Michael Cohen’s Riveting Day in Court

With the end of prosecutors’ case in Donald Trump’s criminal trial perhaps days away, the appearance of Michael Cohen, Trump’s former fixer, on the stand today was a dramatic scene, subject to Rashomon-like competing realities.

For supporters of the case against Trump, the first such prosecution of an American president, Cohen’s steady recitation of a plot to pay off a porn star and, by extension, surreptitiously sway the American public during the 2016 campaign was a tale of redemption. Cohen was a former enforcer seeking revenge and accountability but also, perhaps, some measure of forgiveness for past misdeeds.

But for Trump’s followers — a coterie of whom filed into the Manhattan courtroom today — Cohen is an inveterate liar, and a traitor to boot, enriching himself by writing fictional tell-alls, and offering fictional testimony, about his former boss.

Which version of the story the jury believes will decide Trump’s fate. But regardless of one’s worldview, Cohen’s testimony was undeniably gripping, the chaser to last week’s shot of Stormy Daniels, whose account of a one-night tryst with Trump in 2006 has led to this trial.

In a moment that seemingly crystallized the prosecution’s assertion that Trump was complicit in paying hush money to Daniels, Cohen said Trump ordered him to do it before the 2016 election after consulting with some “very smart people.”

“He expressed to me, ‘Just do it,’” he said, adding, “I was doing everything and more to protect my boss.”