. >> my client. >> your client, michael cohen. let me ask you this. if michael cohen is such a stand-up guy, where is he? >> i -- >> no, no. where is this guy? why won't he come and sit in this chair -- >> because obviously -- >> wait, let me finish. >> i want to answer that question. >> he's been invited numerous times. he won't come on the show. he's dodging the questions. >> he is not doning the questions. >> he's dodging the questions. where is this guy? where is this guy? >> there are other investigations going on. >> where is this guy? >> i was wondering what was in the brown envelope. >> where is he? >> believe me, he can't wait to come here. >> can't wait? >> and talk about this. >> he can give an interview, but he can't come on this show? >> bottom line is, this is an airtight contract -- >> michael cohen in "vanity fair," he did talk to "vanity fair," doesn't come on this program, but he did talk to "vanity fair," said he would have done this at any time, that this had nothing to do with the election. this thing was sign

we have never said that it is michael cohen. but, look -- >> you've been saying that all along. >> come on, let him finish. >> let him finish. >> look, it's very simple. my client sat down. she answered the questions. 90% of america found her credible. why hasn't michael cohen sat down -- forget two hours. i'll take 20 minutes. how about 10 minutes? and answered the questions. instead, he sends you. you're not even involved in the case. >> are you ever going to make an appearance in the case? >> i am never making an appearance in that case. i am his. >> you're a talking head. >> of course. that's what we're here for. >> let's let him answer now. >> first of all, michael cohen just wants you to keep running your mouth and your client running because every time you do, that it's going to cost your client another million dollars. i mean i hope you have a nice malpractice policy because you're advising your client to breach a contract. >> one of the things that certainly stormy daniels feels and michael avenatti has said is that the

supervisor cohen, i want to thank you, and hand it over to you. >> supervisor cohen: thank you. i'm so excited and thank you. the reason why i called this hearing today is because it's the right and the authority of the san francisco board of supervisors to provide consultation and input to the mayor and to the department of human resources on the successor mou negotiation between the city and county of san francisco and the san francisco police officer's association. and for the first time in over ten years, we are negotiating the terms of this mou. it is appropriate that the board exercise its role in bargaining as a branch consider consider bargaining as a branch of the employer, meaning that as an extension of the mayor's office, particularly given the sequence of acting an appointed mayors over the last 3.5 months, excuse me, this is an important conversation that we're having on behalf of the people of the city and county of san francisco, and i just want to ensure that we're doing a good job of making clear the scope of what is legally discloseable, what exactly is being

cohen or mr. trump, we are going to call him out on it. >> stormy daniels said she could recognize this person even though it was many years ago. it scared her that much. >> what she's stated is it left an image in her mind and it stayed with her for a significant period of time. a traumatic experience. and we are confident that she can identify this individual. >> there's an e-mail, you've shown a lot of e-mails that were sent to michael cohen from michael cohen using his trump organization e-mail address. you have this other e-mail from michael cohen to keith davidson who is the former attorney for stormy daniels. there's two things. and i think you just released today, nbc had it and we're showing it. there's two things on that. one is michael cohen where he signed it he's described as the personal attorney for president donald trump, and then there's something else you say that is significant. what is the significance in your opinion of this? >> anderson, we believe this to be a smoking gun e-

micha michael cohen paid her with personal funds. this is not something the president or the candidate actually did. that's why i'm saying he is not talking about this because it has nothing to do with him as a candidate or him personally as the president. >> i'm sorry, look. paris, i know you're a steadfast defender of this president. but most people don't just whack out $130,000 from their home equity loan to an adult film star a few days before an election to protect donald trump. this is not something that happened -- >> loyal friends. >> this is not something that happened in a random fashion. and occam's razor is michael cohen was engaged in a last-minute thing in the campaign to cover up something that was going to be embarrassing to the president and embarrassing to his candidacy because he is a guy who has for a long time gone out and chased down anything that was mammalian and susceptible to his limited charms. this is not a guy who was -- michael cohen was not a guy doing this because of a random set of circumstances. he w

michael cohen gave statements to jimmy kimmel. now she's saying i just want my truth to be out there. >> just because the president's been consistent in his denials doesn't make it credible. i think these women's stories that are very similar are much more credible than the president's. i'm sorry, but that's the reality of it. >> wow. >> with regard to the political -- >> has donald trump lied about his marriages before? >> his story has been completely -- >> jason, i know trump world lives in this comfortable bubble, but let me acquaint you with page 6 in "the new york post." donald trump has been a skirt-chasing hound his entire life. this is not a guy who goes home at night and sits with the little woman and watches tv. this is a guy who is a long-term philanderer, adulterer, whatever phrase you want to use. he has never taken any contract or vow, much less his marital vows, seriously. this is a guy who has a notorious reputation for this. it is a reputation he cultivated as part of his -- >> so you got the sound bite in, but t

. >> supervisor cohen: very good. do you know which department employs the highest paid police officers in the bay area? >> i believe it might be santa clara, from what i remember, the data that we looked at. so there are really two key factors that we look at. >> supervisor cohen: okay. >> one is the wage itself, and the other is total compensation. santa clara's a very high payer for base wage, but it varies across all the agencies how many members of these agencies contribute to their pension, their medical, what the medical is, what the other related benefits are for special skills, for retention, for longevity and so forth. these are different compensations across police agencies and we look at all of them. >> supervisor cohen: i want to step away from compensation and ask exactly what it is we're asking our front line officers to do? maybe you can give us some detail on the job description. >> i think it's the best -- i didn't come equipped to talk about that. i think chief scott would be the better person to ta

remarkably, a lot of it has been at the hands of attorney cohen, mr. cohen. my client wants an opportunity to tell her story to tell the truth about what happened and what didn't happen. to tell the truth about the events not only relating to her relationship with the president, but also the conduct in which she has witnessed over the last 12 to 18 months as it relates to efforts to silence her. she wants an opportunity to set the record straight. she wants the opportunity for the american people to pass judgment as to who is telling the truth. is it her or is it mr. cohen. is it her or president trump. is it her or ms. sanders. that is what my client wants. >> our chief legal analyst -- are you wear of any other women who signed contracts with president trump? >> we are not aware of any other women, but in my experience, the way this was handled and the document, quite honestly, this was amateur hour. very sloppy, very messy. shocking something of this magnitude was handled in this way. >> i have a lot of respect for mr. cohen, i think he is a good attorney

cohen's statements. we're confident that we'll prove to the american people that they have been told a bucket of lies. >> your reaction, josh? >> the brass ring here for avenatti and any lawyer going up against trump is to get him to testify under oath. my bloomberg colleague, timothy o'brien was sued by trump years ago, actually did manage to get him under oath and his lawyers caught trump in 30 different lies. >> people can read that deposition. i think tim has it out there. >> exactly. you can google this and read the lies he caught trump in. that's the big fear of trump's legal team. that's one of the reasons why trump's previous lawyer, john dowd, resigned. he doesn't want trump to testify in front of bob mueller's investigators. i think a lot of lawyers around town would counsel trump and tell him this is potentially a bad idea for you to go ahead. >> it does seem, at least at this point, things can change, i think trump is getting lucky here by the nature of who is opposing him. avenatti has gone

and remarkably, a lot of it has been at the hands of attorney cohen, mr. cohen. my client wants an opportunity to tell her story, to tell the truth about what happened and what didn't happen, to tell the truth about the events not only relating to her relationship with the president, but also the conduct and what she's witnessed the last 12 to 18 months as it relates to efforts to silence her. she wants an opportunity to set the record straight. ultimately, she wants the opportunity for the american people to pass judgment as to who is telling the truth. is it her, or is it mr. cohen? is it her, or is it president trump? is it her, or is it ms. sanders? that's what my client wants. and that's what we're going to fight for. >> our chief legal analyst jeffrey tubin said the contract reads to him like a form that maybe has been used before. does it seem that way to you? are you aware of any other women who signed similar contracts with president trump? >> we're not aware of any other women. but let me just say this. in my experience, the way that this was handled an

now add go michael cohen by name in the suit. not just michael cohen, as the owner of the business that ended up being put together to pay stormy daniels. he is saying that michael cohen defamed his client back in february. just hours after the world watched, the white house today once again denying the allegations. >> the president himself hasn't directly talked about the daniels scandal. instead taking to twitter to decry what he called fake news. cryptically tweeting. so fake news. never more voluminous or more inaccurate. through it all our country is doing great. daniels' attorney michael avenatti making a vigorous defense. >> if she's not telling the truth, let the president take to the podium and call her a liar. >> one of the more troubling things she said was something that she said occurred in 2011 in las vegas. a short time after she gave an interview to in touch weekly. >> i was in a parking lot. going to a fitness class with my infant daughter. and a guy walked up on me and said to me, leave trump alone. forget the s

cohen's client, then who was mr. cohen working for? the answer cannot be himself because he wasn't a party individually to any of this. so the options are either mr. trump or the trump organization or some other unknown party that we haven't heard about. but it is a very simple question. who was his client? >> yeah, and this is the part that does confuse me. i've reported on parts of your case that are more questionable, the idea that you might get the entire mba thrown out because of a missing signature is an open debate in court. but the idea that their defense has become michael cohen just spends a lot of money to help donald trump without donald trump's knowledge is as you say not only shady, it literally would appear to violate these ethics rules. i noticed in your filing you be a reference to that. are you seeking to make as well a separate ethics complaint against mr. cohen? >> we haven't made that determination yet. this is very straightforward. he needed to have communicated with a client. if he didn't have a client, he had no

cohen, we've stated there are no paternity issues. if this is so craftily drafted by his client why include paternity issues? i hope the next time i get on a commercial plane it's a little more airtight than this because otherwise this is going to fall out of the sky. >> the viewers aren't seeing the agreement. this is an airtight agreement. it's an excellent agreement. >>> let's take another quick break. we'll have more of this conversation in just a moment. because there are options. like an "unjection™". xeljanz xr. a once-daily pill for adults with moderate to severe ra for whom methotrexate did not work well enough. xeljanz xr can reduce pain, swelling and further joint damage, even without methotrexate. xeljanz xr can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. serious, sometimes fatal infections, lymphoma and other cancers have happened. don't start xeljanz xr if you have an infection. tears in the stomach or intestines, low blood cell counts and higher liver tests and cholesterol levels have happened. you

cohen's client, then who was mr. cohen working for? the answer cannot be himself, because he wasn't a party individually to any of this. so the options are, either mr. trump or the trump organization, or some other unknown party that we haven't heard about. but it is a very simple question. who was his client? >> and this is the part that does confuse me. i have reported on parts of your case that are more questionable, the idea that you might get the entire nda thrown out because of a imissing signature. i think you have to see what the court says about that. but their defense has become that michael cohen spends a lot of money to help donald trump without donald trump's knowledge, is as you say, not only shady, it literally would appear to violate these ethics rules. are you seeking to make a separate ethics claim with regard to mr. cohen? >> this is very straight forward, he needed to communicate with a client. if he didn't have a client, he had no business doing any of this, but quite honestly, and i have used every superlative tha

that's cohen himself. this is a guy, speaking metaphorically or literally, this is a guy who traffics in those kinds of threats. >> david, real lawyers know the kind of stuff that michael cohen has done, those kind of threats can get you disbarred and disciplined by the bar in many jurisdictions. but the other part of it is that michael cohen, as famous as he is for threats, he's famous for empty threats like the $500 million threat to the daily beast, which sounds a lot like the $20 million threat to stormy daniels. >> cohen has done a number of things that ought to be examined by the new york state bar about unprofessional conduct. and yeah these threats are hollow. in the agreement, by the way, has this million dollar per disclosure on stormy daniels, or stephanie clifford, but it's one sided. there are no penalties if donald trump violates the agreement to keep everything secret. lawrence, i was reviewing the agreement before we went on the air again. there's a telling line that may help explain why do

you know, up until that point, he was leading us to believe it was michael cohen that michael cohen was the one threatening. what did we learn from that interview, mierk al cohen didn't make one threat or spoken to stormy daniels. what this guy says is a threat is a complete fiction. i don't know where he's from. but you're from queens, i'm from brooklyn. that ain't a threat where we're from. where two lawyers speak to each other about a damages clause in a contract and somehow he interprets that as a threat. >> let's look at the different avenues of legale -- exposure for cohen. by saying this is a lie, none of this happened that way, it's defamatory, you hurt her reputation. >> that's not the statement. >> calling her -- >> defamation is a very -- you have to look at the statement itself. what's one of the elements of defamation? a false statement. >> right. >> all he said was, the only statement in question is it doesn't matter whether something is true or not, it can still hurt a person. i will do anything to defend mr. trump. that's the statement at hand. one of the elements that h

cohen is trying to sell to the american public. >> so, david, michael cohen spheresly loyal to donald trump as we know. >> yes. >> has he done a good job representing his client here. >> no, don, i don't think he has. first of all, the idea that he would have -- look, jack -- congressman kingston is right that we haven't proven yet or no one has proven that this is a campaign finance violation. but it strains credulity first of all as joe and joan are saying to think he would have gone out and done this of his own volition without any motive. >> david stop there. you have a juris doctorate. >> i do. >> does that stand up in court even though it strains credulity. because michael cohen believes he has iron clad document that they violated. >> you know, i think that the contract stands. but the contract and the f.e.c. violation if there is one is two different issues. but don wait a second let me step out of the legal mode for a second and say it occurs to me at some point that stormy daniels at this point with all the attention could just go out there and tell her story and set up a go

trump's attorney michael cohen. in return for signing this non- disclosure agreement, cohen would pay her $130,000 through a delaware-based limited liability corporation he had established in mid-october 2016 called essential consultants. daniels says the agreement was appealing because it meant she would receive some money but also not have to worry about the affect the revelation of the affair would have on her child who was now old enough to watch the news. she signed the agreement 11 days before the election. was it hush money to stay silent? >> daniels: yes. the story was coming out again. i was concerned for my family and their safety. >> cooper: i think some people watching this are going to doubt that you entered into this negotiation because you feared for your safety. they're going to think that you saw an opportunity. >> daniels: i think the fact that i didn't even negotiate, i just quickly said, "yes" to this very, you know, strict contract. and what most people will agree with me extremely low number. i

could cohen be in legal trouble. andersen cooper spoke to the former head of the election commission for 60 minutes. >> payment of the money creates a legal mess for trump. cohen and anyone else involved in this in the campaign. >> saying that can be seen as a contribution to benefit a campaign. >> i am. $130,000, in kind contribution by cohen off to the trump campaign. which is -- about $126,500 above what he is a loud to gi if he does this on behalf of his client, the candidate, that is a coordinated illegal in kind contribution by cohen. for the purpose of influencing the election, of benefitting the candidate by keeping this secret. >> of the payment stormy daniels received is the subject of complaints by watch dog groups to the dep artment of justice. trevor potter used to be chairman. now president of the nonpartisan campaign legal center which supports the enforcement of campaign finance laws. >> if the president paid michael cohen back, is that an in kind campaign contribution the president should have report

cohen and mr. trump want. we want an open setting, open court, owned by the people, period. >> may i ask, why did she agree to this arbitration procedure, which is so lopsided, so much in his favor, because if she were to speak, she has a huge liability. >> i think there's a number of terms within the agreement that are very, very onerous and we believe it's what's called legally unconscionable. the term generally means the courts will not enforce it because it is so one-sided. of course, our position is that he never signed the agreement so the agreement is not even worth the paper it's printed on but as it relates to this arbitration proceeding, there's been a lot of misinformation out there and quite honestly, some of it has been peddled by mr. rosen, mr. cohen's new attorney. the agreement never allowed mr. cohen, this is important, mr. cohen to proceed in arbitration. the agreement only allowed mr. trump to proceed in arbitration. and to the best of our knowledge, mr. trump never initiated an arbitration

cohen, in a box. and the box is if mr. cohen wants to say the president was not aware of these actions i took on his behalf, then that raises the question of how binding an agreement is between stormy daniels and donald trump if they're going do say oh, he was really removed from this process. but then if they need to bolster themselves on the other side, then they have to say this was done in coordination with then candidate trump, and that's problematic on the campaign finance side and also potentially leads to an admission or some kind of acknowledgment of an affair. they are denying it, don't get me wrong there. but it's a very dangerous box. so, again, they get to court and this becomes very precarious. they keep it in arbitration, that doesn't happen. >> let me -- we're dying to get to a break. i'm going to make some management control and ask you a question. you have a by line on a lot of important stories in the me too movement and your paper has done a lot of reporting, yours and nick's on harvey weinstein. and i

cohen file their motion to compel arbitration. as soon as we do that, or as soon as they do that, we can refile this motion. that's exactly what we're going to do. we expect that could be filed today, it could be filed in the next couple days. all indications are they're going to file that motion. then we will in turn refile this motion, and then the court is going to make a determination. but wolf, there is language in this order that i am very, very pleased with, because the court appears to agree with our assessment of the law, and it shows that what david schwartz and others have said, that this motion had no merit, that that is baseless. they're in a lot of trouble, wolf. this is not good for the president, it is not good for mr. cohen. >> it's at least a temporary gain for them, although, as you pointed out, you're going to refile and see what happens down the road. as you know, michael cohen's attorney and his friend david schwartz, he was on cnn last night with erin burnett. he said that michael cohen was acting independen

that's cohen himself. this is a guy, speaking metaphor cli or literally, this is a guy who traffics in those kinds of threats. >> david, real lawyers know the kind of stuff that michael cohen has done, those kind of threats can get you disbarred and disciplined by the bar in many jurisdictions. but the other part of it is that michael co michael cohen, as famous as he is for threats, he's famous for empty threats like the $500 million threat to the daily beast, which sounds a lot like the $20 million threat to stormy daniels. >> cohen has done a number of things that ought to be examined by the new york state bar about unprofessional conduct. and yeah these threats are hollow. in the agreement, by the way, has this million dollar per disclosure on stormy daniels, or stephanie clifford, but it's one sided. there are no penalties if donald trump violates the agreement to keep everything secret. lawrence, i was reviewing the agreement before we went on the air again. there's a telling line that may help expla

cohen, i think we were the first to publish the inside of his passport. and there are elements of the dossier that most strikingly, the big picture of a russian campaign to interfere in the u.s. election that have certainly born out as well as statistics. >> so kate, walk us through what comes next. as i explained when we brought this story a few moments ago, this is the first time we have seen this kind of request about michael cohen and these women he is alleged to have paid, on behalf of whom he won't say, and ty cobb tells us they'll do the right thing. so what happens next given all that? you then try to get this material from him? what is the timeline for that? >> it's very early days in the cohen litigation, although the dossier was published a year ago, like i said, he didn't sue until a few year later. so we actually just served with the complaint last week. so the next step hasn't quite been plotted out for us. i think there could be a motion to dismiss, there's no plot that i would be comfortable sharing. >> is it possible that the way this thi

cohen -- yeah. the campaign or mr. cohen can address anything with respect to their actions. with respect to that interview, i will say the president strongly, clearly, and has consistently denied these underlying clachltz the only person who's been inconsistent is the one making the claims. >> raj, regarding the russia actions announced earlier today, the president has not personally said anything about the expulsion of the 60 diplomats. in his phone call last week with president putin, he decided not to confront putin on the attack despite the advice he was given by his national security advisers and he went on to congratulate putin. how to square the action with an entirely different approach from the president? >> i think, you know, those statements coming from the press secretary on this, and the last sentence basically outlawed our approach, which is our relationship with russia is, frankly, up to the russian government and up to vladimir putin and others in senior leadership in russia. we want to have a cooperative relationship. the president wants to work with russia.

. >> chair cohen: thank you very much, other public speakers? >> hi, we work for united players and the soma youth collaborative and we want to say in one voice that clean streets are so important for our youth and our children and we are in support of this measure because it has reached the level of an emergency and it has to be acted on now. >> yeah, it's definitely a priority and it's not okay that our kids walk in the streets and are used to seeing needles and landmines of feces that are not from dogs every day and so we thank you, supervisor kim for prioritizing this. >> if you need more information can you connect with the fix it team and she's seen the level of crises and how it is across multiple neighborhoods so she can address this issue now and in the future. thank you so much. >> thank you, next speaker, please. >> good morning, supervisors, and my name is mary claire and this is -- >> jay k. >> and paul berrerra. >> i'm here to represent the program and they couldn't be here because they're in school and we're in support of supervis

