GOP Rep. Mark Meadows is seeking a criminal referral against Michael Cohen that alleges he violated federal lobbying laws.
FARA, or the Foreign Agents Registration Act, is a 1938 law that requires lobbyists to disclose work they do for foreign entities.
Meadows’ request came after he grilled President Trump’s former fixer on money he received from BTA bank in Kazakhstan.
“The former CEO of that bank had absconded between 4 to 6 billion [dollars]. And some of that money was here in the United States and they sought my assistance in finding, locating that money and helping them to collect it,” Cohen explained.
Meadows, of North Carolina, requested that at its next meeting, the committee look “in a bipartisan way at criminal referrals” against Cohen.
But he was denied by Cummings, who noted, “There are objections.”
A CNN panel said Michael Cohen lied Wednesday when he said he never wanted a job in the Trump White House during his testimony before the House Oversight Committee.
“The one potential problem that I thought Michael Cohen has is when he was asked if he wanted a job in the White House, and he said no,” correspondent Dana Bash said. “Our reporting, I know, Pam, you have been told and I have been told, all of us, by people in and around the process real time, he very much wanted a job in the White House.”
Host Jake Tapper played the clip in which Rep. Jim Jordan (R., Ohio) pressed Cohen about his desire to work in the White House.
“How long did you work in the White House?” Jordan asked.
“I never worked in the White House,” Cohen responded.
“That’s the point, isn’t it, Mr. Cohen? … You wanted to work in the White House, but you didn’t get brought to the dance,” Jordan continued.
Cohen denied Jordan’s claims and insisted he was “extremely proud to be personal attorney to the president of the United States of America.”
“I did not want to go to the White House. I was offered jobs. I can tell you a story of Mr. Trump reaming out Reince Priebus because I had not taken a job where Mr. Trump wanted me to, which was working with Don McGahn at the White House general counsel,” Cohen added.
“I think the issue there is that one sentence: ‘I did not want to go to the White House.’ All of our reporting suggests that’s not true,” Tapper said.
“After he said that I reached out to Reince Priebus,” Bash said. “I spoke to him, and his comment was no comment. He said I’m not getting involved in this and we, of course, witnessed this real time that this president probably more than any other, if he wants somebody in the White House, they’re there.”
“You know, Reince Priebus and John Kelly probably didn’t want Omarosa to be working in the White House and other people, but they were there because the president wanted it to be so. So if Michael Cohen and the president really wanted it to happen, more importantly the president, it would have happened and he wanted it.”
Source: New York Post, Free Beacon
