President Donald Trump's most recent disclosure form showed the president reimbursed Michael Cohen in 2017 for his $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels, who claims to have had an affair with Trump. | Alex Wong/Getty Images Ethics chief knocks Trump over Stormy Daniels payment The president's reimbursement of the $130,000 paid to the adult film actress wasn’t included on last year’s financial form.

The government’s top ethics officer told the Justice Department on Wednesday that President Donald Trump should have disclosed last year that he reimbursed his longtime personal attorney for a “hush money” payment to adult film actress Stormy Daniels.

The letter from David Apol, the acting director of the Office of Government Ethics, came as that office also released Trump’s most recent financial disclosure form, a 92-page document that included the reimbursement to attorney Michael Cohen as a footnote.


While the document provides the firmest proof yet of Trump’s involvement in the slow-brewing scandal around the $130,000 “hush money” deal struck shortly before the election over an alleged affair between Trump and Daniels, it’s not clear what consequences Trump may face for failing to disclose the transaction.

"OGE has concluded that, based on the information provided as a note to part 8, the payment made by Mr. Cohen is required to be reported as a liability," Apol wrote to Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, adding, "you may find the disclosure relevant to any inquiry you may be pursuing regarding the President's prior report that was signed on June 14, 2017."

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It's unclear if DOJ is investigating the lack of disclosure. A spokesperson for the DOJ declined comment.

Despite OGE’s conclusion that Trump was required to disclose the payment, Trump’s team still presented the disclosure as voluntary.

"In the interest of transparency, while not required to be disclosed as 'reportable liabilities' on Part 8, in 2016 expenses were incurred by one of Donald J. Trump's attorneys, Michael Cohen," reads a footnote on page 45 of Trump's form for the 2017 calendar year. "Mr. Cohen sought reimbursement of those expenses and Mr. Trump fully reimbursed Mr. Cohen in 2017."

As recently as April, Trump had told reporters he was not aware of the payment to Daniels.

Still, outside watchdogs saw reason for optimism in the handling of Wednesday’s disclosure.

Walter Shaub, the former head of OGE who is now the senior director of ethics at the Campaign Legal Center, said he is “heartened” that Apol flagged Trump’s disclosure errors to the Justice Department.

“If DOJ investigates and determines that president Trump knew of his debt to Cohen when he filed last year’s report, there will be reason to suspect that his omission of the debt from last year’s report was ‘knowing and willful,’ which would be a crime,” Shaub, who resigned in July 2017, said in a written statement. “No one from the Trump camp asked OGE last year whether the debt was reportable and that, instead, President Trump’s attorney asked OGE to allow him to be the first filer in history to be excused from the obligation to certify that his report was true.”

Apol’s letter to the Justice Department is “highly unusual,” said Craig Holman, a lobbyist for the non-profit watchdog group Public Citizen.

“It’s unprecedented,” Holman said. “All the evidence strongly indicates that Trump lied on his previous financial disclosure form.”

Apol wrote the letter in connection to a complaint from Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a non-partisan watchdog group that asked the DOJ and OGE to probe whether the payment should have been reported on last year's form and whether the failure to do so was knowing and willful.

CREW on Wednesday asked the Justice Department for a criminal investigation into the omission, with Executive Director Noah Bookbinder saying that failure to properly disclose ethics information carries civil and criminal penalties, and willfully making a false statement to the government can be punishable by up to five years in prison.

“There is substantial evidence that President Trump had knowledge of the loan when he filed his public financial disclosures last year, despite his failure to report it,” Bookbinder said. “If the department is not already investigating the president’s failure to disclose the loan last year, it should open an investigation immediately.”

Trump's alleged involvement with Daniels came to light earlier this year, when the Wall Street Journal reported that Cohen had paid the adult film actress, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, $130,000 in October 2016 as part of a nondisclosure agreement related to a sexual affair she claims to have had with the president in 2006. Daniels, who initially signed a letter denying the affair, is suing the president and Cohen to be released from the nondisclosure agreement and has spoken openly about her relationship with Trump, including their sexual encounter.

The scandal has become a growing distraction for the White House.

Both Trump and Cohen have denied that the president had the affair and Cohen initially argued that he entered the nondisclosure agreement with Daniels without the president's knowledge and paid her with his own funds and was not reimbursed. That payment, just a month before the 2016 election, could have been viewed as an illegal campaign contribution if it was not reimbursed. Another of Trump's attorneys, Rudy Giuliani, said earlier this month that the president had indeed reimbursed Cohen for the $130,000 in the form of retainer payments.

The White House has been unclear in offering explanations for the discrepancy between Trump and Cohen's assertion that the president did not know about and did not reimburse the payment to Daniels, and Giuliani's disclosure earlier this month — confirmed Wednesday by Trump's financial form — that the president paid Cohen back last year.

If nothing else, the disclosure keeps Daniels’ name in the headlines and keeps the White House on defense about the president’s alleged infidelity.

The form also reveals that Trump continues to earn millions of dollars of payments off of his various companies. Trump received more than $40 million in income from his Washington, D.C. hotel alone, which has become the go-to lodging and dining spot for Republicans and conservatives visiting the city. It has also been a frequent dinner spot for Trump.

The Trump Organization, which is overseen by Trump’s sons Don Jr. and Eric, continues to be a source of controversy around potential conflicts of interest.

Even with the lucrative D.C. hotel, Trump’s first year in office wasn’t great for the family business, with the president reporting income from hotels, resorts, book sales and licensing deals down by about $150 million last year.

Several of Trump’s signature properties saw a downturn in business from 2016 to 2017. Trump’s Mar-a-Lago winter getaway in Palm Beach, Florida, saw a $12 million decline in income, despite frequent visits from the first family – which occasionally included surprise drop-ins at weddings being held at the club. At the Trump National Doral in Miami, income was down more than $40 million and the Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, N.J., where the first family spends time during the summer, took in nearly $5 million less than it did in 2016.

Management fees at the Trump Corporation fell by $2.4 million.

There were bright spots on the president’s balance sheet. The family’s international hotel licensing business, for example, was booming. At Trump International Hotels Management, income soared more than fivefold, from less than $3 million in 2016 to more than $17 million last year.

While Trump’s form ran to 92 pages, his vice president’s came to just ten. Mike Pence, who has been holding various government positions since 2001, has relatively modest assets: a retirement plan worth between $516,000 and $1,065,000 and a bank account with a balance between $1,001 and $15,000. Pence, a father of three, is also carrying significant student loan debt from putting his children through college: between $115,000 and $310,000, according to the disclosure.

Pence also accrued credit card debt between $15,001 and $50,000 in 2017, according to the form.

Eli Okun contributed to this report.

