Bizarre, Politics

Trump Ally Under Fire For Appearing To Threaten Cohen With Disclosure of Affairs

Just when you thought that the politics in Washington, D.C. could not get more grotesque, it does. In a shocking tweet, House Oversight Committee, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), a strong supporter of President Donald Trump, tweeted out a clear threat to Michael Cohen that his appearance before Congress just might lead to the disclosure of affairs with multiple women. It is clearly highly inappropriate and, even as one of Cohen’s longest critics, it is outrageous to threaten the release of immaterial personal dirt on a witness who is reportedly ready to implicate the President in wrongdoing.

Gaetz tweeted “Hey @MichaelCohen212 – Do your wife & father-in-law know about your girlfriends? Maybe tonight would be a good time for that chat. I wonder if she’ll remain faithful when you’re in prison.  She’s about to learn a lot…”

Gaetz later insisted that the tweet was not a threat, but it is hard to read that tweet in any other way.

If the tweet was supposed to help Trump, it didn’t. It instantly made Cohen a victim and suggested that Republicans are willing to openly threaten witnesses with personal destruction if they testify against the President.

There are areas about Cohen that should be pursued by Congress, including areas where New York prosecutors believe he continues to be withholding evidence. That evidence may consider Cohen’s other illegal activities or associations, including possible wrongdoing by this father-in-law and other family members.

Here is the tweet:

Matt Gaetz✔@mattgaetz

Hey @MichaelCohen212 – Do your wife & father-in-law know about your girlfriends? Maybe tonight would be a good time for that chat. I wonder if she’ll remain faithful when you’re in prison. She’s about to learn a lot…5,9914:12 PM – Feb 26, 2019Twitter Ads info and privacy35K people are talking about this

71 thoughts on “Trump Ally Under Fire For Appearing To Threaten Cohen With Disclosure of Affairs”

  1. Is it true that Gaetz has sex with a dog in his DC office on Sunday morning while others are at church and on Saturday when others at at Synagogue? He is known as Dogbutter.

    2. Excerpted from the first article linked above about the Rovt-Weldon Ukrainian Peace Plan:

      Weldon’s two decade career in Congress ended with the 2006 elections, weeks after the FBI raided his then-29-year-old daughter’s office and home. The Justice Department was probing his actions to support a Russian-managed oil and gas company that gave his daughter a $500,000 contract to do public relations work, Soon after the contract was signed, Weldon helped corral some 30 lawmakers for a dinner, which his daughter’s firm worked on too, to honor the chairman of the Russian company, Itera International Energy Co, and Weldon also intervened to help Itera when federal agencies canceled a contract with the company. Weldon was never charged.

      Rovt made his fortune initially in the fertilizer business, with some operations in Russia, but sold most of his foreign fertilizer assets in 2007 to another Ukrainian, oligarch Dmitry Firtash, who was a chief financier of ex-President Viktor Yanukovych’s pro-Russian political party before Yanukovych was ousted in 2014 and fled to Moscow. That party paid millions of dollars to yet another figure in the Trump-Russia investigation, lobbyist and political consultant Paul Manafort, who was a key Yanukovych adviser before he became Trump’s campaign chairman. Manafort has since been indicted by two Mueller grand juries on charges including money laundering, tax evasion, bank fraud and obstruction.

    3. Excerpted from the second article linked above about the hand-off to Cohen of the Rovt-Weldon Plan:

      When a source first relayed the conversation with Weldon to me earlier this year, it had not yet been reported that Columbus Nova gave more than $500,000 to Cohen’s LLC, Essential Consultants, over a seven-month period in 2017. Weldon’s alleged reference to Columbus Nova, and his comment about Vekselberg’s role in funding the plan’s promotion, renews questions about what that $500,000 was actually for.

