Copyright: Reuters
Let’s look at what Justice Engoron thought about the testimony of Michael Cohen, Trump’s former fixer – who was one of the first to react to the judge’s ruling.
Cohen’s testimony was one of the blockbuster days in the trial, it was the first time Trump and his old lawyer had been in the same room together in years after they had a falling-out.
Engoron says Cohen “was an important witness on behalf of the plaintiff, although hardly the linchpin
that defendants have attempted to portray him to be”.
“His testimony was significantly
compromised by his having pleaded guilty to perjury and by some seeming contradictions in
what he said at trial.
“However, carefully parsed, he testified that although Donald Trump did not
expressly direct him to reverse engineer financial statements, he ordered him to do so indirectly,
in his ‘mob voice,'” Engoron says in his ruling.
“Although the animosity between the witness and the defendant is palpable,
providing Cohen with an incentive to lie, the Court found his testimony credible.”
Quote Message: This factfinder does not believe that pleading guilty to perjury means that you can never tell the truth. Michael Cohen told the truth” from Justice Arthur Engoron
