NEW YORK: Michael Cohen, President Donald Trump’s former personal lawyer and “fixer,” pleaded guilty Tuesday to campaign-finance violations and other charges, saying he and Trump arranged the payment of hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels and a former Playboy model to influence the election.
Cohen’s account appears to implicate Trump himself in a crime, though whether — or when — a president can be prosecuted remains a matter of legal dispute.
The guilty plea came almost at the same moment former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort was convicted in Alexandria, Virginia, of eight financial crimes in the first trial to come out of special counsel Robert Mueller’s sprawling Russia investigation.
In a deal reached with federal prosecutors, Cohen, 51, pleaded guilty to eight counts in all, including tax evasion and making a false statement to a financial institution. He could get about four to five years in prison at sentencing Dec. 12.
In entering the plea, Cohen did not name the two women or even Trump, recounting instead that he worked with an “unnamed candidate.” But the amounts and the dates all lined up with the payments made to Daniels and Playboy Playmate Karen McDougal in the weeks and months leading up to the 2016 White House election.
Cohen, his voice shaky as he answered questions from a federal judge, said one payment was “in coordination and at the direction of a candidate for federal office,” and the other was made “under direction of the same candidate.”
However, in the charging documents, a press release and comments outside the courthouse, prosecutors did not go as far as Cohen did in open court in pointing the finger at the president. Prosecutors said Cohen acted “in coordination with a candidate or campaign for federal office for purposes of influencing the election.”
As cable networks were showing split-screen coverage of the dueling conviction and plea bargain by two former loyalists, Trump boarded Air Force One in the afternoon on the way to a rally in West Virginia. He ignored shouted questions to reporters about both former aides, retreating to his private stateroom on the airliner.
After the court hearing, which ended with Cohen released on $500,000 bail, the lawyer wiped away tears as he gazed out a courthouse window. He left the building and headed straight for a black SUV with tinted windows. A couple of people outside chanted, “Lock him up!” as they recorded the scene with their phones.
Under federal law, an expenditure to protect a candidate’s political fortunes can be construed as a campaign contribution, subject to federal laws that bar contributions from corporations and set limits on how much can be donated.
Daniel Petalas, former prosecutor in the Justice Department’s public integrity section, said, “This brings President Trump closer into the criminal conduct.”
“The president has certain protections while a sitting president but if it were true, and he was aware and tried to influence an election, that could be a federal felony offense,” Petalas said. “This strikes close to home.”
Cohen’s plea follows months of scrutiny from federal investigations and a falling-out with the president, whom he previously said he would “take a bullet” for.
The FBI raided Cohen’s hotel room, home and office in April and seized more than 4 million items. The search sought bank records, communications with Trump’s campaign and information on a $130,000 payment to Daniels and a $150,000 one to McDougal. Both women claimed Trump had affairs with them, which he denies.
According to prosecutors, the payment to McDougal was made through the parent company of the National Enquirer. Cohen made the payment to Daniels through his own company, and then was reimbursed by Trump, he said.
Trump denied to reporters in April that he knew anything about Cohen’s payments to Daniels, though the explanation from the president and his attorney Rudy Giuliani have shifted multiples times since.
The president has fumed publicly about what he felt was government overreach, while privately worrying about what material Cohen may have after working for the Trump Organization for a decade. Trump branded the raid “a witch hunt,” an assault on attorney-client privilege and a politically motivated attack by enemies in the FBI.
“Obviously it’s not good for Trump,” Sol Wisenberg, who conducted grand jury questioning of President Bill Clinton during the Whitewater investigation, said of Cohen plea bargain.
“I’m assuming he’s not going to be indicted because he’s a sitting president, Wisenberg added. “But it leads him closer to ultimate impeachment proceedings, particularly if the Democrats take back the House.”
The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, which provides legal advice and guidance to executive branch agencies, has held that a president cannot be indicted while in office. Trump’s lawyers have said that Mueller plans to adhere to that guidance, though Mueller’s office has never confirmed that. There would presumably be no bar against charging a president after he leaves the White House.
Laurie Levenson, a former federal prosecutor and professor at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, noted that the deal does not require Cohen to cooperate, but does not preclude it from happening, which should be worrying to the president and his allies.
“What it shows is that the people close to the president have criminal exposure and it may mean they don’t need Cohen to cooperate,” she said.
Levenson argued that the deal also knocks back the argument that the investigations swirling around Trump are a “witch hunt.”
“No longer can you say Mueller is on a witch hunt when you have his own lawyer pleading guilty to things that were designed to impact the election,” she said.
Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff of California, a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said in a statement: “The factual basis of the plea, potentially implicating the president in illegal campaign finance violations, adds to the president’s legal jeopardy.”
Mueller’s team, which is looking into Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election, came across the some of the evidence against Cohen in the course of its investigation and referred the matter to federal prosecutors in New York.
Deputy US Attorney Robert Khuzami said that in addition to the campaign finance violations, Cohen failed to report more than $4 million in income between 2012 and 2016, including about $2.5 million from interest payments on a personal loan and $1.3 million from his taxi medallion holdings.
Cohen also lied to a financial institution by failing to disclose more than $14 million in debt and obtaining a $500,000 home equity line of credit he wasn’t entitled to, Khuzami said.
After making the hush money payments, Cohen submitted phony invoices to Trump’s company, ostensibly for services rendered in 2017, the prosecutor said.
“Those involves were a sham,” Khuzami said. “He provided no legal services for the year 2017. It was simply a means to obtain reimbursement for the unlawful contributions.”
Before the election, Cohen had been a trusted member of the Trump organization, working out of an office in Trump Tower next to one used by his boss.
He raised millions for Trump’s campaign and, after being interviewed by the House Intelligence Committee last year, told Vanity Fair that Trump had no part in the suspected Russian conspiracy to tamper with the election.
The president’s initial support for Cohen after the raid soon degenerated into a public feud, prompting speculation that, to save himself, Cohen might be willing to tell prosecutors some of the secrets he helped Trump keep.
When Cohen’s team produced a recording he had made of Trump discussing one of the hush-money payments, Trump tweeted: “What kind of lawyer would tape a client? So sad!“
Ex-Trump lawyer Cohen pleads guilty in hush-money scheme
Ex-Trump lawyer Cohen pleads guilty in hush-money scheme

- Cohen’s account appears to implicate Trump himself in a crime
- The guilty plea came almost at the same moment former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort was convicted of financial crimes
SpaceX's latest Starship test flight ends with another explosion

This time, wreckage from the latest explosion was seen streaming from the skies over Florida. It was not immediately known whether the spacecraft's self-destruct system had kicked in to blow it up.
The 403-foot (123-meter) rocket blasted off from Texas. SpaceX caught the first-stage booster back at the pad with giant mechanical arms, but engines on the spacecraft on top started shutting down as it streaked eastward for what was supposed to be a controlled entry over the Indian Ocean, half a world away. Contact was lost as the spacecraft went into an out-of-control spin.
Starship reached nearly 90 miles (150 kilometers) in altitude before trouble struck and before four mock satellites could be deployed. It was not immediately clear where it came down, but images of flaming debris were captured from Florida, including near Cape Canaveral, and posted online.
The space-skimming flight was supposed to last an hour.
“Unfortunately this happened last time too, so we have some practice at this now,” SpaceX flight commentator Dan Huot said from the launch site.
SpaceX later confirmed that the spacecraft experienced “a rapid unscheduled disassembly" during the ascent engine firing. "Our team immediately began coordination with safety officials to implement pre-planned contingency responses,” the company said in a statement posted online.
Starship didn't make it quite as high or as far as last time.
NASA has booked Starship to land its astronauts on the moon later this decade. SpaceX’s Elon Musk is aiming for Mars with Starship, the world’s biggest and most powerful rocket.
Like last time, Starship had mock satellites to release once the craft reached space on this eighth test flight as a practice for future missions. They resembled SpaceX’s Starlink internet satellites, thousands of which currently orbit Earth, and were meant to fall back down following their brief taste of space.
Starship’s flaps, computers and fuel system were redesigned in preparation for the next big step: returning the spacecraft to the launch site just like the booster.
During the last demo, SpaceX captured the booster at the launch pad, but the spacecraft blew up several minutes later over the Atlantic. No injuries or major damage were reported.
According to an investigation that remains ongoing, leaking fuel triggered a series of fires that shut down the spacecraft’s engines. The on-board self-destruct system kicked in as planned.
SpaceX said it made several improvements to the spacecraft following the accident, and the Federal Aviation Administration recently cleared Starship once more for launch.
Starships soar out of the southernmost tip of Texas near the Mexican border. SpaceX is building another Starship complex at Cape Canaveral, home to the company’s smaller Falcon rockets that ferry astronauts and satellites to orbit.
Trump casts doubt on NATO solidarity, despite it aiding the US after Sept. 11

- Trump also suggested that the US might abandon its commitments to the alliance if member countries don’t meet defense spending targets
- Last year, NATO’s Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said a record 23 of NATO’s 32 member nations had hit the military alliance’s defense spending target
WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump on Thursday expressed uncertainty that NATO would come to the US’s defense if the country were attacked, though the alliance did just that after Sept. 11 — the only time in its history that the defense guarantee has been invoked.
Trump also suggested that the US might abandon its commitments to the alliance if member countries don’t meet defense spending targets, a day after his pick for NATO ambassador assured senators that the administration’s commitment to the military alliance was “ironclad.”
Trump’s comments denigrating NATO, which was formed to counter Soviet aggression during the Cold War, are largely in line with his yearslong criticism of the alliance, which he has accused of not paying its fair share toward the cost of defense. But they come at a time of heightened concern in the Western world over Trump’s cozy relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has long seen NATO as a threat, and as the US president seeks to pressure Ukraine into agreeing to a peace deal with the country that invaded it three years ago.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth sent the alliance into upheaval last month when he said in a speech that the US would not participate in any peacekeeping force in Ukraine, which is not a NATO member, and would not defend any country that participated in it if attacked by Russia.
Trump said Thursday in the Oval Office that other countries would not come to the defense of the US — though they have done exactly that, in the only instance that the Article 5 defense guarantee was invoked.
“You know the biggest problem I have with NATO? I really, I mean, I know the guys very well. They’re friends of mine. But if the United States was in trouble, and we called them, we said, ‘We got a problem, France. We got a problem, couple of others I won’t mention. Do you think they’re going to come and protect us?’ They’re supposed to. I’m not so sure.”
Article 5 was invoked after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, leading to NATO’s largest operation in Afghanistan. France’s military participated in the operation.
“We are loyal and faithful allies,” French President Emmanuel Macron responded Thursday, expressing “respect and friendship” toward US leaders.
“I think we’re entitled to expect the same,” he said.
Macron invoked “centuries-old history,” namechecking the Marquis de Lafayette, a 19-year-old French nobleman, who was a major-general in the American Continental Army during the Revolutionary War, and Gen. John Pershing, commander of the American army in France during World War I. Macron added that a few days ago, he met American World War II veterans who landed on Omaha Beach as part of the D-Day invasion of Nazi-occupied France.
France and the US “have always been there for each other,” Macron said.

When asked Thursday if it he was making it US policy that the US would not defend NATO countries that don’t meet military spending targets, Trump said, “well, I think it’s common sense, right? If they don’t pay, I’m not going to defend them. No, I’m not going to defend them.”
Trump has suggested since his 2016 presidential campaign that the US under his leadership might not comply with the alliance’s mutual defense guarantees and would only defend countries that met targets to commit 2 percent of their gross domestic products on military spending.
The US is the most powerful nation of the seven-decade alliance, has the largest economy among members and spends more on defense than any other member.
The US was one of 12 nations that formed NATO following World War II to counter the threat posed by the Soviet Union to Western European during the Cold War. Its membership has since grown to 32 countries, and its bedrock mutual defense guarantee, known as Article 5, states that an attack on one member is considered an attack on all.
Trump on Thursday also seemed to suggest the US commitment to NATO might be leveraged in his trade war as he seeks to target what he says are unfair trade policies with other nations, including the European Union.
“I view NATO as potentially good, but you’ve got to get, you’ve got to get some good thinking in NATO. It’s very unfair, what’s been happening,” Trump said. “Until I came along, we were paying close to 100 percent of NATO. So think of it, we’re paying 100 percent of their military, and they’re screwing us on trade.”
On Wednesday, Trump’s choice for NATO ambassador, Matt Whitaker, said at his confirmation hearing that in regards to the US commitment to the NATO alliance and specifically Article 5, “It will be ironclad.”
