thank you, chair, chair cohen. >> president cohen: all right. seeing that there are no further accommodations, madam clerk, i'd like to make a motion to excuse supervisor fewer. that motion has been seconded by kpriefr peskin, and can we take that without -- supervisor peskin, and can we take that without supervisor peskin. and it is after 3:00. can we take the special orders at 3:00? >> clerk: this is items 62 and [agenda item read] [agenda item read] >> president cohen: all right. thank you. before we begin, i have a few things i want to read. so madam clerk, thank you for calling items 62 and 63. ladies and gentlemen, the purpose of this hearing is to hear testimony on the proposed levy of assessments of the property districts named. pursuant to the board of supervisors resolution of intention adopted may 22, 2018, as described in the management district -- as described in the mcment district plan, the proposed district would be approximately 535 identified parcels located on approximately 14 whole or partial blocks. details of the covered ar

mike cohen. your honor, as to count number eight, on or about october of 2016, the month before the election, in coordination with and at the direction of the same candidate, i arranged to make a payment to a second individual with information that would be harmful to the candidate and the campaign to keep the individual from disclosing the information. to accomplish this i used a company that was under my control to make a payment in the sum of $130,000. the moneys i advanced were later repaid to me by the candidate. i participated in this conduct which on my part took place in manhattan for the principal purpose of influencing the election. the reason he is saying, i did this in manhattan is because he is being charged by federal prosecutors. in the southern district of new york. that's essentially establishing their jurisdiction to charge him with these felonies. when he says he participated in this conduct for the principal purpose of influencing the election, that is identifying this felony

cohen's legal team as to whether mr. cohen stood by his testimony. they responded that he did stand by his testimony. we hope that today's developments and mr. cohen's plea agreement will not preclude him for an appearance before our committee as needed. thank you very much. >> doug, this does not feel a very good day to be michael cohen. >> no. these huge news. and it's not a good day for the trump administration when you put this combined with flynn delaying his sentencing, and then manafort -- i mean, these are the very senior level advisers to the president, and it calls into question the best and the brightest claim that this president made that he was going to be bringing in the best and the brightest to the administration. he also ran as a law and order president. [ overlapping speakers ] he's bringing in criminals and corrupt agency heads into these positions. >> "lock her up" has a new meaning. they're locking up the entire former leadership of the trump orbit from the campaign years. >> yeah. we're going to need a little more jail space at

cohen today? joining us now is lanny davis, michael cohen's personal attorney, former white house counsel to mr. clinton. i'm really happy that you're here today. thank you for joining us. >> i want to say it's a long time i've wanted to be on your show. i watch you all the time and i appreciate the invitation. >> thank you for saying that. i appreciate it. i know you have a lot of other things to be doing tonight. your client pled guilty to eight counts today. it was a standard plea agreement as far as we can tell. not a cooperation agreement. was that an option for you and your client? why wasn't there any cooperation deal? >> well, there are certain things i can answer directly. so let me try answer this indirectly. when i decided to represent mr. cohen, it was because he committed to me early on in many conversations that he wanted to tell the truth about donald trump. and we talked about what he knew about donald trump. this was one of the subjects. so whether i used the word cooperation or n

no. >> why did michael cohen say this? >> well, you have to ask michael cohen. michael is my attorney, and you have to ask michael cohen. >> do you know where he got the money to make that payment? >> i don't know. >> all right, so that was a lie. in fact, back in may, his tv lawyer, rudy giuliani, revealed that was untrue, saying he did reimburse cohen for the daniels payoff, and he revealed a recording he made that showed mr. trump was also involved in the karen mcdougal arrangement. the david you're going to hear is likely david picker of the national enquirer's parent company. allen is the chief financial officer. >> i need to open up a company for the transfer of all of that info regarding our friend david. so that i'm going to do that right away. i have come up -- i have spoken to allen about how to set the whole thing up with funding. yes. and it's all the stuff, all the stuff. because you never know where that company, what he's going to be. >> if he gets hit by a truck. >> correct, so i'm all over that. i spoke to allen about it. when it comes time for

