The Week UK: Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, raided by FBI

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Donald Trump

Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, raided by FBI
Apr 10, 2018
US President calls raid ‘a disgrace’ and ‘an attack on our country’

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The raid on Michael Cohen, Donald Trump’s lawyer, sparked an outburst from the US President
Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, raided by FBI

FBI agents have raided the office of Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, seizing thousands of documents and sparking an extraordinary outburst from the US President.

Speaking from the White House, Trump declared the raid was “an attack on our country in a true sense” and “an attack on what we all stand for”.

He also accused special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation team of being “the most biased group of people”, adding that the situation is “really now on a whole new level of unfairness”.
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When asked by journalists whether he would seek to fire Mueller following the raid, Trump appeared open to the idea. “We’ll see what happens,” he said. “Many people have said you should fire him.”

The raid, which also targeted Cohen’s home and a room he had been using at the Leow’s Regency, a hotel in New York, was conducted by New York-based federal prosecutors following a referral by Mueller.

The search “does not appear to be directly related to Mueller’s investigation”, says The New York Times, but it is most likely the result of information uncovered during the Russia probe.

CNN says that among the documents seized in the raid was “information related to Stephanie Clifford, better known as porn actress Stormy Daniels”, to whom Cohen paid $130,000 days before the 2016 election. She has claimed that she had an affair with Trump - an allegation Trump denies.

Cohen has also denied that the payment was made on behalf of the Trump campaign, but a watchdog group has brought a lawsuit “alleging that the payment to Daniels was in fact an illegal campaign contribution”, The Guardian reports.
6 April
Donald Trump threatens $100bn in additional tariffs

Donald Trump has reportedly instructed the US trade representative to consider levelling an additional $100bn worth of trade tariffs on China, escalating the already tense stand-off between the world’s two largest economies.

In a statement issued last night, the Trump said the additional tariffs were in response to “China’s unfair retaliation” against the American decision to impose $50bn worth of tariffs intended to penalise China’s intellectual property practices.
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China had “responded swiftly and robustly”, says the BBC, by targeting “106 key US products, including soybeans, aircraft parts and orange juice”.

CNN reports that Trump’s latest announcement “rattled markets and drew criticism from within his own party”, adding that the Chinese government has indicated it will “respond with equal measure to any new duties on its goods”.

Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse, a Republican, called the move “the dumbest possible way to do this”, adding: “Hopefully the President is just blowing off steam again but, if he's even half-serious, this is nuts.”
3 April
Donald Trump’s trade war: China hits back

China has responded to US tariffs on steel and aluminium by imposing import levies on 128 American products, including fruit, meat and wine.
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The new duties, which came into force on Monday and will affect $3bn (£2.1bn) of imports, risk escalating a trade row between the world’s two largest economies. The Dow Jones dropped by almost 2% in response.

China’s ministry of commerce said frozen pork and scrap aluminium would be hit with a 25% tariff rate, while some fruits, nuts and wines would be subject to a 15% charge.

The move is a direct response to Donald Trump’s decision to raise duties on steel and aluminium imports last month.

The US President - who has said “trade wars are good and easy to win” - is also planning to impose tariffs on up to $60bn (£42.7bn) of Chinese imports in a separate row over alleged intellectual property theft.

An editorial in the Global Times, a tabloid newspaper published by the Chinese Communist Party, yesterday warned a full-blown trade war could be looming.

“Even though China and the US have not publicly said they are in a trade war, the sparks of such a war have already started to fly,” it added, reports Reuters.

However, the tariffs do not cover some of the US’s biggest exports to China, such as soya beans. This is a sign, say some analysts, that Beijing wants to avoid an all-out trade war.

“The amount subject to tariff is not big, which shows China is willing to ease the intensity of the trade conflict that was started by the US,” Shi Yinhong, director of the US research centre at Renmin University in Beijing, told The Guardian.
29 March
Donald Trump hits back over second amendment threat

Donald Trump has vowed to defend the right to bear arms for Americans, after a former Supreme Court justice called for the repeal of constitutional gun protections.
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In an op-ed for The New York Times, retired Justice Paul Stevens called for a repeal of the second amendment, which guarantees the right to keep and bear firearms.