cohen or the president. >> a couple more questions. do you know, if any, of these eight women who have come to you have come forward to you also signed confidentiality or hush agreements? >> we understand that two of them have. >> let's get back to our analysts. what do you think? if this is true, that's potentially another huge headache for the president and michael cohen? >> this whole case say huge headache, whether it's this alleged defamation count that has just been added to the indictment, whether or not they're behind the threat in the parking lot, her credibility which seem to me as an observer of witnesses to be pretty good. the whole thing is a mess for them which they have in some sense created for themselves just as they created for other messes. the only thing that the president is doing which is good from a legal standpoint is being quiet, because if he talks and accuses her of being a liar, then he's going to be charged with a real defamation lawsuit. the plaut against cohen i think is a bit on the margins. it's the sta

cohen, in a box. and the box is if mr. cohen wants to say the president was not aware of these actions i took on his behalf, then that raises the question of how binding an agreement is between stormy daniels and donald trump if they're going do say oh, he was really removed from this process. but then if they need to bolster themselves on the other side, then they have to say this was done in coordination with then candidate trump, and that's problematic on the campaign finance side and also potentially leads to an admission or some kind of acknowledgment of an affair. they are denying it, don't get me wrong there. but it's a very dangerous box. so, again, they get to court and this becomes very precarious. they keep it in arbitration, that doesn't happen. >> let me -- we're dying to get to a break. i'm going to make some management control and ask you a question. you have a by line on a lot of important stories in the me too movement and your paper has done a lot of reporting, yours and nick's on harvey weinstein. and i

cohen or ec. why would mr. cohen then send an e-mail where he lists the subject as pp versus donald trump, nda? this is what happens when you can't keep your lies straight, anderson. this is the kind of conduct that happens. then we see how he signs the e-mail. he signs it with his signature block as personal counsel to the president of the united states. i thought -- i thought the president wasn't involved in this. i thought he was just doing this on his own in his spare time from his living room. again, this isn't even a good lie, and it's not even a good cover-up. i mean this is the keystone cops. >> so where does this go from here? i mean you now have amended this complaint. what is the end game here? what do you want -- i mean do you want some sort of a settlement? do you want to make -- have a negotiation, make this go away? >> my client is not interested in a settlement. my client is interested in the truth and nothing but the truth, period. she wants all the facts to be laid out to the american people s

michael cohen. so tim, this stormy daniels, you know, not talking specifics about this alleged affair, but her attorney is talking while appearing multiple times on lots of different networks including last night. he was talking with anderson cooper. and then last night stormy daniels herself was talking with one of our reporters outside an appearance in florida. take a listen. well, she essentially said to our nick valencia last night she's made a lot of money off of this, but, you know, she's not capitalizing off it, it's just all the opportunities are arising as a result of all this being publicized. meantime, her attorney is saying that much needs to be established because michael cohen isn't licensed to work in california to be a part of a deal, et cetera. this is bad because it's difficult for the white house to dismiss it all together. >> the white house is not helping itself. i mean, sarah sanders made clear there was an arbitration. therefore, the president was involved, therefore, the pres

as tenacious. >> michael cohen is not adverse to threatening people. he's a guy who carries a pistol in an ankle holster and makes it clear to people he's a tough guy. >> reporter: from sometimes ruthlessly maneuvering against people who have dangerous information on trump to trying to facilitate business deals for his boss, michael cohen doggedly displays the one character that donald trump values more. >> that's very little more valuable to donald trump than loyalty and michael cohen has showed for more than a decade that he will withhold confidences and fight for trump the way trump likes, which is to hit back hard. >> reporter: but tonight cohen faces controversy for his handling of the stormy daniels case. daniels says the agreement that cohen drew up was, quote, sloppy. >> the way that this was handled and the documentation, quite honestly, this was amateur hour. >> reporter: cohen recently said he used his own personal funds to, quote, facilitate a payment to the porn star shortly before the 2016 election without trump's knowledge or reimburseme

i mean, gary cohen, they haven't been there that long. gary cohen may be the latest senior white house person to leave. gary cohen criticized the president's remarks after chart litesville and there were signs at the time he might be considering resigning from the white house, the prospect that gary cohen might resign led to a big plunge in the markets that day even though gary cohen didn't ultimately leave. tonight gary cohen's resignation was reporting after the markets closed. after the markets closed, people can still trade in basically what amounts to bets on how the market will open in the morning and after the news broke of gary cohen's rest neigh tonighignati that showed the markets going off a cliff. the resignation tonight, you can see it tonight as just the latest in an incredibly chaotic and unstable white house and presidential administration unlike we have ever seen before. but the gary cohen resignation also feels like it's a little bit part of a cluster, double intended because in a period of three weeks, we've had the res

>> reporter: cohen has been largely silent. with his friend and lawyer in another matter, schwartz doing the talking for him. but schwartz may be making matters worse for cohen and for trump, arguing points that support avenatti, who says the hush agreement is invalid because trump did not sign on the line reserved for him under a pseudonym. >> the president was not aware of the agreement, michael cohen never told him about the agreement. you asked a bunch of questions so let me cover that. you asked about the 12 days before -- >> what about the money? >> he was not affair of any of it. >> reporter: schwartz suggested cohen did these sorts of deals without trump's knowledge frequently. >> because he's that close to him, he had great latitude to handle these matters. michael was the fixer. it could be anything. there were a ton of matters that took place that michael fixed, and donald trump wasn't involved in every single matter. >> reporter: former federal prosecutor who watched and tweeted about the interview with cnn's erin b

thank you again to chair cohen and supervisor stephanie and fewer. >> supervisor cohen: i believe this should be a priority for the city during the budget season, as we heard earlier, we're in the midst of a transition to do more transparent and public process. in identifying the budget priorities. excuse me, that was item 1. about a more transparent budget process. the bla, the budget legislative analyst is currently surveying each office to understand the top issues that our cities are facing and what the district supervisors would like to see as a budgetary priority and i understand there may be a gap in funding. so my office we agree with supervisor kim and that street cleaning is a budget priority. i believe that our streets need to be identified top priority in this committee. the priority hearing throughout april that i mentioned earlier at the top of the meeting, are designed to signal to the mayor's budget office what the issues are, and also to instruct them on how they should be allocating funds and to what level. and that was a where request for immediate release of funds t

michael cohen has been saying this was just me. the trump -- the candidate trump, the trump organization had nothing to do with it. these documents -- they don't prove, but they certainly suggest that the trump organization has been intimately involved in the effort to keep stormy daniels quiet from the beginning. >> but you still don't know where the money came from, where the $130,000 came from. michael cohen says it's from his home equity line of credit. >> not yet. but thus far when we have attempted to test the veracity of the statements of michael cohen, he's failed each time. and i'm highly confident he's going to fail that one too. >> appreciate it. more to come on that no doubt. >>> next, the latest on the too close to call congressional race election in western pennsylvania and white house efforts to paint a democratic victory as actually a victory for president trump. and later, waves of kids walk out of their sculls in a nationwide effort to bring attention to gun violence and school safety. we'll show you where it happ

if michael cohen, why after michael cohen releases a statement saying the trump organization had nothing to do with this, i did this solely, you know, in my -- you know, because i'm a friend of donald trump, would he reach out to a trump organization attorney in los angeles to get involved in the arbitration? >> right. i mean, we have to make very clear the timeline here. so the timeline, as you said, was before the 2016 election when this whole contract was signed. the jill martin arbitration came way after. so this is -- this is a year, you know, more than a year later. so it doesn't matter what -- >> was it smart to reach out to a trump organization attorney if you're saying it has nothing to do with trump organization, there are plenty of lawyers in l.a. >> you know what, so what, though. so they reached out to jill martin because they needed a local attorney. so they reached out to jill martin. you know, it's a -- also the e-mails, anderson, michael cohen used that e-mail address for every single thing he did. now, a lot of people do that. a lot of people don't realize. on hindsight

michael cohen of course needs to argue that the president himself and michael cohen were a party to that nondisclosure agreement. and if president discloses anything related to his alleged affair with stormy daniels, that could render that nda nondisclosure agreement null and void. so that's probably the reason the president has been so uncharacteristically mum about the stormy daniels story. >> david, there is -- to your point about this sort of public policy issue here, which is like how many more of these are there, and what are the terms of them, or what are concealed behind them, and how open is the president to the possible leveraging of that, how do we get to the bottom of that? >> well, you know, it would be nice if we had some organ of government somewhere that could maybe investigate these sort of things. i mean, we can very glib because it's about an fair with a porn star. but there could be a lot more important things here. you know, we haven't talked a lot about the catch and kill policy of the national enquirer which is a media company which apparently got information that

