Former White House staffer Omarosa Manigault Newman said Saturday that former Trump attorney Michael Cohen would cross a “big red line” for the president if he discusses President Trump’s children during congressional testimony next week.
Manigault Newman told MSNBC host Alex Witt that she would be interested in “how much [Cohen] shares about the role of Trump’s children in a lot of these deals, including senior adviser Ivanka Trump, Jared, her husband, and the children, Don and Eric Trump.”
{mosads}“There is no question that that big red line for Donald Trump is his children, particularly Ivanka, and once Michael Cohen starts sharing details that may actually implicate them, you will see him truly become unhinged,” she said of the president.
Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner both serve as senior advisers to the president at the White House, while the president’s adult sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, have overseen his personal business empire since he entered office.
Manigault Newman has emerged as one of Trump’s most vocal detractors since her departure from the White House in 2017. She wrote a tell-all book published last year titled “Unhinged: An Insider’s Account of the Trump White House,” which contains several damning anecdotes about the administration’s inner workings.
Cohen is slated to appear for several days of testimony before three congressional panels in the coming week. He is scheduled to testify behind closed doors before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Tuesday, appear publicly before the House Oversight and Reform Committee on Wednesday and then privately testify before the House Intelligence Committee on Thursday.
Democratic lawmakers have signaled that they are eager to hear Cohen’s testimony regarding an array of Trump’s private business dealings during his years working as the then-businessman’s personal lawyer and “fixer.”
“Interacting with Michael Cohen and Donald Trump is a very interesting dynamic, because Michael Cohen truly did work that most people would find a little interesting,” Manigault Newman said Saturday.
“Donald relied on him to carry out so many different tasks, and I think on Wednesday what you’ll see is a man who wants to share the inner workings of the Trump crime family.”
Cohen has been under intense public scrutiny since he pleaded guilty to a slew of charges in August, including campaign finance violations stemming from payments he says he made at Trump’s direction to silence women who alleged affairs with Trump.
The lawyer also separately pleaded guilty to lying to Congress about plans to build a Trump Tower in Moscow.
Cohen is expected to start a three-year prison sentence in May.
Trump has denied any wrongdoing and slammed his former lawyer as a liar and a “rat.”