Stevens, a long-time advocate of gun control, argued that repeal would weaken the National Rifle Association's ability to “block constructive gun control legislation” and would still allow individuals to own guns.

He called on students and other protesters who called for gun controls at the March for Our Lives last weekend in the wake of February’s Parkland school massacre to push for a repeal.

Trump, who has in the past called for tougher background checks and a ban on devices that allow semi-automatic rifles to fire more rapidly, hit back on Twitter:

    THE SECOND AMENDMENT WILL NEVER BE REPEALED! As much as Democrats would like to see this happen, and despite the words yesterday of former Supreme Court Justice Stevens, NO WAY. We need more Republicans in 2018 and must ALWAYS hold the Supreme Court!

    — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 28, 2018

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the administration was not considering repealing the amendment. Any change to the constitution would have to be approved by a two-thirds majority in both houses of Congress, “and there have been no formal proposals for such a move”, says The New York Times. It would then need to be ratified by three-quarters of US state legislatures.

Gun control has long been one of the most divisive issues in American politics and Trump has sought to use it to gather conservative support ahead of November’s crucial mid-term elections.

However, CNN described his assertion that “we need more Republicans in 2018 and must ALWAYS hold the Supreme Court” as “a notable choice of words since the judiciary is supposed to be independent of the executive branch”.
26 March
Donald Trump and Stormy Daniels: porn star ‘physically threatened’ after alleged affair

Adult film actress Stormy Daniels has claimed she was physically threatened and told to keep quiet about her alleged 2006 sexual encounter with Donald Trump.

Daniels made the claim during an interview with CBS News program 60 Minutes, saying she was approached in 2011 by a man in the car park of a Las Vegas gym as she was getting out of her car.

“A guy walked up on me and said to me, ‘Leave Trump alone. Forget the story,’” Daniels said. “And then he leaned around and looked at my daughter and said, ‘That’s a beautiful little girl. It’d be a shame if something happened to her mom’.”
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The Guardian says the allegation of a physical threat “takes the dispute between the president and the porn star to an entirely new level”.

Daniels also claimed that she and Trump had only one sexual encounter, and that Trump had wooed her with the promise of an appearance on Celebrity Apprentice.

The BBC reports that Trump “strongly denies” having had an affair with Daniels, and that his lawyers are seeking $20m in damages from her, claiming she has broken “a non-disclosure deal signed before the 2016 presidential election”.

Daniels accepted a $130,000 payment from Trump’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen days before the 2016 presidential election in return for signing the non-disclosure agreement.

Her lawyer, Michael Avenatti, now says the so-called “hush agreement” is not valid as it has not been signed by Trump. A lawsuit to have the agreement declared void has been filed in a California court.
23 March
Trump replaces McMaster as national security adviser

Donald Trump’s national security advisor, General HR McMaster, has resigned and will be replaced by former US ambassador to the UN John Bolton.

Trump announced the decision on Twitter, saying McMaster would “always remain my friend.”

    I am pleased to announce that, effective 4/9/18, @AmbJohnBolton will be my new National Security Advisor. I am very thankful for the service of General H.R. McMaster who has done an outstanding job & will always remain my friend. There will be an official contact handover on 4/9.

    — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 22, 2018

CNN reports Trump and McMaster had been “discussing this for some time, and that the decision was not related to any one moment or incident, rather it was the result of ongoing conversations between the two”.

In a statement, McMaster announced he is also retiring from military service later this year, and thanked Trump for the opportunity to serve as national security advisor.
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The Washington Post says Bolton’s appointment could “lead to dramatic changes in the administration’s approach to crises around the world”.

Bolton has previously publicly stated that a pre-emptive war would be the only likely way to end North Korea’s development of nuclear weapons capable of striking the US.

“We have to ask ourselves whether we’re prepared to take pre-emptive action, or live in a world where North Korea – and a lot of other people – have nuclear weapons,” he said.

Bolton has also been outspoken in his disdain for the deal struck with Iran over its nuclear weapons program, and has called for the US to withdraw from it.

Bolton’s appointment – coupled with the removal of Rex Tillerson as secretary of state – could see the US “heading toward a much more confrontational relationship with the Islamic Republic”, the BBC says.

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