commissioner cohen, supervisor cohen, chair cohen, president cohen. i have to also join the chorus of having an open process during the budget process. i think we had very good debates during the process and sometimes we had to give, sometimes we win some. i thought it was well-run. san francisco police budget, one of these things i lost some arguments there. again, it's all about give and take. and the nice thing about the issues i raised with the staffing saying how can we get police officers on the street faster and people didn't buy the argument at the time but the nice thing is we didn't just leave it. we agreed the controller's office should look at the 6-8 officers that could be civilianized which would quickly then have police officers on the street rather than sitting behind a desk. hopefully that study will come soon so we can actually continue having a discussion around that particular issue. i want to thank also ben rosenfield's office, harvey and severin of b.l.a. and jon givner deputy city attorney and kelly kirkpatrick, and congratulati

he -- cohen is a criminal. cohen has admitted to lying in the past. but he was also very close to donald trump and he is someone who has documented a lot of his life and i think one of the most important things we're going to learn in the next few weeks is what -- to what extent michael cohen's implicating story about the president can be corroborated. are there e-mails? are there tapes? are there financial records that show that michael cohen is telling the truth when he says that donald trump committed a crime. that is an enormously important question. we don't know the answer to that yes. >> david cay johnston, here's what michael cohen said in open court under oath "the payment to mcdougal was made at the direction of a candidate for federal office." adding it was made for the principle purpose of influence the election. the daniels payment was made at the coordination and direction for that same candidate for that same reason. tell us your thought this is morning. >> well, i think this points directly to a conspiracy, including one under new york

president, what about michael cohen? any comment on michael cohen? >> no comments at all about his old friend michael cohen. the list of trump associates found or pleading guilty grew. the danger for him has increased exponentially and the scandal is now right at the doorstep of the white house. joining me now from outside the courthouse is nbc news tom winter who first broke the story of cohen's talks of a plea deal. former watergate prosecutor nick ackerman, former fbi special agent clint watts and the "the new york times" megan twoey. tom, let's start with you. i have something you haven't had a chance to get your hands on yet. you said it to me, it's the information that details everything that he said, everything that michael cohen has told them he knows. it's a lot. >> yeah, it is a lot. we had a full allocution from michael cohen. the proceedings took place nearly an hour and a half. michael cohen appeared to be anxious to speak. once he got up, he told the judge he wrote down some notes. he said that he was going to tell the judge exactly wha

cohen." so mimi, there the federal prosecutors today in court telling the judge that there are audio recordings made by mr. cohen that prove mr. cohen's guilt of these crimes and prove his version of the way he committed these crimes, which is at the direction of donald trump. >> right, lawrence. that's common for the prosecutor to give a summary of evidence like that at the judge's request in a plea in the southern district of new york. and i think the point about the recordings, we heard one of those recordings a couple of weeks ago that cohen had made sort of surreptitiously of himself and mr. trump speaking. and you know, standing alone without cohen's testimony or input, it was -- would be a little hard to decipher, but there was a lot there. i think when we heard that recording we said -- i think i was with you that night and we were talking about how much that recording told us about the fact these payments were for the purpose of influencing the election. because you could hear them t

i've been told john doe is michael cohen. >> you've confirmed that joe doe is michael cohen. >> that's right. and robert could you zamy who has been leading this prosecution because the u.s. attorney, jeff berman, was recused from this case originally, he's going to make comments outside of court. so at this point we have a plea agreement involving michael cohen but the exact terms of this and what he's pleaing to, we don't have that. >> all the recording of discussions of a plea deal here and now the scheduling of this hearing, they're not saying in their plea deal but you have confirmed this would be for the purposes -- >> this is for the purpose of a plea agreement, that's correct. at that time or shortly the plea agreement will become unsealed in federal court here in manhattan and at that point we'll be able to look and see what this is all about. but we have it and we know that we're going to have a court proceeding at 4:00 today. >> tom dupree, you've been through working on that side of the law many plea deals. take us through what would be going right now between now and 4:00

