President Donald Trump's lawyer Rudy Giuliani Sunday continued to brand Trump's ex-attorney, Michael Cohen, as a liar, saying he doesn't know why he wouldn't have recorded a meeting where he says the then-candidate discussed a meeting his oldest son had held with Russians promising information on Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton.
"It seems to me his default position is to lie," Giuliani told "Fox News Sunday" host Chris Wallace about Cohen, who has said he was present at a meeting with Donald Trump Jr., the president's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and others, in which they spoke with then-candidate Trump about the upcoming Trump Tower meeting two days later.
Cohen then said he was in Trump's office the day of the meeting itself, and his son, Kushner and others came in.
"Every other person in both those meetings say it was not true," said Giuliani. "There was no such meeting in advance, there was no such interruption. If he taped everything else, why the heck didn't he tape this? It's not on tape and he's capable, I think unfortunately, of doctoring tapes. It would be hard to do it now since we have an expert. It's just flat-out untrue."
Giuliani said he would have been surprised before that Cohen would lie about such things, but now, he would believe Cohen was not telling the truth.
"He's a bad liar because he lies in contradiction to tapes and he lies in contradiction to what I just said, [which] is probably just supported by anywhere from two to five witnesses," said Giuliani.
Giuliani later told CBS' "Face the Nation" that the president's team knows of 183 unique conversations that are on tape, which is among items seized by the FBI during its raids on Cohen's property earlier this year, and there are "maybe 11 or 12 out of the 183 in which the president is discussed at any length by Cohen, mostly with reporters."
The conversations corroborate what the president has said on Twitter that he didn't know about the payments to former Playboy model, Karen McDougal, or to adult film actress Stormy Daniels, said Giuliani, but it would be up to Cohen and his attorney, Lanny Davis, to release the recordings.
"These are tapes I want you to read, I want you to hear them," said Giuliani. I didn't think I'd be able to get them out publicly. And somehow, he and his lawyer have this crazy idea of just throw it all out there. I think they also don't realize it's going to hurt them with the prosecutors. When I was a prosecutor, I didn't want some guy giving out all the evidence to the press."
Trump found out later that Cohen had made the payments, said Giuliani, but he denied they were made to benefit Trump's presidential campaign.
"He didn't like the campaign," Giuliani told CBS. "He says very derogatory things about the campaign, said 'I only made it because I personally love the president and Melania [Trump].'"
He said he also changed his mind about Cohen over the fact that he was "surreptitiously recording his clients," which could be considered a "discoverable offense" against the attorney.
"I would say he was a scoundrel," said Giuliani. "He had a conversation with one of your colleagues, [CNN's] Chris Cuomo in which he made a big show of putting his phone in a drawer [saying] we will be off the record, no recording. He then proceeded to record two hours of that conversation. That makes him a total liar."
Giuliani said the president had been angry at first, but he thinks that's over and now, Trump feels disappointed in Cohen.
"We've assured him in a very strange way, it's a very good development for us because we do have all these tapes and they are completely demonstrating the president did nothing wrong," said Giuliani. "Cohen is on record over and over again stating his position. It will be hard for him to contradict that now, and he's done so many despicable things, his credibility is now an issue."
Trump last summer told The New York Times that he did not know about the meeting, pointed out Wallace, asking Giuliani what it would mean if the president had not told the truth.
"I guess there's something wrong with it on an ethical, moral basis," the former New York City Mayor said. "If you got prosecuted for lying to the newspapers, the press, my God, Cohen should go to jail for a thousand years."
Giuliani said he doesn't know if he's at "war" with Cohen, and the real test will be with investigators, the Department of Justice and the American public.
"He doesn't get to decide this case," said Giuliani. "I should say I feel sorry for him, but nobody would believe me. He has destroyed himself."
Giuliani also discussed a tape Cohen made when he and Trump talked about a hush payment to a former Playboy model who had claimed she had a relationship with Trump before he became president, laughing when asked about Cohen's attorney saying he'd waived attorney-client privilege when responding about the recording.
"You've got to get the cart before the horse here," he said. "If the reality they leaked the tape and then we quite clearly responded, which we are allowed to do in the court order."
The New York Times has confirmed that the leaked tape did not come from Trump's legal team, he pointed out, which is unusual.
"If we have to defend him. That's exactly what we're doing and it's been very helpful to us because now we were able to put out the whole transcripts, which contradicts several things that Lanny Davis says," said Giuliani. "He's almost as bad as Cohen...These people tell Clinton-like lies, lies that can be contradicted by tape recorder."
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Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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