Michael Cohen: Trump bluffing about another White House bid

Michael Cohen, former President Trump’s ex-lawyer, said he thinks Trump is bluffing about possibly launching another bid for the White House, calling the prospects of a 2024 run “disingenuous.”

“His insatiable need for attention is one reason he continues to flaunt this disingenuous 2024 run,” Cohen told Insider in an interview.

“The other is he’s making more money doing that than anything he has ever done before,” he added.

Cohen, who is serving a three-year prison sentence after pleading guilty to a number of felonies in 2018, said the former president will “continue to grift until the very last second” because he “cannot stomach … being a two-time loser.”

Ultimately, Cohen said Trump will take himself out of the running for a 2024 White House bid.

“He’ll say he’s not going to run again because of bipartisan hatred for him or because of the Democrats or because he doesn’t want to put his family through any more,” Cohen said.

Cohen said Trump is “trying to retain some semblance of power, importance, and relevance, none of which he has.”

Trump has been publicly toying with the idea of a 2024 run for months now, but interest in his plans for the future are rising, especially after a recent poll showed that he would be the clear favorite to win the Republican Party’s presidential primary if it were held today. 

Trump in July told Sean Hannity in an interview that he has made a decision on a 2024 run, without offering additional details. And earlier this month, the former president said it is an “easy question” whether he will mount another bid for the White House.

Either way, Trump “wants back” into the national spotlight and the presidency, according to reporting from veteran journalist Bob Woodward and The Washington Post’s Roberta Costa in their new book “Peril.”

“And you start to hear a certain refrain from people who really know him, that he wants back, that he feels he has the political capital with his core supporters,” Costa said during an appearance on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”

Costa said Trump believes he still has a strong grip on the GOP, adding that “people are going to war with him at the highest rank of the party.”

“And this time, even though there are others out there with ambition, like Vice President Pence, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis [R], it’s President Trump who really wants back, based on our own reporting,” he added.