and paul manafort, are cohen, mr. trump's personal lawyer, directly implicated the president of the united states as a co-conspirator of a federal crime. cohen testified under oath that the president told him to make the hush money payments to two women who accused the president of affairs for, quote, principle purpose of influencing the election. >> the words that michael cohen used under oath are that he broke the law, quote, in coordination with and at the direction of a candidate for federal office. if that sounds legalistic and innocuous, it is anything but. the president told him to break the law, michael cohen said. and this has huge implications and the white house knows it. in just a few minutes, a "star" reporter will tell people that those close to the president are worried that impeachment is a possibility. and this means that the president was just lying when he said this on air force one. >> reporter: mr. president, did you know about the $130,000 payment to stormy daniels? >> no. >> reporter: then why -

cohen. >> now, the pushback will be, well, cohen is an admitted liar and he's going to say whatever he has to to get the best deal that he can. do you believe that he could prove that he was directed by then-candidate trump? >> so thank you for asking me that question, and i once asked everybody for donald trump watching your show to listen to a tape that rudy giuliani mischaracterized. so now i'm going to say to everybody for donald trump, the word "directed" came from donald trump's lawyers, who wrote the special counsel and said that donald trump directed michael cohen to make that payment. and rudy giuliani, who threw his client under the bus and said, it doesn't matter that on air force one, that donald trump denied knowing about the payment. he in fact reimbursed mr. cohen. throwing his client under the bus and i think waiving attorney-client privilege. so there is no factual dispute. mr. trump's lawyers said he directed michael cohen to make that payment. he is as much guilty of a felony. he just hasn't owned up to it. but what he did do is try to hide by asking his lawyer to do

cohen himself made the contradiction that, is a crime by cohen. that wouldn't make trump an unindicted co-conspirator. can you have a crime committed by cohen but even if he's directed to do it by trump, if trump had the authority to do it and it depends on where the money came from, it depends on a variety of issues. >> but i'm asking if you it came from the trump organization. you seem to be avoiding what was said. >> can i answer your question in one word? >> what we know there are contributions that are made by corporations and we know that the supreme court has had a terrible time figuring all of this out. and you don't use complex, subtle, confusing criminal law as the basis either for charging or impeaching a president. that's why people are mostly fined violating the laws. >> you know, it's helpful to donald trump to think this is all that complicated. it's no the that complicated. did michael cohen commit a crime? you bet he did. let's think about why campaign finance laws exist at all. right? the reason they exist is so that we know who

while slamming cohen. the president tweeted today, i feel very badly for paul manafort and his wonderful family, justice in quotes took a 12-year-old tax case among other things, applied tremendous pressure on him, unlike michael cohen he refused to break. make up stories in order to get a deal. such respect for a brave man. a felon a felon who cheated the american taxpayers out of tense of millions of dollars. chief white house correspondent john roberts at the white house. >> we're hearing from the white house and the president as you pointed out earlier, relax to the cohen plea deal. the president's outside attorneys tried to portray michael cohen as a liar. but on many occasions in the past he has been very emphatic and saying that the president had nothing to do with the payments. and now he's suddenly changing his story with his back against the wall to say well, no, i was directed by the president to do this and i was directed by the tonight do it on two occasions. as you might well imagine, that wa

the government's evidence is only applying to cohen but that's not to say it's limited to cohen. cohen in court yesterday was very engaged. i've rarely seen a defendant who so wanted to speak his piece. he certainly went above and beyond and whether one expects to hear from a defendant during a guilty plea. >> in terms of the way in which he implicated the president, he described the campaign finance felonies he committed having been done not just in coordination with but at the direction of the federal candidate which in this case was unavoidably president trump. if that federal candidate was somebody other than a president, which of course raises constitutional issues whether or not you can indict a president, would you expect a person described that way in court to be on the hook in some way, the subject of an investigation or to be expecting indictment himself or herself? >> i think that's fair we would expect them to be under investigation. we have to be careful when we talk about implicating people because evidence has to be developed separately for every defendant in a cas

