well, there s no privilege between a father-son. you know, it s an exposure leverage that you start using with family members. you start saying things like, you know, do you want your dad going to prison? you say to allen weisselberg, your son s criminally exposed. is that what you want? or do you want to cooperate here? those are the kinds of discussions that happen with agents and prosecutors and family members and trying to convince them to cooperate and save themselves, but you know, i m struck by the fact we talked about misplaced trust with weisselberg and trump. the very fact that trump decided that weisselberg was going to be the guy to handle inauguration funds, organization funds, personal taxes, that s a mistake. but it shows you how much trust he placed in weisselberg, and now, perhaps, how much he got that wrong.
editor and a columnist at bloomberg opinion, also the author of trump nation: the art of being the donald. he joins me now. thank you for being here tonight, tim. hi, zerlina. so what may allen weisselberg have done wrong here? what are the kinds of things he s being accused of in this particular case? well, you know, this is a very straightforward case. they re saying that the trump organization or the trump family diverted portions of the inauguration funds into their hotel, into their hotels in washington, for their own uses. and the interesting thing about weisselberg s name coming up is, i hadn t seen that before, ivanka s name had come up a lot, she was considered one of the people piloting communications around what to do with the inauguration funds that went into trump s hotel in washington.
funds that were contributed to the inauguration, were they misused. how did they get on to that? there was an adviser melania trump that helped with the inauguration. this person talked with michael cohen. there was a tape of that conversation. it was retrieved when the fbi raided his home and his office. what else was retrieved? what are they looking at in the inauguration funds, whether or not there was foreign money flowing into it in an effort to gain access and influence donald trump or to get favors. there was a tendency developer interested in a nuclear project. he contributed money. later on, he contracts with michael cohen to represent him and trying to get a loan from the energy department. his lawyer didn t respond with any comment. the white house isn t commenting on that. these are all things that
this american company gave money for the inauguration funds. they also gave money, i believe, to the rnc and for some campaign stuff, all of which is legal. at the very least, there may be no nefarious reason here at all is that that this company would have given $500,000 for michael cohen. they could have been hiring him for any number of consulting for what? his legal skill and acumen, i doubt that. but he does have the ear of the president, so a company might want but at the very least, it is moronic for michael cohen, who is representing the president of the united states to be publicly seen as accepting money from a company which has such deep ties to a russian
involvement with the transaction. do you have evidence to the contrary? we do have evidence of the contrary. also we have the ceo, who is the cousin of the oligarch. and what is the explanation for the half a million dollars worth of payments? michael cohen should not have been accepting money especially under the circumstance at this time from anyone with russian ties. this american company gave money for the inauguration funds and gave money to the rnc and for some campaign stuff all of which is legal. at the very least, there may be no nefarious reason. they could have been hiring him. for what? his legal skill and acumen?