Investigators in the U. S. Senate and House of Representatives said on Friday they plan to examine whether U. S. President Donald Trump directed his former lawyer to lie to Congress, prompted by a report by Buzzfeed News.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Investigators in the U. S. Senate and House of Representatives said on Friday they plan to examine whether U. S. President Donald Trump directed his former lawyer to lie to Congress, prompted by a report by Buzzfeed News.
Leading Democrats in the House of Representatives said they would seek to verify the story, saying that if true it would be evidence of criminal activity by the president.
Buzzfeed, citing two unnamed law enforcement sources, said Trump’s former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, who is going to prison for lying to Congress, told investigators working for Special Counsel Robert Mueller that Trump had directed him to lie about efforts to build a skyscraper in Moscow while he was running for president.
The White House said the story was false. “Look, that’s absolutely ridiculous,” spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told reporters.
The report said Mueller’s office learned of Trump’s instructions to Cohen through internal Trump Organization emails, witness interviews, text messages and other documents, and that Cohen told prosecutors about the directive in an interview.
Trump said on Twitter that Cohen was lying in order to get less prison time. Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, said in a statement that any suggestion that Trump told Cohen to lie is “categorically false.”
Mueller’s office declined to comment.
Cohen, who once said he was so loyal to Trump that he would “take a bullet” for him, is scheduled to begin a three-year prison sentence in March after pleading guilty to charges including campaign finance violations, tax evasion and lying to Congress.
If Trump did tell Cohen to lie, that would constitute criminal activity, said House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler, who said he would look into the matter.
