Donald Trump
Alva Johnson, former Trump Campaign Staffer, Sues the President for an Alleged Non-Consensual Kiss
Read the complaint Johnson filed in federal court in which she details the incident.
Trump Lawyer Michael Cohen Pleads Guilty to Campaign Finance Violations
The Plea Deal
Michael Cohen, Trump’s former personal lawyer, plead guilty to campaign finance violations including two felonies: making an excessive campaign contribution and causing an unlawful corporate contribution. During his August 22, 2018 plea in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, Cohen admitted that he was acting to benefit Trump’s presidential bid by arranging a $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels (the outspoken pornstar who Trump had an affair with, to read more about Stormy click here and another $150,000 payment to a former Playboy playmate, Karen McDougal. Stormy Daniels claimed that she only had one sexual encounter with Trump but McDougal said her affair lasted over a 10-month period. Trump was married during both dalliances. Upon making the payments, Cohen was reimbursed by the Trump Organization as part of a “retainer agreement.”
What Does the Plea Mean for Trump?
After the plea, Cohen’s lawyer, and PROOF friend, Lanny Davis, tweeted, “Michael Cohen took this step today so that his family can move on to the next chapter. This is Michael fulfilling his promise made on July 2nd to put his family and country first and tell the truth about Donald Trump.” Naturally there’s significant disagreement as to what this all means for Trump (party lines, anyone?). The truth is Trump has been sued more times than imaginable (even while in office) and he does seem to be protected by a bit of Teflon (aka staunch Trump followers) as he seems to avoid any real or lasting punishment for missteps– both intentional and unintentional– on major issues time and time again. Lanny Davis is attempting to make things more clear for a lot of us when after Cohen’s plea he continued to tweet, “Today [Michael Cohen] stood up and testified under oath that Donald Trump directed him to commit a crime by making payments to two women for the principal purpose of influencing an election. If those payments were a crime for Michael Cohen, then why wouldn’t they be a crime for Donald Trump?”
Well, if only it really were that cut and dry. It’s not. First, even if Cohen is being truthful about making the hush-money payments at the behest of Trump, the illegality must be proven as to Trump’s actions and directives. This is not so easy a task. Prosecutors will need to prove that Trump intended to carry out illegal activity and that he knew or had reason to know that what Cohen was doing was illegal.
This certainly would be easier if Cohen has e-mails or communications (more video or audio recordings) with the President that prove then-candidate Trump knew the payouts were being made to benefit or influence his presidential race. It will be an uphill battle to prove this though, and Cohen made no allusions (or direct statements which certainly would have been persuasive) to a conversation with the President when in court.
Trump Denies it’s a Crime but Lashes Out at Obama
Trump (as he oft does) started a Twitter tirade against Cohen starting with, “If anyone is looking for a good lawyer, I would strongly suggest that you don’t retain the services of Michael Cohen!” (Why Trump’s school age and school yard behavior continues to surprise us we don’t know!) In another tweet Trump compared Obama’s campaign violations with those alleged against him, stating, “Michael Cohen plead guilty to two counts of campaign finance violations that are not a crime. President Obama had a big campaign finance violation and it was easily settled!” This is a complete misstatement by Trump as Cohen’s admitted campaign finance law violations are in fact crimes–intentional willful violations of campaign laws whereas election law experts describe Obama’s infractions as minor violations that are treated as regulatory or civil matters.
Impeachment Likely?
Here’s the deal with impeachment. In order to impeach, a majority vote (51%) for impeachment is needed in the House of Representatives. This is a very real possibility and, If Democrats continue to win seats in the midterm elections, even more so. But because there is a vote for impeachment doesn’t mean a president will be removed (ie. Bill Clinton). Note, impeachment is really just the bringing of charges. Removal is the conviction of those charges. For removal, there must be a ⅔ vote of the Senate–that means 67 Senators must vote for Trump’s removal in order for him to be removed from office. Even if there are those Democrat midterms wins, this a very big number; the likelihood of removal is pretty low. In fact, to date, no president has been involuntarily removed from office.
However, there is no doubt that the plot is thickening as it relates to Trump and impeachment.
Trump U Lawsuit Settles for $25M, But Not Everyone is Happy With the Deal
President Donald Trump officially settled a lawsuit brought by thousands of students of his Trump University real estate training program for $25 million, but at least one former student does not want to accept it.
Students joined together and sued after they claim they paid for real estate courses that didn’t deliver. They allege they were promised insider information but what they were taught could be found with a simple internet search.
