In the 48 hours since Robert Mueller and federal prosecutors in Manhattan released sentencing memos for Michael Cohen, we’ve seen a Fox News contributor and one of the fair and balanced network’s highest-profile hosts try to parse this development in a way that makes no sense to anyone following this story.
First up, on Friday, Alan Dershowitz called into “The Five” and claimed that when Mueller pounded on Cohen lying about when Trump broke off talks for a Moscow Trump Tower, he was trying to criminalize a “political sin.” Watch here.
Dershowitz claimed that the only way that deal would rise to the level of criminal conduct would have been if Trump promised a penthouse suite to Vladimir Putin. However, he claimed there was no evidence of such a “quid pro quo.” It led him to believe that the sentencing memo was an indictment of “political sin, rather than federal crime”—and that Mueller’s final report would contain more of the same.
Um, Alan? Cohen was charged with lying to Congress in his written testimony regarding when those talks broke off. Last I checked, perjuring yourself in this manner is most assuredly a crime. Indeed, according to Mueller’s memo, Cohen may have veered into obstruction of justice and/or witness tampering by “releasing and repeating his lies to the public, including to other potential witnesses.”
Last time I checked, a real estate mogul and presidential candidate who continues talks about a real estate deal with a hostile power isn’t committing a crime in and of itself. But when that mogul’s lawyer lies about when those talks broke off, it is a crime. It says a lot that it even has to be spelled out. But apparently Dershowitz doesn’t understand that—or doesn’t want us to understand.
Then last night, Judge Jeanine whined about how St. Andrew’s Plaza pounded on Cohen arranging hush money payments to Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal “in coordination with and at the direction of” Trump. Watch here.
Pirro claimed there were perfectly legitimate reasons for those payments—keeping his wife and family from finding out, fear that the affairs would put “tarnish on his brand,” or simply wanting to get Daniels and McDougal “off his back” and make a “nuisance lawsuit” go away. For good measure, she claimed that since no campaign funds were spent and the payments were made while Trump was still a private citizen, there was no crime.
Au contraire, Judge Jeanine. Years of campaign finance law precedent say otherwise. The payment to Daniels was an in-kind contribution to the Trump campaign, since it was intended to keep Daniels from speaking up. And it far exceeded the limit for an individual donor. The payment to McDougal came from the coffers of the National Enquirer—and was thus an illegal in-kind corporate contribution to the Trump campaign.
So in the space of 24 hours, two high-profile Fox News personalities have wailed that Trump is being prosecuted for conduct that isn’t really criminal. It’s hard not to conclude that Fox News isn’t just reporting. It’s trying to make its viewers decide that Trump is being persecuted by the big, bad libruls.