A furious President Trump on Monday blasted the FBI’s seizure of his personal lawyer’s records, calling the move “a witch hunt’’ — and even “an attack on our country.’’
He claimed that the news was responsible for the drop in the stock market from a daily high of 24,373 to just below 23,932, even though news of the feds’ raid broke around 4 p.m., just as the market was closing. The Dow Jones Industrial Average still ended the day 46 points higher than Friday.
Michael Cohen, Donald Trump
“It’s a disgraceful situation,’’ the president raged after federal agents raided the office and hotel room of his lawyer, Michael Cohen, as part of a bank-fraud probe.
“It’s a total witch hunt,” Trump said. “It’s an attack on our country … what we all stand for.
“When I saw this when I heard about it, that is a whole new level of unfairness,’’ the president said.
In the raids, the FBI seized records related to several topics, including payments to Stormy Daniels, according to a person with knowledge of the warrants. The seized records included those involving the $130,000 that Cohen paid the porn star, who says she had an affair with Trump in 2006 and that the dough was hush money.
“The stock market dropped a lot today, as soon as they heard the noise, you know, this nonsense that was going on,’’ Trump said. “It was up, it was way up. It dropped quite a bit at the end.”
The president also railed against his attorney general, Jeff Sessions, and the man who stepped in to oversee the investigation into his administration’s ties to Russia when the AG recused himself, Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
“The attorney general made a terrible mistake when he did this and when he recused himself, or he certainly should have let us know if he was going to recuse himself and we would have put a different attorney general in,’’ Trump said. “So he made what I consider to be a very terrible mistake for the country.”
Asked why he doesn’t fire Mueller, whom he has also repeatedly publicly criticized in the past, Trump replied, “I think it’s a disgrace what’s going on. We’ll see what happens.
“Many people have said you should fire him. Again, they found nothing and in finding nothing, that’s a big statement,’’ Trump said.
He added that he did “the right thing’’ by firing former FBI Director James Comey.
“If you look at all of the things he’s done and the lies, and you look at what’s going on at the FBI. Turned out I did the right thing,’’ Trump said.
Manhattan federal prosecutors obtained search warrants for Cohen’s business records, including his confidential client communications, after receiving a referral from Mueller, who’s investigating Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, sources said.
Cohen’s lawyer, Stephen Ryan, confirmed the search, which does not appear to be directly related to Mueller’s investigation but stems from information Mueller uncovered and gave to prosecutors in New York.
“Today the US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York executed a series of search warrants and seized the privileged communications between my client, Michael Cohen, and his clients,” Ryan said in a press release Monday afternoon.
“I have been advised by federal prosecutors that the New York action is, in part, a referral by the Office of Special Counsel, Robert Mueller.”
Ryan called the warrants “completely inappropriate and unnecessary,” saying they “resulted in the unnecessary seizure of protected attorney-client communications between a lawyer and his clients.”
Under Justice Department regulations, Mueller is required to consult with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein if he comes across legal matters that fall outside his mandate, suggesting the porn star payoff has nothing to do with Russian collusion.
Manhattan federal prosecutors are probing Cohen for bank fraud and campaign finance violations, the Washington Post reported.
A spokesman for the Manhattan US Attorney’s office declined to comment.
In addition to Cohen’s office, the FBI also raided his home and the Park Avenue hotel where he’s been staying, according to reports.
Agents seized Cohen’s electronic devices for business records, emails, and information tied to his payments to Daniels, sources said.
Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, claims she was paid the $130,000 in a deal with Cohen, 51, shortly before the election to keep the fling quiet.
The timing of the Oct. 28, 2016, the agreement has raised the specter it may have violated campaign finance laws.
Because the funds were paid so close to the election, they could be seen as a campaign expense “for the purpose of influencing the 2016 presidential general election,” according to a complaint filed with the DOJ by the watchdog group Common Cause.
Cohen has claimed that Trump knew nothing about the hush money, and the president last week told reporters aboard Air Force One that he had no knowledge of the payment to Daniels.
“You’ll have to ask Michael Cohen,” he said. “Michael is my attorney. You’ll have to ask Michael.”
Daniels has also claimed that she was threatened by a stranger in 2011 when she tried to sell her story of an affair with Trump.
In an interview with “60 Minutes,” Daniels said she was approached in a Las Vegas parking lot while she was with her daughter in 2011.
“’ That’s a beautiful little girl. It’d be a shame if something happened to her mom,’” the stranger said, Daniels, told the CBS show.
Daniels’ lawyer, Michael Avenatti, who is fighting the non-disclosure deal, vowed on Monday to find the man who threatened Daniels in 2011.
“We’re going to be releasing that tomorrow, along with a significant reward, asking that the public come forward, asking to identify this individual,” Avenatti told CNN on Monday.
Avenatti on Sunday night posted a photo of Daniels working with a sketch artist to identify the man.
“Stephanie Clifford @StormyDaniels with Lois Gibson, the foremost forensic artist in the world,” he posted on Twitter.
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