michael cohen and others? and i think those are really the big issues right now. >> here's the one problem. i'll get to you, molly. the one problem if he issues a pardon, he could be subpoenaed -- we're talking about paul manafort -- testify before congress. he condition no longer plead the fifth if he has a pardon from the president of the united states? >> maybe, maybe not. some of them were tax fraud charges which may expose him to consequences -- criminal consequences in state court. and so his equivalent to the fifth amendment right is available in that context. and it's very rare for a judge to say, no, you can't invoke the fifth. you have to testify. i think as a practical matter he probably still could decline to testify. >> molly, how do you see this unfolding? >> with all due respect, there's a way to read it that is not just as a signal that trump is going to pardon cohen. if he did intend to pardon him -- >> sorry, to pardon manafort. he's had a lot time of when he could have done that and hasn't s

>> president cohen: for 14. [roll call vote taken] there are ten aye. >> president cohen: thank very much. divided question for item 14 is finally passed. mr. peskin, welcome back to the chamber. now call on supervisor sandy fewer. >> supervisor fewer: thank you very much. i request we divide the question for the san francisco municipal transit agency budget on the rest of the budget for roll call vote, please. >> president cohen: all right. thank you very much. supervisor fewer. madam clerk. please call the roll on the divided question. divided question for m.t.a. budget. [roll call vote taken] >> ten aye and one no with supervisor fewer in the dissent. >> president cohen: the budget is passed, and call the roll for items 14 and 15. [roll call vote taken brang. [roll call vote taken]. 11 ayes. >> president cohen: items 14 and 15 are finally passed as a whole. madam clerk, could you please call the next item. >> and just to be clear, items 14 through 20. >> president cohen: excuse me, 14 through 20, correct. >>

cohen today implicated him. >> cohen implicated him. and also there's a quite -- a decent possibility that there's going to be more investigations, more trials, more interviews because of all of this. so now every comment, a good lawyer is telling donald trump don't say a word. >> do you think he actually took legal advice there and that's why he didn't say anything about michael cohen, realizing michael avenatti's on speed dial with any court in the country that will take his case? >> i'm trying to watch this -- watch that through the eyes of paul manafort, who i've known since the early '80s. >> he's sad for him. >> he's sad for him. he left the door open there. >> i thought ajar. i didn't see a pardon. >> and he said it's sad, it has to end this way. the word "end" is not something paul manafort wants to hear in this context. >> he might get a commutation. i don't think he gets a full pardon. scl he's got that other trial he's facing in september. and as others have pointed out that's a z c. jury. another difference is it's not a nor

that's michael cohen. we have greg now, former fbi assistant director at the fbi office of congressional affairs. take me behind the scenes of when michael cohen is first taken into custody by the fbi, just in the last hour or two, what that even looks like. >> hi, brooke. i just left court myself and so i'm not up to speed on all of the details of the reporting. i understand that cohen does plan on entering a guilty plea although according to reporting i've seen, there's not a cooperation agreement per se. that's somewhat unique in and of itself. we'll see if that changes over time. needless to say, the process that cohen is about to undergo is a sobering one. he will be brought into the courthouse, processed. if this is a typical sort of initial appearance type of proceeding today, he'll appear before a magistrate judge. the government will put on the record that they've entered into a plea agreement with cohen. cohen will affirm that and it will go from there. >> and that walk into that federal courthou

you say that cohen committed a crime. >> yeah, so does cohen. >> actually cohen said he committed a crime and the judge said he committed a crime. but what you seem to be avoiding -- you don't believe the trump organization was billed by michael cohen and that the trump organization paid back michael cohen? >> there's a dispute about the facts. the president said today that he paid the money out of his own pocket. >> well, he just said he paid. >> if it was a corporate contribution, that's very different. >> okay, if it was a corporate contribution, you're saying that is a problem? >> of course. it's all a problem. i'm not here to defend trump. it's a problem. it's a problem because -- >> the president's saying it's not a problem. >> lying is a problem. >> it's a problem. i'm not here to defend the president. i'm here to say that it's a complicated issue and that if a candidate makes a contribution on his own to pay hush money, that sounds terrible, it's a political sin. i'm here to say, you have to distinguish between political sin and federal felonies, and a lot of the commentary so far

>> number. >> why did michael cohen make it? >> you have to ask michael cohen. michael is my -- an attorney. you'll have to ask michael cohen. >> do you know where he got the money? >> no. >> his lawyer said he did reimburse him for the daniels payoff and a few weeks ago michael cohen revealed the recording he made that shows mr. trump was also involved in the karen mcdougal arrangement, the david you'll hear in this tape is david pecker of ami. >> i need to open up a company for the transfer of all of that information regarding our friend david. so that i'm going to do that right away. i've spoken to allen about how to set the whole thing up with -- >> so what are we going to do? >> yes. and it's all the stuff, all the stuff. because you don't know what he's going to do. correct. so i'm all over that. and i spoke to allen about it. when it comes time for the financing which will be -- >> what financing? >> well, i have to pay you. >> pay the cash? >> no. no. no. >> how are you? >> when the recording first hit, many observers rashsaid it soun like a couple of cr

cohen as mr. cohen said, under oath today in federal district court. there is no doubt that donald trump committed a crime, and more than that, a cover-up of the crime, because he did not want to write the check to stormy daniels, which mr. giuliani admitted he directed mr. cohen to do, why didn't donald trump write the check himself? he covered up what he knew was wrongdoing? >> this is all going to come down to proof, where are the receipts, right? where are the receipts? that michael cohen has? >> and speaking to chris earlier, chris said he has no reason to lie, it doesn't behoove him to lie, because then he's in more trouble than he's already in. does he have the proof? does he have the receipts? so first of all, yes, the wire transfer from the trump corporation to the account that michael cohen set up that then went to stormy daniels is recognizable and provable. let me repeat, the proof is president trump's own lawyers wrote the special council and used the word directed. there doesn't need to be proof when the lawyers have acknowledged that the

michael cohen is turning himself in. if he has done so, safe assumption he is planning to enter a plea or additionally a plea and a cooperation agreement with prosecutors. very telling will be what crimes he admits to, if he pleads guilty. in the course of entering the plea, the judge will state on the record that he committed those crimes and entering into this plea of his own free will and that nobody forced him or threatened him to enter into this plea. that is a standard practice in taking any plea. it's a requirement and in going towards what michael cohen may have been thinking about, you look at what the potential charges are if he is going to plea and cooperate, a very high likelihood he is going to. given the millions of dollars put him in the stratosphere. >> what a plea deal means as distinct from cooperation. what we don't have confirmation on is whether he is cooperating. some have told me you have to draw a distinction from a plea deal which saves the government the trial but cooperation agreement can, ulti

. >> supervisor cohen: okay. colleagues, do you have any other questions, anything else that you want to share? >> can i finish my -- thank you. i just -- sorry, i lost my place. although i have to have an additional job on top of running my business just to live and to be able to raise my two small children in such an expensive city like san francisco i'm optimistic as my future looks bright, especially with the mentorship of few south parking. and i'm getting my certification outside of the airport contract. i have worked with new south parking since 2012 and since then and through the mentorship i have grown to manage the $12 million of revenue at the airport. >> supervisor cohen: how much? >> it's $12 million. but there's other things they helped me to navigate, like learning how to become an employee and enabling good jobs for my staff. or sharing the passion that i have for my community, like the work that i do in the bayview in have the arthur coleman medical center which thank you, supervisor cohen, for y

