Cohen: I Lied to Congress to Be ‘Loyal’ to Trump

While pleading guilty Thursday to making false statements to Congress about President Trump’s real-estate dealings in Moscow, former fixer Michael Cohen claimed he did so in order to stay “loyal” to his ex-boss. “I made these statements to be consistent with Individual-1’s political messaging and to be loyal to Individual-1,” Cohen said in court, CNN’s Erica Orden reported. “Individual-1” has been previously identified as Trump. As The Daily Beast has reported, Cohen made a surprise appearance in Manhattan federal court Thursday to make his guilty plea, in which he admitted to making false statements to the House Intelligence Committee in 2017 about the scope of conversations regarding Trump’s plan to build a new Trump Tower in Moscow. Cohen told the committee that the deal fell through in January 2016—but Trump ally Felix Sater has previously claimed that talks continued through June of that year.