Federal Judge Gonzalo Curiel (who made headlines during the presidential campaign when Trump said he wasn’t capable of being impartial because he is Mexican-American) signed off on the deal in late March, finalizing it despite at least one student, Sherri B. Simpson, who wasn’t happy. Simpson of Florida has objected to the terms of the settlement and has asked Judge Curiel to release her from the class and allow her to sue the president on her own. She wanted Trump prosecuted for racketeering, and also wanted an apology. Curiel moved forward with signing off on the deal. Simpson can still appeal.
The terms of settlement allow for about 4,000 students to recoup about 90 cents on the dollar of what they paid for the alleged scam classes. Apparently many of the plaintiffs are elderly and desperately need the funds. The lawyers for the plaintiffs said they would waive their fees, and lawyer Jason Forge told the The New York Times, “Once in a long while, this profession yields some good feelings. This is one of those times.” We at PROOF agree with Forge–it is often hard to feel good feelings in the law even when you win. But Forge and the rest of the team “did good” here. They obtained an excellent settlement for the victims, 90 cents on the dollar is solid and the fee waiving means more money in victims’ pockets. Well done, Jason Forge, you earned those good feelings.
And, actually despite what some think about lawyers, doing legal work for free, which is referred to as pro bono, (short for pro bono publico, which in latin means for the public good) is an integral part of being a lawyer. So much so that the American Bar Association (ABA) considers it an obligation for attorneys to engage in pro bono work. Rule 6.1 of the ABA model rules of professional conduct (these are the rules that govern how an attorney should act in his/her legal capacity) states that: Every lawyer has a professional responsibility to provide legal services to those unable to pay. A lawyer should aspire to render at least (50) hours of pro bono publico legal services per year.
No doubt, the Trump U team spent well more than 50 hours on the case!
Trump, who, as part of the deal does not have to admit fault, claimed in November that the only reason he was settling was because of his presidential win, tweeting, “The ONLY bad thing about winning the Presidency is that I did not have the time to go through a long but winning trial on Trump U. Too bad!”
If Trump hadn’t agreed to the deal, he could have found himself fighting a very public trial while also going through the transition to become president. That’s exactly what seems to upset Sherri Simpson so much. According to the New York Times, she said of the settlement agreement, “For him to go out there and say, well, ‘I didn’t do anything wrong,’ it’s disgusting. I want an apology.” We understand Simpson’s frustration (boy, do we understand your frustration, Sherri!) but in the bigger picture, with the victims recouping much of their money fairly quickly and the avoidance of public, messy lawsuit, we agree with Judge Curiel and the class’ legal team that settling is the better option at this point. We like a good, fair fight too Sherri and that apology would have felt good as well but with Trump that was never going to come easy–or quickly.
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Did NBC Make the Right Decision Terminating Billy Bush?
PROOF Answer: Yes
In August 2016, Billy Bush, former Access Hollywood reporter, was hired to cover the third hour of the popular NBC morning show, The Today Show. This was a big feather in Bush’s cap. But from the start, the relationship was rocky. While in Rio covering the Olympics, it was Bush who first interviewed Ryan Lochte after Lochte lied about being held up at gunpoint in Brazil. Bush failed to question any aspect of Lochte’s story and within hours of Bush’s interview, as the story went viral, it was readily apparent that what Lochte said happened, in fact, didn’t. It was also in Rio that Bush bragged about knowing of footage of Donald Trump “acting like a dog.” Bush’s bravado came back to bite him (pun intended!), because as we all now know after hearing Bush brag about it, Access Hollywood staffers started to look for the footage. And, boy did they find it! Unfortunately for NBC while their lawyers thought about what to do with it, someone at Access Hollywood no longer wanted to sit idly by and leaked the footage to the Washington Post. Soon, the whole world knew exactly what went down on that Access Hollywood bus. Trump clearly was in fact “acting like a dog.” And Billy Bush, ever the celebrity sycophant wasn’t much better. He wasn’t simply agreeing with Trump’s inappropriate comments about women but was encouraging Trump, securing hugs for the both of them—a sort of accomplice, if you will. Or in this instance, loyal frat brother or in Trump lingo, locker room mate. NBC responded by ultimately (note, not immediately) suspending Bush. And now, NBC has terminated Bush and he’s not going back to his desk at The Today Show.