cohen. sarah sanders remaining mum about that, repeating talking points and also not talking very much about whether president trump might pardon paul manafort. the white house in all-out damage control mode after two of president trump's former aides become felons. press secretary sarah sanders repeating the same message. >> as the president said, we have stated many times, he did nothing wrong. he did nothing wrong. the president in this matter has done nothing wrong. >> reporter: trump's former fixer michael cohen pled guilty to campaign finance violations and tax fraud charges adding he broke the law in coordination and at the direction of trump. >> they didn't come out of the campaign and that's fake. but they weren't -- that's not a -- not even a campaign violation. >> reporter: president rushing to defend the former campaign manager paul manafort who was found guilty of eight counts of financial crimes tweeting i feel very badly for paul manafort and his wonderful family. a possibilit

cohen might know because in plain english, mr. cohen handled just about everything. whatever the president's effort to diminish him tonight that we showed earlier. and a lot of it is unpleasant business. >> you know i'm so glad you asked me that, brian. it is something that perplexed me for months. and i'm just stunned talking to the sources that i talk to or close to the president who say, you know, we've never really asked him. it's kind of uncomfortable. i mean, every lawyer it's like lawyering defense 101. you go to your client and you say tell me everything. tell it to me now. let's figure it out. then we can deal with it. it seems like the people who would most likely be able to really give the president a good defense don't really know every detail. and it's odd. i'll also mention one more thing that is odd to me, brian you raised it at the beginning of the program. did the president know? didn't the president know? the tape you played where michael cohen is talking to the president about purchasing the rights to playboy center fold karen mcdougal's story. the

cohen. mr. davis, i hope you've been able to take a walk around the building there throughout the day. >> lots of coffee has helped me. >> let me start with this. i keep hearing the words deal, deal, deal, plea deal. michael cohen still is facing jail time. michael cohen does not have immunity from anything. michael cohen has other things. what deal did you cut? explain what the deal is when i heard the words deal. what makes it a deal? >> i have no idea. he pled guilty in a corroborative statement. the word that the prosecutors and michael cohen agreed he would say to the judge under oath, at the direction and coordination of the candidate. >> and what did he get in return, a promise of a lesser sentence? >> no. >> what did he get in return? >> nothing. he has said i will tell the truth to whoever asks me to appear. but he hasn't done that in return for anything. that's why he called me. >> let me ask you this. is this a deal in order to make a deal? >> no. >> is he hoping to get something in t

he laid into michael cohen in that interview with fox news and even tried to minimize michael cohen's role in his life. he at one point called cohen a part time employee but on the issue of paul manafort, the other legal issue on the outskirts of this situation, the president remained coy about a key question -- would he be willing to pardon manafort? listen. >> are you considering pardoning paul manafort? >> i have great respect for what he's done in terms of what he's gone through. you know he worked for ronald reagan for years. he worked for bob dole, i guess his firm worked for john mccain. he worked for many, many people. many, many years. and i would say what he did, some of the charges they threw against him, every consultant, every lobbyist in washington probably does. >> well, so much for draining the swamp. it seems very much that president trump is not at all concerned about those charges paul manafort was found guilty of. in fact he later told the fox news interviewer that one of the reasons he had respect for manafort was that he didn't flip like michael cohen did. this i

cohen's business of taxis and campaign finance and cohen is going to appear before a judge like he has been doing for the past four and a half months since the investigation started when they raided his home, hotel room and office back in april. and this time he's going to admit to guilty -- admit guilty pleas to all of the charges. they will be read one by one and unclear if the judge will make him give in detail what he is guilty to or answer yes and all things we are waiting to find out. also waiting the find out is, you know, earlier reporting saying he's not cooperating as part of this plea deal. certainly, that will be revealed in court. if that's true, if it's not true. and so, there's just a lot of details that are going to unfold and a lot of drama. i can tell you building up outside of the courthouse waiting for any word of what's going on inside as this unfolds, jake. >> all right. brynn, thank you so much. let's talk about wit the panel. i mean, it is just stunning on its face. m

