Michael Avenatti upended the entire narrative around the Stormy Daniels case against President Donald Trump Tuesday evening when he provided documents suggesting that his client’s complaint is actually tied to charges of potential Russian collusion by the Trump campaign.
After he released the document, which claims that Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen received $500,000 from a company tied to a Russian oligarch after the election, Avenatti appeared on MSNBC’s “The Last Word” with host Lawrence O’Donnell to offer a challenge to the president and his attorney. The money, Avenatti said, was sent to the same shell company that Cohen set up to pay his client.
“Michael Cohen, if you’re watching this, authorize your attorneys to release the bank statements, the source documentation from this account to the American people, to the media, so that people can get to the bottom of this. And to the extent that we haven’t been accurate about something, then they can prove it up,” Avenatti said. “But Lawrence, that’s not going to happen.”
He continued: “This thing is ugly — and it’s gonna get worse for the president and for Michael Cohen. And it doesn’t matter how many times they send out Rudy Giuliani to call us names, call me an ‘ambulance chaser,’ do everything in his power to distract away from the facts.”
.@MichaelAvenatti tells @Lawrence: This thing’s ugly and it’s gonna get worse for the president and for Michael Cohen. #LastWord pic.twitter.com/Xh88IdgDv2
— The Last Word (@TheLastWord) May 9, 2018
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re shoring up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
Last week, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy