So still no collusion?  When is this sham of an investigation going to be over?

You're really try to pull something, aren't you? Big surprise.

IIRC, some rando gopnik type guy asked for a meeting with Trump, was denied, and that was the end of it, at least yhe end of what they've been able to prove.  Eerily similar to the Fusion GPS setup on Don Jr.  Then Cohen stupidly made an absolute statement about no contacts with Russians under oath, and that's what he's pled guilty to.

I think Cohen's just not a very savvy guy in this big-time sort of game, and he's what finally got caught in Mueller's perjury net.  Small fish to be sure, but still a fish.  The hope was he could be used as bait to land the bigger fish, but that seems to have been a nonstarter.

No wonder they were so pissed; half the DNC muck rakers probably knew about Stormy, but didn't want to get sued by a billionaire

They had Cohen on other crimes but made the deal that he had to plead on crimes related to Trump. Whether or not they could have convicted him on what he pleaded to isnt the issue at this point.

So you actually can’t even link it together? You are the one declaring seeing the picture being painted. Finish the job Bob Ross.

Again - the SDNY is investigating "Russian collusion"?

Do you understand how Cohen's case came about in that district?

Can someone explain this whole thing start to finish. So many fucking names thrown around I don't know who is who anymore.

He colluded with Russia?

What he's been charged with in the SDNY doesn't directly involve "Russian collusion".  That's why Mueller referred the case to SDNY.

Cohen has been cooperating with Mueller's office when it comes to the SCO's investigation.  Exactly what he's given them we don't really know....yet.

Well Fox is reporting that the people at the National Inquirer cooperated and the Feds say the payments were made to hide the affairs in order to directly influence the election. If anyone remembers when CNN's Cuomo played the tapes that Lannie Davis brought Trump did mention something about protecting his campaign.

The SD of NYS may have dug up other stuff on Trump as part of the Cohen raid. It may have nothing to do with Russia but it seems they want Trumps head on a platter.

The real question is will America sit by as the the corrupt left and DOJ take down a president based on Russian lies to kick this entire thing off.

*prophylactic extortion payment

Collusion?

The only collusion readily apparent is between Cohen and Mueller trying to give Trump some sore of blackeye, real or imagined.

You mean the FAKE Russian dossiere created by the Dem party, a british agent and paraded around by John (hope you like hell) McCain?

So it's illegal to try to win a election?

I feel we are getting somewhere. So you are saying Mueller has infinite time and money to search the life, with a fine comb, every detail of anybody that looked at Trumps general direction. He can do this under the guise of looking for “collusion”. He can gather up crimes that were committed throughout a persons life under this guise, and when collusion isn’t found, he send off all this dirt for the SDNY to prosecute.

Under that point, this investigation will never end. Mueller can search for “collusion” on any republican, for potentially forever. Nice to have that kind of job security.

The payments would only be a violation, if he wouldn't have normally paid off whores, but did so because he was running for office and needed to hide it.

It seems like SOP at this point, so the feds are wrong.

So the argument is that Cohen and the Enquirer made payments to third parties that were intended to influence the election, and therefore those payments are illegal campaign contributions?

How is this different from someone like George Clooney hosting a $350,000 dinner to benefit the Clinton campaign?

Cohen probably had tapes where Trump alludes to the stories hurting his campaign.

ETA: this investigation sounds like a lot of desperate grasping at technicalities to me, but what do I know.

It's different because it was her turn...

Uhh hello we do know...he was given three years in jail for *not cooperating enough*

So they couldn't prove Russian collusion so now they are moving the ball and trying to get him on campaign finance. Is that correct?

So he paid his own money so that affairs he had didn't get out and hurt his chances at being president? I couldn't fucking care less.

Trump has proven capable of multitasking when it comes to committing crimes.

Jeannie Rhee, w Special Counsel’s office, said in court that Michael Cohen “has provided our office with credible and reliable information about core Russia-related issues under investigation and within the purview of the Special Counsel's Office.“

Jake Tapper  (@jaketapper) December 12, 2018

Nice to see Jeannie Rhee is poking her head out.

Clinton foundation lawyer, Jeannie Rhee says Cohen is cooperating with russia-related investigation. Lol

Way to go Jake Flapper, concealing her identity.

Eta: This tells me the special counsel, Clinton defense team,  is worried about Clinton foundation crimes committed.

I wonder if Trump could get a hold of the documents pertaining to the millions that have been paid out to the sexual "conquests" of various congress-critters still in office.

Anyone with any sense at all knows those peeps were paid-off to keep the congress-critter in office.

They will never stop.

He's a clown that doesn't listen to legal advice and doesn't pay his bills - would you work for him?

ETA:  Representing the President personally is usually a dream gig that every white shoes firm fights for.  There's a reason Trump is stuck with has-been dregs of the legal world like Sekelow and Rudy.

So spending your money to pay off a whore is an illegal campaign contribution, because it was spent to influence the election? Would that make the money spent by Hillary on the dossier illegal, and for that matter any money spent by the campaign illegal, cause it's all being spent to influence the election?

Is this why special counsel teams end up with politically biased investigators and Clinton sycophant prosecutors?

Remember Trump never actually wrote a check to Stormy. He paid Cohen a $30,000 monthly retainer fee. So when this came up Trump said to Cohen take care of it for him. Cohen didn't have any money to take care of it so he took out a 2nd on his house to payoff Stormy. Stormy of all things was the one actually trying to effect the election with extortion, not Trump.

Taxi medallions

Nice drive-by shit slinging. What crimes was committed? Please list them by the date they were committed, thanks.

Thanks to Tapper for narrowing down the Jeannie Rhee. First mentioned, I did not know if it was special council  Rhee, or the Jeanne Rhee that served the CLINTON FOUNDATION.