      The New York Times has reported that Cohen and Vekselberg met 11 days before Trump’s inauguration, and discussed U.S.–Russia relations. Columbus Nova acknowledged in a statement that it hired Cohen “after the inauguration” for consulting work, but insisted that Vekselberg had nothing to do with it

  3. Maybe someday Prof. Turley will learn the difference between a threat and a warning.

  4. Unless there is a “smoking gun” audio recording of Trump expressing a corrupt intent or a signed document that proves financial fraud, I have no doubt that Gaetz will NOT believe anyone’s testimony against Trump. Any testifying employee will be accused of being an ingrate; any co-operating felon will be accused of attempting to cut a plea deal; Jared (it will be insinuated) is a Jew; Don, Jr., will be accused of selling out his father, and Melania will be called a ‘golddigger.” The ONLY person whose testimony against Trump cannot be challenged is Ivanka. She is the only one who could leave Hannity speechless.

    1. Jeffery S.,
      Plus the fact that Cohen has committed perjury in previous testimony opens him up to the “you lied then, and now we’re supposed to believe you?” question.
      I agree that if it comes down to Cohen’s version vs. Trump’s version, it won’t be enough to get Trump impeached or facing criminal charges down the road.
      Given that Cohen surreptitiously recorded conversations with Trump, and that he had 10 years or so in the Trump Organization ( as a lawyer, I guess), there may be that smoking gun.
      Today’s testimony in open session is supposed to avoid touching on anything that might interfere with the Special Counsel’s “ongoing investigation”, according to what I’ve read.
      If that’s the case, compliance would prevent adding anything significant to the public’s knowledge about the Cohen-Stormy Daniels-Russia Trump Tower negotiations etc. issues.
      If Mueller’s “final report” is indeed going to be finished in the very near future, as widely predicted, I don’t think the prohibition against “interfering with the ongoing SC investigation” would be very important.
      Rep. Gaetz isn’t a member of the House Committe who’ll be questioning Cohen, but if Russia/ Stormy Daniels payment etc. are off the table for discussion, maybe someone else on the committee can expand on the allegations Cohen’s affairs and marraige to fill the time.😐

    2. I’m assuming Mr Silverman you are Jewish. I’m not so I just want to understand your thinking here. Are you suggesting Donald Trump is an anti-semite now too?

      To me it doesnt look that way. but what do I know. But seems funny way to act for a person who hates jews, to let his cherished daughter marry one, embrace, him, let Jared push aside valued political allies like former NJ governor Chris Christie who said that Jared pushed him aside for the transition leader job and then gave Trump bad advice; to employ many Jewish lawyers like Cohen who today is trying to roast him and implicate him in crimes that Cohen committed, but, to continue, Trump did business I am sure you will allow, with probably thousands if not tens of thousands of Jewish residents or customers in his properties; and Trump is considered a strong ally of Israel, by the Israelis.

      Is that an antisemite?

      Trump has a lot of Jewish support. And a lot of Jewish opponents. But this is an issue that’s emerging. I see a lot of articles about it recently. An issue which is perhaps unwise for the anti-Trump people to flame the fires of too hotly

      https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/nov/14/american-jewish-community-divisions-trump-pittsburgh

  5. F— Trump is a constant refrain among communists from Hollywood to D.C.; from sea to shinning sea.

    I don’t suppose all those various iterations are threats.

    1. Well, Trump is a whore who would grab a p— and f— a porn star, so maybe they are threatening to bang him

  7. I don’t like the tweet and would never want a client of mine to do something that stupid. That said, I just wish people felt as strongly about what has been said to and about President Trump, especially now with him in Vietnam. An endless, very leaky investigation which would make the attorneys in Jarndyce and Jarndyce blush and which is based in large part on false testimony and documents. Then there have been the repeated passionate threats to impeach, and the death wishes or actual threats from celebrities, and false story after false story after false story, all calculated to destroy a Presidency. This seems a little more serious than saying that personal secrets may become public if you come to Congress and testify under oath. But let a supporter of Trump attack a scum like Cohen and people get self-righteously enraged. Surely this madness will pass.

    1. Honestlawyer your comment reads as deceitful.

      The Donald Trump you describe is a genuine statesman. A man of integrity who uses diplomatic language. A good, Christian role model concerned for all Americans.

      That’s the mythic Donald Trump; a romanticized do-over. Romanticized in the minds of uncritical admirers.

      The ‘Real Donald Trump’ is active on Twitter. There you shall find an abusive bully. An irrational buffoon who’s always popping-off. Trump’s only agenda is dividing America. It’s all there in the tweets.

      1. Peter H. — it’s actually YOUR comment that reads as deceitful. “The Donald Trump you describe is a genuine statesman. A man of integrity who uses diplomatic language.” Where did you read that? In your own head?

      2. Peter H. — “Trump’s only agenda is dividing America.”

        Yup. That’s the “narrative” Peter H. You got it!

        Don’t forget the other mainstream narratives:

        Russia helped Trump get elected.
        Russia deprived Hillary of her rightful place in the Oval Office.
        Trump is a racist.
        Trump has told 9 gazillion lies (see the CNN report with the gumballs in jars)

        Oh, and Peter, you know that a “narrative” is not synonymous with objective reporting of “facts” or “the Truth”….right?

        1. Here are a few other narratives…

          The Democrat party wants America to become a socialist country like Venezuela.
          Barack Obama was a deep-thinking enlightened leader and true statesman who brought the country together and healed our deepest divisions.
          There was not a ‘smidgen’ of corruption in the Obama administration.
          Barack Obama presided over a scandal-free administration.

      3. Peter, don’t you hope that his agenda today includes peace and denuclearize on the Korean peninsula? That’s why he’s in Hanoi you know, while the Democrat majority conducts its cohen circus.

        I sure hope you’re wrong Peter and it sure looks that way to some of my Democrat friends who especially admire his trade policy and initiative to withdraw from conflict in Syria too. They see a more beneficial agenda than you do, who claims he is solely focused on silliness like tweeter.

        But what do I know. I am a Republican. So i must be wrong eh?

    2. haha, nice allusion from Dickens

      “Jarndyce and Jarndyce drones on. This scarecrow of a suit has, in course of time, become so complicated that no man alive knows what it means. The parties to it understand it least, but it has been observed that no two Chancery lawyers can talk about it for five minutes without coming to a total disagreement as to all the premises. Innumerable children have been born into the cause; innumerable young people have married into it; innumerable old people have died out of it. Scores of persons have deliriously found themselves made parties in Jarndyce and Jarndyce without knowing how or why; whole families have inherited legendary hatreds with the suit. The little plaintiff or defendant who was promised a new rocking-horse when Jarndyce and Jarndyce should be settled has grown up, possessed himself of a real horse, and trotted away into the other world. Fair wards of court have faded into mothers and grandmothers; a long procession of Chancellors has come in and gone out; the legion of bills in the suit have been transformed into mere bills of mortality; there are not three Jarndyces left upon the earth perhaps since old Tom Jarndyce in despair blew his brains out at a coffee-house in Chancery Lane; but Jarndyce and Jarndyce still drags its dreary length before the court, perennially hopeless.”

  8. Gruesome would be Rubio threatening Maduro with what happened to Qaddafi. Some are asking for Rubio to resign over that threat. But I’m sure it’s fine w’most of Congress.

    This case is however another example of the gangsters who help run the place. They are really coming out of the woodwork! The entire govt. is almost entirely filled w/killers, would be killers and those who egg on killers. USA is number ONE in death, threats and lawlessness!

  9. MORE ON GAETZ..

    AND COMMENTS OF SARAH SANDERS

    In a statement Tuesday, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders called Cohen a “disgraced felon” and said “it’s laughable that anyone would take a convicted liar like Cohen at his word.”

    Cohen pleaded guilty to multiple crimes last year, including lying to Congress about a Trump Organization project in Moscow and orchestrating hush-money payments to women who claimed during the 2016 election to have had sexual encounters with the president. He has said he is finished with lying and is seeking to tell his story.

    Reached by phone Tuesday evening, Gaetz said the tweet “speaks for itself.” He would not say whether Oversight Republicans intended to use this allegation during the Wednesday hearing; Gaetz is not a member of the committee but he is very close with Republicans who are, including ranking member Jim Jordan (R-Ohio).

    Gaetz gave no proof or details about what he meant in his tweet. Asked whether his actions constituted witness intimidation, he balked: “Challenging the credibility and veracity of a witness is something that happens every day in America, and we need more of that in Congress when people intend to come and lie to us.”

    Edited from: “Trump Ally Threatens Cohen With Unsubstantiated Allegations of Womanizing”.