cohen formed. and what we've done now is we've added the following allegations and a number of these are very critical and very, very important for your viewers to understand. first of all, we have added an allegation or claim of defamation against mr. cohen for his previous denials of the affair basically calling my client a liar. so, we're going to put those claims to the test and we're going to prove that, in fact, my client is telling the truth and it is mr. cohen who has misled the american people. that's number one. >> we're not lawyers, but the ultimate defense in a defamation case is the truth. if she is found to tell the truth she prevails over mr. cohen. >> the opposite. he effectively told a lie about my client. his lie was the affair did not happen effectively. we're going to prove that it did happen and therefore his denial was inaccurate. so, that's the first thing. but secondly and equally important if not more important, we are now seeking to invalidate the agreement, not just becau

>> michael cohen is an astute and smart attorney. he knew very well if he talked to the president or then candidate trump about this or ask him for money for this, that would have opened up a host of issues for the candidate now president. he is smart not to do. that he acted on his own volition which is what a smart attorney does. i hope to have friends like that. he knows in the long run, he will be okay, he will be fine because he did something that he felt was the right thing to do outside of the fact that donald trump is a billionaire. >> i appreciate it. thank you. next, the man stormy daniels attorney called a thug. later, his murder became a right wing conspiracy theory. how seth rich's brother is fighting back in court. ♪ a wealth of information. a wealth of perspective. ♪ a wealth of opportunities. that's the clarity you get from fidelity wealth management. straightforward advice, tailored recommendations, tax-efficient investing strategies, and a dedicated advisor to help you grow and protect your wealth. fidelity weal

cohen. they're now attempting to remove this case to federal court in order to increase their chances that the matter will be decided in private arbitration, thus hiding the truth from the public. he goes on to say the fact that a sitting president is pursuing over $20 million in bogus damages against a private citizen who is only trying to tell the public what really happened is remarkable, likely unprecedented in our history. we are not going away and we will not be intimidated, basta italian for aenough. he goes on, how can president trump seek $20 million in damages against my client based on agreement that he claims mr. trump never was a party to and knew nothing about. back with the panel including pal callen, that's callen, not callahan as i said earlier. paul, first of all, why try to get this moved to a federal court? >> it's a fas natsing move. federal judges tend to be very friendly to arbitration. remember, that's what this is all about, whether an arbitrator can decide this as o

if michael cohen, why after michael cohen releases a statement saying the trump organization had nothing to do with this, i did this solely, you know, in my -- you know, because i'm a friend of donald trump, would he reach out to a trump organization attorney in los angeles to get involved in the arbitration? >> right. i mean, we have to make very clear the timeline here. so the timeline, as you said, was before the 2016 election when this whole contract was signed. the jill marten arbitration came way after. so this is -- this is a year, you know, more than a year later. so it doesn't matter what -- >> was it smart to reach out to a trump organization attorney if you're saying it has nothing to do with trump organization, there are plenty of lawyers in l.a. >> you know what, so what, though. so they reached out to jill martin because they needed a local attorney. so they reached out to jill martin. you know, it's a -- also the e-mails, anderson, michael cohen used that e-mail address for every single thing he did. now, a lot of people do that. a lot of people don't realize. on hindsight

. >> right, michael cohen does not. if there's delay getting the president to be deposed, you can always get michael cohen deposed, assuming he can get anyone deposed in this case. >> in both cases, think about it, in some ways michael cohen is a more potentially damage is witness in the sense that, as harry points out the facts of the stormy daniels case alone the politics are not particularly damaging to trump. suddenly find himself, if he's not -- to avoid perjury, will find himself telling stories that will lead to other questions. those other questions as you've been pointing out are though he's been very careful, very careful here, not to say it expressly. but you're right, he's now got three or four different individual courts where he could have this dreaded appointment with an actual testimony. and the important thing there is, whereas in the mueller probe the ultimate sort of arbiters or power brokers are the republicans in congress who don't seem to have much stomach for pushing back. here we'll have an indiv