Though Bush’s contract with NBC is not available to the public at the time of this writing what is very likely that there is a morality clause in that contract. What is further clear is that Mr. Bush violated that morality clause by his actions and thereby breached his contract, which gives NBC a legal basis on which to fire him. Morality clauses are standard in employment contracts in the entertainment and news industry. They serve to protect an employer’s legitimate concern with public opinion. This is especially important for journalists ( yes, I know it’s hard to think of Billy Bush as a journalist but technically he is/was) because in order for viewers to trust journalists, to listen to them and to rely on them when they interview guests or discuss topics of national or local importance, credibility is paramount. When that credibility is called into question, as it has been with Billy Bush, employers must and should take action.
Bush’s employment situation was further complicated by the fact that several staffers at NBC have expressed their discontent with him and their desire not to work with him. No doubt these staffers are glad that NBC made permanent Bush’s temporary suspension. NBC simply could not afford to alienate its female staffers by keeping Bush on the job. But even more important to NBC? They couldn’t afford to alienate viewers and, The Today Show, has a very large female audience. Just look at Bush’s Facebook page or read the thousands of comments across various social media platforms and it is without question that if NBC decided to keep Bush on, The Today Show would have suffered in the ratings.
So, from a business perspective, the decision by NBC to terminate Billy Bush wasn’t all that difficult and resolving it all via settlement was smart. All parties now go away relatively peacefully without lawsuits. No Warner Brothers/Charlie Sheen situation here.
Trump Got Sued on His First Monday on the Job!
Donald Trump is no stranger to the justice system. He has filed lawsuits and has been sued many, many times. In fact, a USA Today analysis found 3,500 legal actions by and against Trump. 3,500!!! It’s almost unbelievable, isn’t it? Well, we can add one more to the list because on the first Monday of his new job, President Trump was slapped with a lawsuit (He was also sued last week by a former Apprentice contestant).
On January 23, 2017, leading ethics experts filed a massive lawsuit against Trump alleging that his business relationships with foreign powers and foreign players violates the Constitution, specifically they allege that his actions violate the little known emoluments clause. As with any constitutional claim the legal issues are complex but, simply stated, the emoluments clause prohibits federal officials from receiving financial benefits from foreign governments. President Trump’s companies have multimillion-dollar real estate deals with foreign powers and it is those dealings, among others, the suit claims, that violate the emoluments clause. Two easy to understand examples are that The Bank of China, one of the five biggest state owned commercial banks in China, is a tenant of Trump Tower and is also as a lender in another building in New York City in which Trump has a significant partnership interest.
Trump has been fighting the conflicts issue for months as it was continually raised during the campaign. In response to such complaints, Trump said that although he would not sell his ownership in his company, The Trump Organization, he would hand over control of it to his two adult sons, Donald Trump Jr and Eric. He also promised that his company would not make any more deals abroad and would donate profits from foreign governments that stay in his hotels to the U.S. Treasury (Hmmm. Let’s see if that happens!). Naturally, Trump’s camp has praised his actions to limit his conflicts. In fact one of his lawyers, called his efforts to do so, “extraordinary.” But that’s what his side is saying. Esteemed and widely regarded government ethics lawyers and experts say Trump’s steps to remove conflicts of interest are not enough and that is why this lawsuit was filed today.
The truth is that no other president has had such wide and deep foreign business dealings. The Trump Organization, has stakes in real estate holdings in 20 countries, including Turkey and South Korea. And, Trump has not lived a life of public service, his life, to date, has been about him, about how to amass wealth and how to serve his own interests. With this history in conjunction with the breadth of his foreign business dealings in a company he still owns, it’s hardly surprising that people are worried that Trump will put his personal financial interests above those of the people of the United States.
The pedigrees of the plaintiffs in this lawsuit are impressive and include attorney Norman Eisen, an ethics adviser to Barack Obama, Richard Painter, a former George W. Bush adviser, and Constitutional law scholars Erwin Chemerinsky and Laurence H. Tribe, among others. But despite the background and experience of these scholars and attorneys, this is no open and shut case—at any level. In fact, whether the plaintiffs even have standing (the right to sue) and whether or not the emoluments clause even applies to the office of the president, and more specifically, to Trump’s actions, has already been raised.
Two things we do know for sure? This case is going be heavily litigated by both sides and that list of 3500 Trump lawsuits is going to continue to grow to over the next four years.
If you want more details about Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington v Donald J. Trump, click here for a copy of the complaint filed on January 23, 2017 in federal court in New York.