Trump: Payments to Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal Didn't Violate Campaign Finance Law
The president defended Michael Cohen's payments to two women, saying they were “civil” payments.

Mark Wilson/Getty
President Trump shrugged off hush-money payments to two women who he had affairs with in a interview with Reuters on Tuesday. “Michael Cohen is a lawyer. I assume he would know what he’s doing,” Trump said when asked if he had discussed campaign finance laws with his former personal lawyer before the payments were made. “It wasn’t a campaign contribution. If it were, it’s only civil, and even if it’s only civil, there was no violation based on what we did. OK?” He also dismissed prosecutors’ claims that a number of people from his campaign had met or had business dealings with Russians before the 2016 election as “peanut stuff.” In court papers filed last week, prosecutors from the Southern District of New York sought a long prison sentence for seeking to influence and financially benefit from Trump's presidential win.

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