supervisor cohen. >> president m. cohen: all right aye. >> clerk: cohen aye. there are nine aye's. >> president m. cohen: the resolution to establish the discover community polk district and levy assessment is unanimously passed. congratulations. madam clerk? may we return to public comment? >> clerk: at this time madam president we will call the first speaker. >> president m. cohen: thank you. >> i want to start off with the fact that we already know there's a lot of disparities and discrimination that takes place. i want to start off saying today i have no problem in dealing with all nationalities as i take care of my business, not only on the inside of this building but the outside of this building too. sfgovtv, please? i want to demonstrate and give accommodations and demonstrate that all the age that work with you supervisors, this aid by the name of chelsey boulliard is a special tribute to me. i like the way she has taken care of business. because she is 6-7 months pregnant i have to persuade her to sit down when she is helping me pertaining to my issue

thank you. >> supervisor cohen: thank you. any other speakers? >> good morning, peter strauss on the board of the san francisco transit riders and the member of the transportation justice coalition and we want to thank supervisor peskin for all of the work in the past few years that led up to this. and i want to thank supervisor fewer and your colleagues on the full board for joining as co-sponsors of this measure which we strongly support. as you know the voters passed it by two-thirds in 2016. and also many people were part of the task force late last year and early this year which supported an investment program in transportation but failed to develop a revenue source to support it. so we look to this as addressing the revenue issues as best we can. and we also recognize that we have a lot of work ahead of us and we look forward to working with you on developing the allocation strategy that needs to accompany this measure as we go forward. but today i want to thank you for your support and i urge the committee to pass this

president, what about michael cohen? any comment on michael cohen? >> it doesn't involve me the president says. he cannot say that anymore about michael cohen. was released to do on a $500,000 bond. identified in those court documents as individual one. that is the current president of the united states right there in cohen's criminal information. according to cohen, he illegally conducted payment to two women. stormy daniels and karen mcdougal. at the direction of president donald j. trump. >> tom winter was in the courtroom. what did you see tonight? >> the first couple of hearings because arguments over several months about who should look at the evidence that was seized from michael cohen and how should that process go through and a tremendous amount of media attention, stormy daniels was in line. it felt more like a new york city nightclub than a hearing. today it was different. as soon as michael cohen entered the courtroom, the entire courtroom quieted down. no gasps or any sort of outburst from the crowd at all. the thing that was interesting

cohen: k

president cohen. i think i deserve to be demoted and take the last seat down there. so, this particular legislation i've had probably some, lost some sleep over it, because i don't -- i saw merits for either a support or don't support for this piece of legislation, and i probably was walking in here, and again, there's -- we have heard some arguments already and some of the justifications and yes, part of why i was having some issues is 75% of the people in san francisco voted for, to legalize the marijuana. and we've gone through much discussion on the board in terms of, you know, how do we roll out the program to allow for businesses to start up and we talk about equity and so forth. so, all those things weigh heavily with me, and i probably walk into the chamber favoring not supporting this, although i was still pretty much on the fence on this, and i think supervisors peskin remarks struck home somewhat, growing up in the same community that he represents, and knowing the dynamics and what has hap

>> good morning, chair cohen and supervisors. thank you for allowing me to speak to you this morning. we are well aware of the section 23 of the code that would require under section 23.3 an appraisal and possibly a review appraisal, however, in my opinion we should be relying upon section 233 2330 which alls the director of real estate to forego an appraisal if an authorized lease below market -- if it is for a proper public purpose. in this particular case the lease is for 100% affordable housing. so by definition we know that it's below market. an appraisal in this circumstance would only give us information on how much subsidy we're giving to this tenant in order to provide affordable housing. we know by definition that this is a below market lease. so getting an appraisal would not tell us anything more than we already know. i urge the board to allow me to exercise the authority granted me under section 2330 and that you approve the resolution without the need for further appraisal. >> chair cohen: thank you. b.l.a., what re

