| | | | It was a 2-bombshell day in Trumpworld | | Two massive clouds that have been hanging over Donald Trump's presidency for months broke open almost simultaneously on Tuesday afternoon -- and poured rain all over the President.
Between 4 p.m. and 5 p.m. Eastern time, two narratives -- both disastrously bad for Trump -- emerged:
1. Paul Manafort, the man who spent five critical months leading Trump's campaign in 2016, was found guilty of eight financial crimes. On the 10 other charges brought against Manafort, the jury couldn't reach a unanimous conclusion and the presiding judge declared a mistrial on those counts.
2. Longtime Trump personal attorney and fixer Michael Cohen agreed to a plea deal with the Southern District of New York in which he admitted guilt on eight charges and acknowledged that he had discussed or made hush payments to two women alleging affairs with Trump in order to keep damaging information from becoming public, at the direction of and in coordination with a candidate for federal office. That candidate, although Cohen didn't name him, is obviously Donald Trump.
While both stories are very big deals, the Cohen plea is more important in terms of its direct impact on Trump. Remember that Cohen has acknowledged discussing or making payments to both porn star Stormy Daniels and ex-Playboy model Karen McDougal during the course of the 2016 campaign as a way to ensure their silence about alleged affairs they conducted years earlier with Trump.
Cohen at first insisted that the Daniels payment was made out of his own pocket and without any direct or indirect knowledge by Trump. Of the payoff, Cohen said back in February: "In a private transaction in 2016, I used my own personal funds to facilitate a payment of $130,000 to Ms. Stephanie Clifford. Neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with Ms. Clifford, and neither reimbursed me for the payment, either directly or indirectly."
In a New York City courtroom on Tuesday, Cohen admitted that wasn't true. He said he sought to keep the payments -- as well as their source -- out of the public eye "in coordination and at the direction of a candidate for federal office."
And those 12 words are a very, very, very big problem for Donald Trump.
I wrote recently that the next two weeks would be an absolutely critical moment for Trump's presidency, for the broader Republican Party and for the country. Now, in the space of a single hour, two massive dominoes have fallen -- and they both landed on Trump. While the Manafort news is more of a glancing blow, the Cohen plea deal is, without question, the biggest problem for Trump personally that has emerged publicly to date.
The Point: Either of these developments could make for a disastrous week for the President of the United States, but this one-two Tuesday punch was, literally, catastrophic for the Trump White House.
Read my full analysis here. | | "[Dossier] is just a fancy French word for 'a load of crap.'"
- White House counselor Kellyanne Conway, on Fox News | | | MANAFORT AND COHEN, BY THE NUMBERS | | Former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort was found guilty on 8 charges: - 5 counts of tax fraud
- 1 count of hiding foreign bank accounts
- 2 counts of bank fraud
Jurors were unable to reach a verdict on 10 charges, and Judge T.S. Ellis declared a mistrial on those counts. The verdict was read around 4:30 p.m. and the jury was dismissed at 4:43 p.m.
Manafort faced 18 charges with the potential for 305 years in prison, related to his political work and lobbying in Ukraine. It's the first case special counsel Robert Mueller brought to trial as part of the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 US election. Now, Manafort faces a maximum of 80 years in prison.
The defense has asked Ellis for 30 days to file for a judgment of acquittal.
Trump's former personal attorney Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to 8 charges: - 5 counts of tax evasion
- 1 count of false statements to a bank
- 1 count unlawful corporate campaign contribution
- 1 count excessive campaign contribution
When asked by the judge if he was of sound mind when entering his plea -- and if he had consumed alcohol -- Cohen said he had 1 Lillet on the rocks last night, via CNN's Mark Morales.
The sentencing date for Cohen is set for December 12 at 11 a.m. Bail is set for $500,000. Cohen faces up to 65 years in prison. | | | Cat Power teams up with Lana Del Rey for "Woman." Rolling Stone magazine called it the song "you need to know." Get familiar. | | | Today's topic: SCOTUS nominee Brett Kavanaugh may have just clinched his last confirmation vote. | | Russia is at it again.
Tech giant Microsoft says Russia is behind a spearphishing attack on US Senate offices and conservative think tanks. Microsoft has seized six websites created by Fancy Bear, a group linked to Russian military intelligence, that look like "sites their targeted victims would expect to receive email from or visit."
Why does Fancy Bear sound familiar? It was the group behind the hacking of the DNC in 2016.
There's no evidence the domains were used in successful attacks. - No surprise here, but the Kremlin has denied any knowledge of attempts to interfere.
- The White House has yet to comment on the new hacking attempts. Trump told Reuters just yesterday: Mueller's investigation has "played right into the Russians -- if it was Russia -- they played right into the Russians' hands."
- The pushback: "Well, (Russia) clearly tried to hack into us, they clearly tried to hack into (International Republican Institute), into US Senate offices, and it's something to keep an eye on," Kenneth Weinstein, the president and CEO of the Hudson Institute, one of the think tanks targeted by Russians, told CNN's Wolf Blitzer today.
Why it matters: This comes less than three months ahead of the 2018 midterms. It also demonstrates new ways in which Russia is attempting to destabilize US institutions.
Read more of CNN's Donie O'Sullivan's story here.
But wait, there's more! Chris interviewed Ronald Bushar, the vice president and government CTO at FireEye, a DC-based cybersecurity company, to get a better sense of the breadth of the Russia moves in 2018 -- and how they compare to 2016. Read the full Q&A here. | | TRUMP RALLY TONIGHT IN COAL COUNTRY | | On Tuesday, the EPA unveiled its plan to transfer the regulation of coal-fired power plants back to US states, a move that's expected to boost the coal industry and increase carbon emissions, CNN's Jeremy Diamond reported.
The proposal allows states to set their own emissions standards for coal-fueled power plants. It's a reversal of Obama administration efforts to combat climate change.
Experts say the coal emissions rollbacks will be bad for America's health, via CNN's Jen Christensen.
Tonight, Trump heads to the heart of coal country to deliver the news. He joins supporters in Charleston, West Virginia, for a political rally at 7 p.m. ET. (Also be sure to watch for any further comment on Manafort and Cohen). | | Elizabeth Warren is giving us a preview of her possible 2020 pitch.
The Massachusetts senator unveiled a new plan to stem corporate government and root out corruption in the swamp. Her plan would impose a lifetime ban on appointed officials from taking lobbying jobs.
She also took aim at Trump and his administration: "There's no real question that the Trump era has given us the most nakedly corrupt leadership this nation has seen in our lifetimes," she said. "But they are not the cause of the rot -- they're just the biggest, stinkiest example of it."
Read more here from CNN's Gregory Krieg and Dan Merica on the details of Warren's anti-corruption plan. | | THE LATEST IN TRUMP VS. INTEL CHIEFS | | The drama over Trump pulling John Brennan's security clearance hasn't died down yet.
President Trump is now suggesting that former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper is siding with him over Brennan, a former CIA director.
Clapper told CNN's "State of the Union" that he views Brennan's rhetoric as concerning, even if he believes Brennan has a right to speak his mind.
Read more of CNN's Maegan Vazquez's story here. | | | From Brenna: "Congressional hearings are usually as exciting as the meetings the rest of us have to go to, but sometimes things like this happen. Sen. Rob Portman could be reaching for something in his pocket, but really is probably just photobombing Sen. Tom Carper. Slide into your friends' DMs/hearings/inboxes and share The Point with them!" | | | | | | |
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