administration to approve its merger with time warner. one of the president s attorneys forrer new york city mayor rudy giuliani didn t know about his work with at&t and the president denied the merger. giuliani later walked those comments back, by the way, telling nbc news the president did not actually intervene in the case. joining us now to take a closer look at that part of the story sheila, staff writer at the new yorker. she recently wrote a piece diving into this called, what did at&t pay michael cohen for? she s also the author of black edge, information, dirty money and the quest to bring down the most wanted man on wall street. sheila, great to see you. at&t, this is the weird situation. so, for people who think there is a swamp out there who would like it drained, the idea that a company that has business before the government after a president has been elected who said he would not allow that merger to go through, then pays the still personal lawyer of that president for i