Fox News host unmasked as Trump lawyer Cohen's client

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Michael Cohen, US President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, was forced on Monday to reveal that Fox News host Sean Hannity, one of Trump’s most ardent defenders, was one of his three clients.

Cohen, Trump’s fiercely loyal and pugnacious lawyer, disclosed Hannity’s name through one of his own lawyers at the order of the judge.

Stormy Daniels, an adult-film actress who claims to have had a sexual encounter with Trump, watched from the public gallery.

Daniels, in a separate civil case, is fighting a 2016 non-disclosure agreement arranged by Cohen in which she was paid 130,000 US dollars to stop her from discussing her claim she had sex with Trump a decade prior, something Trump has denied.

US President Donald Trump's personal lawyer Michael Cohen arrives at federal court in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York, US, April 16, 2018. /Reuters Photo

Hannity, 56, said on Monday that he had never paid for Cohen’s services or been represented by him, but had sought confidential legal advice from him. The conservative host often uses his weeknight broadcast on Fox News to defend the president against what he sees as biased attacks by the media. Sometimes Trump praises Hannity in return.

Cohen was in court to ask the judge to limit the ability of federal prosecutors to review documents seized from his offices and home last week as part of a criminal investigation, which stems in part from a probe into possible collusion between Trump’s presidential campaign and Russia.

The Russia investigation has frustrated the White House as it has spread to enfold some of Trump’s closest confidantes.

Judge Kimba Wood spent more than two-and-a-half hours listening to arguments by Cohen’s lawyers, prosecutors from the US attorney’s office in Manhattan and a lawyer representing Trump in the hearing. She is expected to rule later.

She ordered prosecutors to give Cohen’s lawyers a copy of the seized materials before the next hearing.

The unexpected naming of Hannity made him the latest outsized media personality to be drawn into the investigation’s cast of unlikely supporting characters.

Adult-film actress Stephanie Clifford, also known as Stormy Daniels, speaks as she departs federal court in the Manhattan borough of New York City, New York, US, April 16, 2018. /Reuters Photo

Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, was another. As she arrived at the courthouse dressed in a lavender suit, photographers knocked over barricades as they scrambled to get pictures.

Daniels sat with her lawyer, Michael Avenatti, who told reporters they were there to help ensure protection for the integrity of the seized documents, some of which they believe pertain to the Daniels agreement.

Cohen, dressed in a dark suit, at times looked tense, folding and clasping his hands in front of him.

Cohen has argued that some of the documents and data seized from him under a warrant are protected by attorney-client privilege or otherwise unconnected to the investigation. But Judge Wood said she would still need the names of those other clients, and rejected his efforts to mask the identity of Hannity, a client Cohen had said wanted to avoid publicity.

"I understand if he doesn’t want his name out there, but that’s not enough under the law,” Wood said, before ordering the name disclosed.

Stephen Ryan, a lawyer for Cohen, drew gasps and laughter from the public gallery when he named Hannity as the client.

Twitter screenshot

After his identity was revealed, Hannity said on his syndicated radio show that he and Cohen “have occasionally had brief discussions about legal questions about which I wanted his input and his perspective.”

He assumed those discussions were covered by attorney-client privilege, he said on the show, which Fox says reaches more than 13 million listeners. In a later post on Twitter, he said the advice “dealt almost exclusively about real estate.”

Legal advice can be considered privileged even if given by a lawyer for free.

Hannity told his viewers on April 9 that the raid on Cohen was an effort by federal investigators to wrongly impeach the president. He never mentioned his association with Cohen during the broadcast.

Cohen has asked the court to give his own lawyers the first look at the seized materials so they can identify documents that are protected by attorney-client privilege.

Sean Hannity (R) with White House advisor Kellyanne Conway at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Maryland, US, February 22, 2017. /VCG Photo

Failing that, they want the court to appoint an independent official known as a special master, a role typically filled by a lawyer, to go through the records and decide what prosecutors can see.

But prosecutors want the documents to be reviewed for attorney-client privilege by a “taint team” of lawyers within their own office, who would be walled off from the main prosecution team.

"I have faith in the Southern District US Attorney’s Office that their integrity is unimpeachable,” making a taint team “a viable option,” Judge Wood said.

But she also said that to help ensure fairness and the perception of fairness, “a special master might have some role here.”

After the hearing, Cohen left without comment.

Daniels, in contrast, stepped up to the bank of microphones set up on the sidewalk, telling reporters that Cohen had thought he was above the law.

“My attorney and I are committed that everyone finds out the truth and the facts of what happened, and I will not rest until that happens,” she said.

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Source(s): Reuters