Trump: Payments to silence women were a ‘simple private transaction,’ not illegal campaign contribut

[Wingnut]

y John Wagner December 10 at 9:50 AM
President Trump asserted Monday that payments to buy the silence of two women about alleged affairs were not illegal campaign contributions, as federal prosecutors contend, but instead a “simple private transaction.”

In morning tweets, Trump sought to counter assertions in a court filing Friday that he had directed his former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, to try to silence the women in a bid to influence the 2016 presidential election.

Cohen has pleaded guilty to the alleged crime, saying he acted at Trump’s direction.

In his tweets, Trump suggested that the payments were being scrutinized only because investigators have not been able to find evidence of collusion between his 2016 campaign and Russia.

He also blamed Democrats for the scrutiny — a day after some high-profile members of the party appeared on Sunday talk shows and suggested Trump faces serious legal jeopardy.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-payments-to-silence-women-were-a-simple-private-transaction-not-illegal-campaign-contributions/2018/12/10/e1b198c2-fc6b-11e8-862a-b6a6f3ce8199_story.html?tid=pm_pop