Does anybody have the FBI #? There was a guy running for coroner, and he paid a shit ton of money for these signs. The signs, in my expert opinion, were trying to influence voting.

My questions is how in the hell under a Republican controlled congress, as well as Trump's own Justice Department was this allowed to happen?

Still nothing on Hillary's emails, etc.  

All of the Cohen plea agreement documents can be found here.

You still seem unable to understand the difference between the SDNY's role in this matter and the SCO's.  Rhee was in court to explain how Cohen has been cooperating with Mueller's investigation.  The actual charges are being handled through the SDNY.

Expenses paid with campaign funds have to be disclosed.  Was this paid for with campaign funds or with the monthly retainer Trump had been paying him for exactly these types of circumstances?

Neither were the 280 Congressional Settlements that converted Tax $$$$ to Campaign $$$$ to cover Sex Harassment and other shenanigans.

Campaign funds paid the monthly retainer. Cohen used his personal funds to pay the whore.

Unconstitutional appointment of Mueller and the most corrupt DOJ in US history under Obama.

When the tippy top levels of government are lawless and corrupt, this is what happens.

I believe the justice department is rotten to the core, largely stemming from 8 years under Obama.  I still find it frustrating that all of this has been allowed to take place and go on under Trump's authority and Republican controlled House and Senate.

I think Trump underestimated just how deep and wide the swamp's control is.  If he's not careful I'm afraid they'll keep digging until they find something to string him up by.  Not that they'll really do anything to him (well they probably will impeach him but so what, he'll stay in office).

I'm sure everyone, even the most politically observant human, underestimated the amount of corrupt POS people were in our government mucking shit up.

Obama had a $3M campaign finance violation and was only fined $300K.

Cohen wasn't convicted for that.  He was convicted for lying about it, tax evasion...

That is because he has a D after his name.

I listened to Judge Napalatano lay this all out.
Basically what the campaign did (paying off whores to STFU) amounts to felony level campaign finance law violation.

And Trump directing people to pay off said whores makes him copiable and makes it a conspiracy (an additional crime in and of itself).

The way this goes may not end well for Trump. Impeachment may be an achievable goal. All the dems and a bunch of RINOs (especially the holy roller types may be game for this given the nature of the offense).
IMO, that is the cold, hard truth of this. Not saying I like/agree with it, just that it could very well happen.

My wish would be that it turns into an "everybody burns" moment where both sides of the aisle feel the pain as all the corrupt go down in flames but you know that isn't gonna happen.

The Clintons, Obamas and all the other notable dems will ride through this unscathed.

The article in the OP says he was sentenced to 2 months for lying to congress. The three years appears to be for campaign finance violations.

I think people are missing a key point. It wasn't illegal to pay whores off to influence the election. You can absolutely do that as much as you want as Trump had clearly done in the past.

What you can't do, however, is pay people off to influence an election and not RRPORT the payments on your campaign finance report. If they had reported the payments as payments to "Essential Consultants, LLC" or whatever proxy company Cohen had registered as "legal services" or "legal settlement fees" or something like that there wouldn't be any issue.

In short, the issue isn't paying someone to influence an election. That's literally politics at its core. The issue is raising or spending money that you don't report. It would be no different than if Trump had taken a 120k campaign donation and didn't disclose it on his campaign finance reports. One, it would be in excess of the contribution caps mandated by law, and two it would be illegally concealing that you received the funds.

Part of Cohen's issue is that he FRONTED the money and in doing so broke the contributions cap. Being reimbursed after the fact doesn't change that because the spending was never legally reported before being discovered.

Whether people have a problem with Trump paying off whores or not isn't at issue. Personally, I don't give a shit. But you cannot spend money to influence an election and not report it. That's goes for any campaign, PAC, or non-profit out there. Trump isn't being singled out - - people are prosecuted for concealing donations or not reporting spending all the time.

Generally, these cases never make it to the criminal level because if a violation is uncovered the violating party typically files an updated campaign finance report and pays a negotiated fine. Trump refused to do that, and instead worked with Cohen to keep the payments hidden. That's why it becomes criminal and isn't like other cases where the campaign or candidate can simply amend their report, say mea culpa, and pay a fine.

If you go to extraordinary lengths to conceal the payments, refuse to admit the payments happened until a search warrant uncovers evidence of the payment during a search of your attorney's office, and a tape made by your attorney is discovered, in which you and your attorney conspire to conceal the payment and source of the funds, then the door is closed on a voluntary settlement. Especially since Trump continues to deny that it was a campaign related expenditure even though he's on tape implying otherwise. Finally, Trump eventually did disclose the payment in an official filing, but it was on his mandatory ethics form for being President (where you list assets and liabilities), was done after the Cohen raid, and totally prevents a voluntary settlement because he's still trying to claim it wasn't a campaign expenditure.

Trump, more or less, did a version of OJ's "If I did it..." by claiming he didn't do it, but if he did, it was simply a private matter not related to the campaign, but if it was actually a campaign expenditure it was OK because he's allowed to contribute as much money to his own campaign he wants. The obvious flaw being that Cohen paid the money and not Trump, and so Trump's public statements and ethics form are actually self-incriminating instead of being exculpatory.

At least she's earned 100 cents on that dollar.

The monthly "retainer" didn't start until well after the payment had been paid. It isn't a retainer if you don't pay it until long after someone has already spent money on your behalf. Then it is a reimbursement. According to Trump's and Cohen's own records, Cohen was not under a retainer agreement when he paid the funds to get the NDA. In fact, and someone can correct me if I'm wrong, Cohen was counsel to Trump's companies before and during part of the campaign, so he was always paid via Trump org directly. There wouldn't have been a retainer agreement anyway because of that.