Good evening, im ali velshi sitting in for lawrence odonnell. We have a very good last word for you. Trumps tangled web. From russia collusion, to the president s tortured relationship with the truth. Well look at it all over the course of this hour. The day began as a growing web of deceit between president and shifting stories between the president and Rudy Giuliani to clean up Rudy Giulianis nowinfamous fox news appearances. Youll remember he revealed that the president reimbursed Michael Cohen for the 130,000 Hush Money Payment. There are new details that just broke within the last half an hour about when the president learned of that payment to Stormy Daniels. According to the New York Times President Trump knew about a sixfigure payment that michael d. Cohen, his personal lawyer, made to a Pornographic Film Actress several months before he denied any knowledge of it to reporters aboard Air Force One in april, according to two people familiar with the
arrangement. The times report
and there s one other thing to keep in mind with all of this news today, that this top executive at the trump organization, essentially donald trump s right-hand officer at his business, has been given immunity by federal prosecutors. and it s this, david pecker, this guy, the national enquirer chief who was the keeper of donald trump s tabloid secrets, well, he s flipped and given information to prosecutors. michael cohen, the keeper of donald trump s personal secrets, he s pleaded guilty to crimes he says he committed with trump and now allen weisselberg, the keeper of donald trump s financial and business secrets, he s been given immunity. donald trump is running out of hiding places. the other two executives who run the trump organization with allen weisselberg and who run the trump trust from which weisselberg ordered the cohen reimbursements be paid, they re both named trump. where are prosecutors going to go next? joining us now is david fahrenthold, washington post
the trump trust from which weisselberg ordered the cohen reimbursements be paid, they re both named trump. where are prosecutors going to go next? joining us now is david fahrenthold, washington post reporter, winner of a pulitzer prize for his coverage of the workings of the trump foundation and organization. david, great to have you with us. thank you for being with us. thank you for your reporting. i don t know if we can overstate how important allen weisselberg is to the trump organization to the trump foundation and donald trump. it s a name not everybody knew about more than a few weeks ago after we heard the tape from michael cohen but this guy has been with trump from the beginning. donald trump treated all points of his personal empire personal expenses, company, charity as one big pot of money and the person who oversaw all that pot of money was allen weisselberg. he would bring in checks individually for donald trump to sign. he didn t have a lot of executive respons
says he committed with trump and now allen weisselberg, the keeper of donald trump s financial and business secrets, he s been given immunity. donald trump is running out of hiding places. the other two executives who run the trump organization with allen weisselberg and who run the trump trust from which allen weisselberg ordered the cohen reimbursements be paid, they re both named trump. where are prosecutors going to go next? joining us now is david fahrenthold, washington post reporter, winner of a pulitzer prize for his coverage of the workings of the trump foundation and organization. david, great to have you with us. thank you for being with us. thank you for your reporting. i don t know if we can overstate how important allen weisselberg is to the trump organization to the trump foundation and donald trump. it s a name we didn t know until a few weeks ago from the tape with michael cohen, but this guy has been with donald trump from
and then you have people like weisselberg and cohen, cohen s been in trump s world and i know trump is trying to distance himself right now and say he just did small deals for me, he wasn t really a fixer, downplaying cohen s role, but cohen was in a lot of meetings, he was setting up a lot of arrangements. i think that tape where cohen is talking about weisselberg is fascinating. because you could probably argue that weisselberg didn t really know all the dirty details. when you hear that tape it suggests he actually, in fact, did. let me pick up on that point, a really interesting question, weisselberg knowing about what the payments were necessarily for. the wall street journal reports that mr. trump was known for being meticulous on payments made. weisselberg would bring checks to sign for the company on a daily basis. is it at all plausible that any of the cohen reimbursements that were made were, a, maybe not necessarily aware to weisselberg what they were for, in fact, if th