    Tonight’s WASHINGTON POST
    …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

    Sarah Sanders said: “It’s laughable that anyone would take a convicted liar like Cohen at his word.”

    One could alter Sanders’ statement to read: “It’s laughable that anyone would hire Michael Cohen as their lawyer”. And with this adjustment we have the crux of the matter; Donald Trump was the exclusive client to a highly dubious lawyer. No amount of spin can change this reality.

    Of course Gaetz was trying to intimidate Cohen. We’ve seen these plays again and again by Trump allies. There’s always a mafia-like mentality in dealing with Trump critics. Trump himself has referred to Cohen as a ‘rat’; the mafia term for ‘snitch’.

    1. Cohen is a rat. And a snitch. Yes the mafia uses that word. They use a lot of other English words too.

      Are you afraid for Mr Cohen’s physical well being? How generous of the Democrats to care! Now that he’s on their side.

  10. I see the armchair lawyers are out. Love the guy quoting the First Amendment, as if all speech is protected speech, which anybody with a scintilla of Con Law knowledge knows isn’t true. This is witness tampering, and a pretty blatant example at that. Uttered on Twitter, not the floor of the House. This clown better get a good lawyer.

    1. That was me perhaps? I’m the clown who knows how to read statutes, case law, and treatises. Can you?

      Don’t hold your breath for Gretz to get indicted.

      Oh wait: maybe you think that’s a threat of suffocation?

      Hopefully you can see my point. In this country police and courts are not censors. Gretz remarks are offensive and idiotic but not actionable is my opinion. but I’m not a prosecutor and they get to decide whether to bring charges not me.

  11. its also a grandstanding, tough guy kind of remark. one doubts cohen will see it or care.

    also it accomplishes nothing. you just make the spite grow hotter with talk like that. it’s pointless except to draw attention to this graetz character that i never heard of, and dont want to hear more about. forget about him, gosh.

    it’s about like the evidentiary harpoon. you want to wound again by making and objection and pulling the harpoon out? just STFU already. dont draw more attention to cohen, which is what this fool did

  12. Threat: a statement of an intention to inflict pain, injury, damage, or other hostile action on someone in retribution for something done or not done.

    Quote the “statement of an intention” in Gaetz’ words. No such words exist in Gaetz’ words.

  15. Almost as bad as Schiff’s ability to see what no one else can see, almost.

      1. @enigma, Yea, after his political career he will be the next Medium to the stars. I’ll bet your still one of those “The Russians are coming” or is it now the Ukrainians.

        1. I know that you’ll find this impossible to believe, but . . . Michael D. Cohen is not the only convicted felon and proven liar associated with Trump and Trump’s campaign for president in 2016. Paul Manafort is also a convicted felon and proven liar who was Trump’s campaign manager, for crying out loud.

          One of the most critical things that Manafort lied about was the intended Russian recipients of all 75 pages of Tony Fabrizio’s $767,000 worth of detailed, sophisticated in-house Trump polling data. But that’s not all.

          Manafort also lied about the Ukrainian Peace Proposal that he got from the Russian spy, Konstantin Kilimnik, and forwarded to Michael D. Cohen, who passed it along to Lt. Gen. Michael T. Flynn, who got on the phone with the Russian Ambassador, Sergei Kislyak, and said something that has not yet been publicly disclosed that caused Vladimir Putin not to retaliate against Obama’s election-interference sanctions.

      2. enigma……….information no one else can see? Do you mean like the results on his Prodromal Questionnaire?
        Scary stuff, I’m sure.

        1. I mean the classified infomation that he has access to. that would include the FBI briefing to the Gang of Eight when the Trump investigation was opened. I don’t give him credit for special insight. i give him credit for having literally seen more documents and heard from more witnesses than almost anyone.

          1. enigma….yes, I knew what you meant. Schiff is a wannabe hero, but fails because of zero moral and cerebral substance.
            Sorry, but your boy is a known idiot. But, hey, you enjoy that fantasy, ya hear?

  16. Professor Turley, surely you’ve studied the 1st Amendment.
    _______________________________________________

    1st Amendment

    Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
    _________________________________________________________________________________________________________

    I presume a “question” is a subset of speech which leads me to believe that Americans also enjoy the freedom of “questions.”

