Novartis Got Out-Lawyered by Michael Cohen for Trump Services

Lawyer Michael Avenatti also said hundreds of thousands of dollars streamed into Cohen’s account from companies, including pharmaceutical giant Novartis, AT&T and Korea Aerospace, with U.S. government business interests.

Michael Avenatti, Stormy Daniels’ attorney, talks to reporters outside of federal court in NY. Ms. Daniels seeks to nullify a contract between her and Mr. Cohen in which she was paid $130, 000 to keep quiet about a sexual affair with Donald Trump in 2006.

“As the contract unfortunately could only be terminated for cause, payments continued to be made until the contract expired by its own terms in February 2018.”, the spokeswoman said.

He added: ‘We have only scratched the surface in this case. With the recent change in administration, Novartis believed that Michael Cohen could advise the company as to how the Trump administration might approach certain U.S. healthcare policy matters, including the Affordable Care Act. At that time, he was still Trump’s personal lawyer. According to reports of the raid, agents obtained documents related to several issues, including Cohen’s payments to Clifford. “It is a corrupt payment to a sitting present”, said one person familiar with the Mueller investigation.

Korea Aerospace, which is seeking to sell its planes in the US, hired Cohen’s entity for advice on local accounting standards and sent a single payment of $150,000 when the work was completed, a spokesman confirmed Wednesday, adding the contract was legal.

An attorney for porn star Stormy Daniels named Novartis among companies that made payments to Cohen’s Essential Consultants outfit until early this year.

Trump has denied having an affair with Daniels and said there was no collusion with Russian Federation.

Avenatti, who represents Clifford, said Cohen submitted false information to First Republic Bank when opening a new account in October 2016.

Novartis, which has not been accused of any illegal activity, made payments totaling almost $1.2 million to the USA firm. The lawyer’s seven-page document, titled “Preliminary Report of Findings”, does not explain the source of his information but describes in detail dates, dollar amounts and parties involved in various dealings by Mr. Cohen and his company. Davidson said, meaning Trump. ‘It would be a conflict right now for him to be the president’s attorney, ‘ he told ABC. Trump attorney Jay Sekulow said the outside legal team has no comment on Avenatti’s allegations.

The bank account, it seems, was a little busier than just that.

‘They were a regular occurrence. Not bad. I wonder what Cohen told them? Avenatti’s document said the payments totalled about half a million dollars.

The timing of those payments is nothing short of a disaster. And while none of this is proof of anything improper in and of itself, it at least raises questions about if AT&T was trying to pay for access to the Trump administration and perhaps even favorable decisions from it.

If Trump meant to reimburse Cohen for such payments, they should have been reported by the president on a 2017 financial disclosure form that required him to state his financial liabilities, Eisen said.