Novartis said it had spoken about the payments to lawyers for the special counsel, Robert Mueller, who is examining Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. Novartis said that it had cooperated fully, and considered its role in the matter closed.

AT & T said it was approached by investigators for Mueller late last year, shortly before its contract with Cohen expired. The company said it, too, had cooperated fully and also considered the matter closed.

The companies' arrangements with Cohen show how corporate executives reached outside usual channels to establish ties to a new administration that seemed to play with a new set of rules. Both companies have said they had been seeking insight and advice on how to approach the administration on matters related to their businesses.

Trump's arrival in office came at a particularly perilous time for both Novartis and AT & T.

Trump had threatened to eliminate President Barack Obama's health care program, which could disrupt the pharmaceutical industry, and had also frequently raised the issue of high drug prices during his campaign. And AT&T had announced an $US85.4 billion bid for Time Warner in 2016, and would need the approval of the Justice Department. The department sued to block the deal last year.

In court papers, Cohen's lawyers denied some of the claims in Avenatti's report. But they openly acknowledged that Cohen had received payments from AT & T and Novartis, and that federal authorities had seized records related to the transactions when they raided Cohen's office, apartment and hotel room last month.

Cohen reached out to Novartis executives in early 2017, presenting himself as knowledgeable about the president's thinking on health care and other areas of concern to the company, according to a person briefed on the talks. The person would speak only under the condition of anonymity because the contract was private.

Novartis said that after it determined that Cohen could not provide the services he offered, the company wanted to terminate his contract. But the drug giant learned it could do so only for cause, so it allowed the contract to expire.


Joe Jimenez, the chief executive at Novartis at the time the deal was signed with Cohen, left the company in January 2017. His replacement, Vasant Narasimhan, took over the next month, and the company has said he had no role in the arrangement. Narasimhan dined with Trump along with other European business leaders at this year's World Economic Forum, but Novartis said his presence at the dinner had nothing to do with the payments to Cohen.

Like Novartis, AT & T was also scrambling to adjust to the new White House at the start of Trump's term. Inside the company's Washington office, which had close ties to traditional Republican circles, staff members were concerned that they lacked connections to the Trump administration. In addition, one of its top executives in Washington had been a vocal opponent of Trump during the campaign.

Cohen provided advice on how AT & T should approach the administration about its $US85.4 billion merger and regulatory issues before the Federal Communications Commission, according to the person familiar with the agreement.

AT & T said Cohen was one of several consultants it retained at the start of Trump's term to help it better understand the president's thinking. "Companies often hire consultants for these purposes, especially at the beginning of a new presidential administration, and we have done so in previous administrations, as well," the company said in a note to employees.

Companies do commonly hire consultants with ties to politicians for strategic advice. In the Trump administration, several former campaign and transition officials set up consulting firms - some that do not fall under the lobbying disclosure laws - to advise clients on the president's possible thinking on mergers, regulations and legislation related to taxes and trade.

After the election, AT & T poured money into efforts related to the new administration. It donated $US2 million to the inauguration festivities and an additional $US80,000 for telecom equipment used during the event.

The company first engaged with Cohen around the time that Trump took office, looking for people who could provide some sense of the president's thinking, the company said in its letter to employees.

The circumstances around Cohen's dealings with Korea Aerospace are less clear.

The New York Times