Last year, NATO’s Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said a record 23 of NATO’s 32 member nations had hit the military alliance’s defense spending target.
Trump has taken credit for countries meeting those targets because of his threats, and Stoltenberg himself has said Trump was responsible for getting other nations to increase their spending.
Hegseth dismisses as “garbage” critique of US stance on Russia

WASHINGTON: US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Thursday dismissed as “garbage” accusations that Washington had taken a pro-Russia stance, saying President Donald Trump was pursuing a peaceful end to Russia’s three-year-old invasion of Ukraine.
Trump has piled pressure on Ukraine, pausing all US military and intelligence assistance to Kyiv, as his administration pushes for a negotiated solution to the biggest conflict in Europe since World War Two.
Trump and his advisers, including Hegseth, have also declined to brand Russia as the aggressor.
“The press is interested in narratives. Our president is interested in peace. So we will get characterized one way or another: ‘Oh, your stance is pro-Russia or pro-’ ... it’s all garbage,” Hegseth told reporters.
“The President got elected to bring peace in this conflict, and he is working with both sides in a way that only President Trump can ... to bring them to the table to end the killing.”
Hegseth spoke alongside British Defense Secretary John Healey, who aimed to discuss a peace plan for Ukraine during a meeting at the Pentagon on Thursday.
“It’s the detail of those discussions which are rightly behind the scenes that the defense secretary and I will now pursue this afternoon,” Healey said.
Over the weekend, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov praised Trump’s “common sense” aim to end the war, while accusing European powers which have rallied around Kyiv of seeking to prolong the conflict.
Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky had acrimonious talks at the White House on February 28 but since then the two sides have resumed work on a revenue-sharing minerals deal.
At his speech to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday, Trump said he had received a letter from Zelensky in which the Ukrainian leader said he was “ready to come to the negotiating table as soon as possible.”
Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, said on Thursday he is in discussions with Ukraine for a peace agreement framework to end hostilities with Russia and that a meeting is planned next week with the Ukrainians in Saudi Arabia.
“We’re now in discussions to coordinate a meeting with the Ukrainians,” Witkoff told reporters at the White House. He said it would likely be in Riyadh or Jeddah.
EU leaders commit to working together after Trump signals that Europe must defend itself

- “Europe faces a clear and present danger, and therefore Europe has to be able to protect itself, to defend itself,” said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen
- Pledge underscores sea change in geopolitics spurred on by Trump, who has undermined 80 years of cooperation
BRUSSELS: European Union leaders on Thursday committed to working together to bolster the continent’s defenses and to free up hundreds of billions of euros for security after US President Donald Trump’s repeated warnings that he would cut them adrift to face the threat of Russia alone.
With the growing conviction that they will now have to fend for themselves, countries that have faltered on defense spending for decades held emergency talks in Brussels to explore new ways to beef up their security and ensure future protection for Ukraine.
“Today history is being written,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told reporters after the summit ended.
She said the 27 EU leaders are “determined to ensure Europe’s security and to act with the scale, the speed and the resolve that this situation demands. We are determined to invest more, to invest better and to invest faster together.”
The pledge underscored a sea change in geopolitics spurred on by Trump, who has undermined 80 years of cooperation based on the understanding that the US would help protect European nations following World War II.
The leaders signed off on a move to loosen budget restrictions so that willing EU countries can increase their military spending. They also urged the European Commission to seek new ways “to facilitate significant defense spending” in all member states, a statement said.
The EU’s executive branch estimates that around 650 billion euros ($702 billion) could be freed up that way.
The leaders also took note of a commission offer of loans worth 150 billion euros ($162 billion) to buy new military equipment and invited EU headquarters staff “to examine this proposal as a matter of urgency.”
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, a staunch supporter of Trump and considered to be Russian President Vladimir Putin’s closest ally in Europe, refused to endorse part of the summit statement in favor of Ukraine.
But the 26 other EU leaders approved the bloc’s stance that there can be no negotiations on Ukraine without Ukraine and that the Europeans must be involved in any talks involving their security. The Europeans have so far been sidelined in the US-led negotiations with Russia.
