It’s all so dumb. I mean, it’s important and I’m writing about it but, Jesus Christ, watching Donald Trump, Don Jr, Michael Cohen, and Rudy Giuliani sling mud is like watching the Zoolander version of a criminal conspiracy.

Anyway… Breaking News! From CNN:

Michael Cohen, President Donald Trump’s former personal attorney, claims that then-candidate Trump knew in advance about the June 2016 meeting in Trump Tower in which Russians were expected to offer his campaign dirt on Hillary Clinton, sources with knowledge tell CNN. Cohen is willing to make that assertion to special counsel Robert Mueller, the sources said. Cohen’s claim would contradict repeated denials by Trump, Donald Trump Jr., their lawyers and other administration officials who have said that the President knew nothing about the Trump Tower meeting until he was approached about it by The New York Times in July 2017.

The Trump Tower meeting has become the leave-behind of entire, alleged, conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Russian operatives. We have to keep coming back to collusion because the Trump Tower meeting is still on the table. Donald Trump Jr. and Jared Kushner attended the meeting. President Trump has repeatedly claimed that he knew nothing about the meeting… until he drafted a statement for his son about what happened at the meeting.

It’s never been credible that Fredo Trump took that meeting on his own accord, but that is the story team Trump has been sticking to. Donnie even testified before the Senate that his father knew nothing about the meeting before it occurred.

But unnamed sources are now claiming that Cohen knew about the meeting and was at a meeting where Trump was told about it. More on those in a second.

Trump spokesman hype-man co-conspirator lawyer Rudolph Giuliani has gone on the offensive against Cohen:

“He’s been lying all week, he’s been lying for years,” said Rudy Giuliani, the President’s attorney, to Chris Cuomo on CNN’s “Cuomo Prime Time” on Thursday night.

He added, “I don’t see how he’s got any credibility.”

Giuliani also said Cohen is “the kind of witness that can really destroy your whole case” and called Cohen, who was a top Trump Organization attorney for a decade, a “pathological liar.”

Giuliani… actually has a point here. Michael Cohen is a pathetic button-man. He’s in a load of legal trouble, and has been publicly spurned and thrown under the bus by a man he seemed to honestly love before it all went bad. Everything Cohen has done seems to be a plea to get attention from Trump. In my uninformed psychoanalysis, somewhere in his mind he still thinks Trump will take him back.

Unless Cohen has this on tape, he’s not terribly credible here. He’s damaged. If the rest of Trumpworld closes ranks — if Trump and Don Jr. and Jared and Manafort ALL SAY Cohen is lying — it just doesn’t seem like Cohen has enough credibility as a human to have his say-so be the final word on the matter. This isn’t evidence, this is testimony, this is potentially hearsay. It’ll work in the press, I guess, but it won’t hold up in court.

Not that Trump is ever going to go to trial.

Which brings us back to the “sources.” Who do you think leaked this alleged Cohen testimony?

Cohen lawyer Lanny Davis has already said “it wasn’t us.” Davis has credibility if for no other reason than he likes to “take responsibility” and go on television when he violates the norms of criminal procedure. There’s also the fact that leaking this information doesn’t help Cohen. Remember, Cohen is trying to use this testimony to bargain for a better deal. He wants S.D.N.Y. to care that he might have information that relates to the Mueller probe. Having this out there in the press doesn’t help him. If what Cohen says is true, only Don Jr. has been caught, under oath, in perjury. A prosecutor would want to keep this information close until President Trump was under oath.

Conversely, it potentially makes a lot of sense for Trump’s team to leak this out. And we know Giuliani likes to play this kind of a game. It gives Trump the jump on slamming Cohen’s credibility. And… if it turns out to be actually true that Trump did know about the Trump Tower meeting before it happened, this is a soft way for Trump to start walking back his numerous, public lies about it, before a potential on-the-record deposition by the Mueller team. It still kind of screws over Don Jr., but if Don Jr. thinks he’s the favorite child he’s been living a lie his whole life.

I think team Trump leaked it. And I think they’re preparing to go to full war on Michel Cohen.

There’s not going to be anything left of Michael Cohen by the time MAGA is done with him. He’s going to have to go hide out at Hansel’s place.

Cohen claims Trump knew in advance of 2016 Trump Tower meeting [CNN]

Elie Mystal is the Executive Editor of Above the Law and the Legal Editor for More Perfect. He can be reached @ElieNYC on Twitter, or at elie@abovethelaw.com. He will resist.