    Rep. Gaetz asked, “Do your wife & father-in-law know about your girlfriends?”

    And threats, a threat is in the eye of the beholder. For example, I perceive absolutely no threat from “global warming” while many enviro-

    whackjobs have been, in a paralyzing state of terror, wildly proclaiming the end of the world for more than half a century.

    And speaking of threatening, do the main stream media and their minions (i.e. democrats) know that President Donald J. Trump is

    currently conducting sensitive and critical negotiations with a dangerous communist dictator? Why would the MSM and their minions

    deliberately threaten President Trump’s summit with Kim Jong Un by scheduling Congressional testimony by confessed liar and perjurer

    Michael Cohen this week? Now there’s a clear and present threat.

    1. Wrong. The First Amendment doesn’t protect criminal behavior, and what Rep. Gaetz said is clearly a threat. You’re letting your bias towards President Trump override your principles. Sad to see conservatives act this way.

        1. i guess some people might think it’s chargeable under state laws usually named “intimidation” but it would be a hard nut to prosecute I think, harder to win, and then probably not hold up on appeal.

          also i don’t see a federal blackmail style threat here, nor obstruction. you have to take criminal charges seriously and not pull them out all the time when the talk gets tough. that is never how courts have worked in this country espeically not for political speech which is at the heart of the concerns protected in the first amendment.

          nonetheless, it’s a despicable tweet. only a fool taunts someone headed to jail, in my way of thinking. and enough of the sex – extortion style talk already. its so tiresome, in every direction

      2. Were you frightened? You just saw your own reflection in the mirror. What is sad is that all you parasites who are terrified of losing your “free stuff” so you vote for frauds and charlatans who are in search of personal power. Would you please cite the Constitution where redistribution of wealth is provided for; individual welfare, food stamps, Social Security, Medicare, etc.? You have to ignore the enumeration of the power merely and solely to tax for “…general Welfare…,” period. And please cite where the Constitution denies the right to private property allowing governmental imposition of “Affirmative Action Privilege,” forced busing, rent control or Fair Housing and Non-Discrimination. Of course, you can’t cite the Constitution for any of your claims because your claims are not allowed by the Constitution. You vote for the frauds who promise that the Constitution says, “Y’all can do any doggone thing y’all please.” That is the truly sad outcome of American freedom and free enterprise. Anybody would be frightened; terrified of losing all that wonderful “free stuff.” I get that.

  17. I don’t see the tweet as a threat. We all know what’s going to happen when this so-called hearing takes place – media circus blown way out of proportion. The congressman was just telling it like it is.

  18. Obstruction, witness tampering. Contempt of Congress and extortion. He needs to be indicted and prosecuted.

  19. The problem was the threat – that was wrong.

    But the facts about Cohen’s character should come out if Congress is going to parade his “sworn” testimony to embarrass Trump.

    We know that Cohen is a tax cheat, a liar (in his relationships), a perjurer (under oath), and probably a felon.

    The fact that he is an apparent adulterer rounds out our understanding of the man.

    2. We know that Trump is a tax cheat, a liar (in his relationships), a perjurer (under oath), and probably a felon.

    3. “We know that Cohen is a tax cheat, a liar (in his relationships), a perjurer (under oath), and probably a felon.”
      You don’t see the poor logic in defending Trump by casting Cohen as a liar?

      1. it’s not poor logic it’s the logic of every lawyer impeaching a snitch who is telling the tales the government feeds him, against an accused person, to lighten up a sentence for his own beef.

        now that said of course it reflects poorly Trump associated with Cohen

        1. The poor logic is lies not in attempting to impeach Cohen’s cedibility. It lies in drawing attention to the neccessay compaison to the man he’s testifying about. Possibly the biggest known liar of all time.

            1. Can you name a bigger liar? Even after he gets caught in his lies he keeps repeating them. There may have, possibly, been bigger lies told. As for pure volume, Trump wears the crown.

    2. So they could fly to their country-clubs at taxpayer expense while getting free publicity on the few remaining businesses not yet bankrupt.

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