In other developments, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said talks between Ukraine and the US on ending the war will take place in Saudi Arabia next week. In his nightly address, Zelensky said he would travel to Saudi Arabia on Monday to meet the country’s crown prince, and his team would stay on to hold talks with US officials.
In recent weeks, Trump has overturned old certainties about the reliability of the US as a security partner as he embraces Russia, withdraws American support for Ukraine and upends the tradition of cooperation with Europe that has been the bedrock of Western security for generations.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, whose country holds the EU’s rotating presidency, said that three years of war in Ukraine and a shift in attitudes in Washington “pose entirely new challenges for us, and Europe must take up this challenge ... and it must win.”
“We will arm ourselves faster, smarter and more efficiently than Russia,” Tusk said.
Spending plans win early support
Zelensky welcomed the plan to loosen budget rules and expressed hopes that some of the new spending could be used to strengthen Ukraine’s own defense industry, which can produce weapons more cheaply than elsewhere in Europe and closer to the battlefields where they are needed.
“We are very thankful that we are not alone, and these are not just words. We feel it. It’s very important,” Zelensky said, looking far more relaxed among Europe’s leaders in Brussels than almost a week ago when he received a verbal lashing from Trump in Washington.
Friedrich Merz, the likely next chancellor of Germany, and summit chairman Antonio Costa discussed ways to fortify Europe’s defenses on a short deadline. Merz pushed plans this week to loosen his nation’s rules on running up debt to allow for higher defense spending.
Others too appeared ready to do more.
“Spend, spend, spend on defense and deterrence. That’s the most important message,” Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen told reporters.
The call is a sharp departure from decades of decline in military spending in Europe, where defense often ranked low in many budgetary considerations after the Cold War.
In an address to his country Wednesday evening, French President Emmanuel Macron said the bloc would “take decisive steps.”
“Member states will be able to increase their military spending,” he said, noting that “massive joint funding will be provided to buy and produce some of the most innovative munitions, tanks, weapons and equipment in Europe.”
Macron conferred with his EU counterparts about the possibility of using France’s nuclear deterrent to protect the continent from Russian threats.
Helping EU countries find more money
The short-term benefits of the budget plan offered by von der Leyen were not obvious. Most of the increased defense spending would have to come from national budgets at a time when many countries are already overburdened with debt.
Part of the proposal includes measures to ensure struggling member states will not be punished for going too deep into the red if additional spending is earmarked for defense.
“Europe faces a clear and present danger, and therefore Europe has to be able to protect itself, to defend itself,” she said.
France is struggling to reduce an excessive annual budget deficit of 5 percent of GDP, after running up its total debt burden to 112 percent of GDP with spending on relief for businesses and consumers during the COVID-19 pandemic and the energy crisis that followed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Five other countries using the euro currency have debt levels over 100 percent of GDP: Belgium, Greece, Spain, Italy and Portugal.
Europe’s largest economy, Germany, has more room to borrow, with a debt level of 62 percent of GDP.
Pressing security needs in Ukraine
Part of any security plan would be to help Ukraine defend itself from Russian attacks such as the one that hit Zelensky’s hometown overnight.
A Russian missile killed four people staying at a hotel in Kryvyi Rih, in central Ukraine, shortly after volunteers from a humanitarian organization moved in. The volunteers included Ukrainian, American and British nationals, but it wasn’t clear whether those people were among the 31 who were wounded.
Early this week, Trump ordered a pause in US military supplies being sent to Ukraine as he sought to press Zelensky to engage in negotiations to end the war with Russia. The move brought fresh urgency to Thursday’s summit.
But the meeting in Brussels did not address Ukraine’s most pressing needs. It was not aimed at drumming up more arms and ammunition to fill any supply vacuum created by the US freeze. Nor will all nations agree to unblock the estimated 183 billion euros ($196 billion) in frozen Russian assets held in a Belgian clearing house, a pot of ready cash that could be seized.
Macron tells Trump France is ‘loyal and steadfast ally’ in NATO

BRUSSELS: French President Emmanuel Macron on Thursday said France was a “loyal and steadfast ally” in NATO after US leader Donald Trump questioned whether alliance members would come to the United States’ defense.
“We have always been there for each other,” Macron told reporters in Brussels after a meeting of EU leaders to discuss European defense. He said France had shown “respect and friendship” to the United States, and “we are entitled to ask for the same thing.”