>> no, no. >> why did michael cohen -- >> you have to ask michael cohen. michael is my attorney and you'll have to ask michael cohen. >> do you know where he got the money to make that payment? >> i don't know, no. >> there you go. today we do know because michael cohen answered that question. you'll have to ask michael cohen, in court today. said it was at the behefts of the president. giuliani said in may on another network, yeah, he knew about these payments and he paid him back. how does the white house handle this? what does sarah sanders say at the podium when you and other journalists ask her? >> well, let's not even go to sarah. that would be tomorrow. let's talk about tonight. the white house from what i'm understanding from our republican sources are -- white house staffers are very upset and very concerned about what the president could say tonight in west virginia. so that's the first step. and then tomorrow you know, we always hear sarah sanders do prez-splaining. this president and michael cohen are polar opposites on the truth as it relates

not michael cohen. there's a sense if someone does anything out of the desire to sort of savage any dignity or anything for their family, that they betrayed him. the idea of loyalty and carnage sort of collided after i got off the air today and sort of looked at the wreckage in the lives of these people that went into business with the president committing crimes, perhaps at his behest. you see ongoing pile ups in the lives of everyone associated with this president. >> emily jane fox, you have spoken to michael cohen in the hours since his appearance in federal court. tell us about the conversation. >> this was an emotional day for michael cohen. mostly because of what his family witnessed and i think that was difficulty. i wasn't in the courtroom today listened to him go count by count and not only admit he was guilty to those, but really describing detail why he was guilty of those crimes. so watched him get emotional and describing that and then this evening when i spoke with him emotional talking a

>>: is a victory to -- >> cohen is a victory to. cohen decided to not fight this. they had everything once they rated his apartment and his office. they had everything. there was no way out. joe: kevin, the white house has been urging publicly, on twitter through rudy giuliani on cable news, for mueller to wrap it up. we have been hearing that for a while. the events of today, do they change that? does this mean we are still in the early innings of the most story -- the mueller story? >> as the reports have been coming out, the emergence of rhetoric coming from democrats, people like senator mark warner saying any efforts to pardon paul manafort or michael cohen would be the wrong decision and would be something that they would not suggest for president trump. i've not been able to find any comments coming from republicans. we are set to hear from president trump himself later this evening in just about two hours where the president will address supporters in west virginia on what was supposed to be dubbed as an energy, policy speech. whether or not he goes off scr

michael cohen decided to be for michael cohen. lanny davis is his lawyer. that's a purposeful decision. not to send a message but lanny davis is a well-known democratic fund-raiser and a democratic lawyer. since hired lanny davis, he's taken an independent approach as they begin these negotiations. there will be a proffer and lanny is going to proffer what michael cohen knows. the reason michael cohen wants to cooperate right away once they raided their office, the best of trump but he knows the worst of trump. >> that's the other thing. combine it with omarosa manigault-newman also taping the president and has tapes. what kind of people is president trump surrounding himself? >> all the people that president trump is willing to surround himself with, michael cohen never known as the stellar attorney that everyone had to have. it was president trump who hired him and a lot of people didn't know why and didn't understand the relationship and president trump also -- wasn't the coziest relationship you have ever seen and president trump quite cruel to him in s

cohen on

betrayed by michael cohen? is he concerned about what he might say to robert mueller? >> i don't think the president is concerned at all of he knows that he did nothing wrong and there was no collusion and we'll continue focusing on the things that americans care about and that we can have an impact on. >> so the white house says the president isn't concerned that what michael cohen might tell mueller but cohen might have a lot more to say. >> of course he has a lot more to say. we keep calling him the fixer. for the a decade he was doing the dirty work on donald trump. that includes the russia deal, it includes that he's made tapes. we've heard one of them and it has been very damming to it. he's been there with the trump foundation where it is just potentially ripe with iillegali. when you have your closest attorney flip out like this, i don't know how donald trump sleeps at night. then you have lanny davis, the lawyer famous for the clintons, orchestrating all of this. the president must be just horrified to