied to Congress, courts, special counsels, the IRS, the banks, and virtually every creature that walks or crawls on the face of the Earth.
Notably, his past convictions for business and tax fraud were not taken in Trump’s interest but in his own.
When he admitted on the stand that he lied during his prior plea agreement, it was to advance his own interests.
Cohen has now continued this pattern of shifting loyalties and turned on New York Attorney General Letitia James and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, accusing them of pressuring him to frame his testimony to guarantee Trump’s conviction.
After Trump’s recent court victories and the remanding of his federal case, Cohen is claiming that the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office and the New York Attorney General’s Office “pressured and coerced” him into tailoring testimony:
“I felt pressured and coerced only to provide information and testimony that would satisfy the government’s desire to build the cases against and secure a judgment and convictions against President Trump.”
The posting led some to speculate that Cohen is again marketing his availability to the highest bidder.
Whatever the reason, his statement clearly undermines his former allies as they struggle to preserve what remains of their prior prosecutions.
Cohen remains the personification of the old fable of the scorpion and frog. In the fable, a scorpion convinced a leery frog to carry him across a river, noting that he could not sting him since they would both drown. Halfway across, the scorpion struck, and the frog asked why he would doom them both. The scorpion replied, “I am sorry, but I couldn’t resist the urge. It’s in my nature.”
James and Bragg just felt that all-too-familiar sting from Michael Cohen.
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