What is Michael Cohen’s endgame?
To talk about all this, I spoke by phone recently with Paul Rosenzweig, a former senior counsel in the Starr investigation of President Bill Clinton and a senior fellow at the center-right think tank R Street Institute. During the course of our conversation, which has been edited and condensed for clarity, we discussed if Cohen is trying to signal Trump or Robert Mueller, whether a president can put himself at legal risk through his use of the pardon power, and the mysterious behavior of another Trump surrogate, Rudy Giuliani.
Isaac Chotiner: What do you make of the way Cohen’s behaving?
Paul Rosenzweig: Well, as a preliminary matter before I give you my thoughts, one thing that everybody really should realize is that people in Mr. Cohen’s situation are very idiosyncratic in their responses. I’ve had clients who lash out at everybody. I’ve had clients who refused to accept the truth of what has happened, can’t believe they’d been caught. I’ve had clients who believed in the magic of their ability to talk their way out of it. I’ve had clients fall into despair. So, there is no pat answer for what Cohen personally is trying to do because, unless you’re inside his head, it’s really difficult to say.
And this is due to the psychological burden of being under investigation or the complications of one’s legal position?
Both. I mean, the legal strategies are like fight or flight, right? Either stand your ground and fight to the end or give it up, flee, and try and change teams and get the best deal you can. I suppose there’s a third legal strategy, which is head for the hills and see if you can get asylum in Argentina, but that’s not available to Mr. Cohen at this point. Then, psychologically there’s tough it out, there’s crack and crumble, there’s refuse to believe it’s happening. So it’s a combination of some legal strategy and what motivates your client individually, which may not be consistent.
Anyway, I interrupted you. You were saying what your theory was.
If the allegations in the search warrant that led to the searching of Mr. Cohen’s office are true, which is an assumption, but the judges said there’s probable cause to believe they are true, then he is in a lot of trouble. Not just with respect to Mr. Trump, but even more so with respect to his own personal business dealings in New York, right? There’s allegations related to his taxi cab medallions. Things like that.
[… The interview can be read in full over at Slate]
