Early Thursday morning, Michael Cohen ascended the steps at 40 Foley Square, the neoclassical federal-court building in Lower Manhattan, and pleaded guilty to lying about his involvement in a Moscow real-estate deal on behalf of his client, Donald Trump, during the 2016 presidential campaign. The charge was brought by special counsel Robert Mueller and his team of litigators, who Cohen has met with seven times, according to court documents, dating back to the summer. Cohen, in a dark suit, white shirt, and baby blue tie, spoke into a microphone in front of a packed courtroom to admit that he had made false statements about the Russian business venture in statements to the Senate and House Intelligence Committees. He said that the negotiations for the Moscow deal extended into June of 2016, far longer than he had initially admitted.

Cohen also admitted that he agreed to travel to Russia for a meeting regarding the project and had spoken to Trump and members of his family about it, despite telling congressional investigators that he had not done so. In a charging document, the special counsel’s office noted that Cohen “attempted to conceal or minimize” the deal and the conversations “in the hope of limiting the ongoing Russia investigation.” Cohen explained that he “made these mis-statements to be consistent with Individual 1’s political messaging and out of loyalty to Individual 1.” Individual 1 is not identified in the charging documents, but Cohen revealed his identity as President Trump.

Cohen’s early-hours plea caught much of the media off guard. There were only four cameras outside the courthouse during his arrival. Similarly, his guilty plea also came together only in the last two weeks, according to people familiar with the matter. It was during that time frame that Trump submitted his written answers to questions from Mueller’s team—including, according to a previous New York Times report, an explicit question about the president’s communication with Cohen about the Russian real-estate deal. Various outlets have reported that Cohen’s admission sent panic through Trumpworld, but Rudy Giuliani, the president’s attorney, insisted that the president’s answers were collinear with the statements. (Giuliani, of course, has a history of staving off uncomfortable narratives.)

Cohen’s admission on Thursday comes several months after he pleaded guilty to eight charges in the Southern District of New York, regarding tax evasion and lying to a bank, as well as campaign-finance violations resulting from payments made to women alleging affairs with Trump ahead of the presidential election. (Trump has denied the affairs. Cohen, at the time, said in court under oath that he made the payments at Trump’s direction.) He is due to be sentenced in less than two weeks. This previous guilty plea, notably, also came together quickly, in about the span of a week.

Cohen’s evolution has otherwise been less abrupt. His recent admission comes more than a year after he told me he would take a bullet for Trump and, in that same interview, said that he had no contact with anyone from the Kremlin about the Moscow real-estate deal. (He contradicted this statement on Thursday morning.) What ensued has been a delirious sequence of events, including the F.B.I.’s search of his homes and office, Trump’s bewildering interviews diluting their affiliation, Giuliani’s media blitzes, the hush-money payment disclosures, a disagreement over who would pay Cohen’s metastasizing legal bills, and eventual collaboration with the Mueller team. More than ever, Trump and Cohen appear engaged in a high-stakes game of he-said-he-said.

Thursday’s events were the latest round. In court, Cohen labored to explain that he made his false statements to Congress in order to stay in line with the political messaging set forth by Trump and his advisers. “As I had in the years before the election, I continued in 2017 to follow the day-to-day political messaging that both Individual 1 and his staff repeatedly broadcast,” Cohen told the judge. Trump subsequently fired back to reporters that Cohen was “weak” and accused him of lying to investigators to reduce his prison sentence. Giuliani told the Times that Cohen, as a result of the guilty plea, “has just told us he’s a liar. Given the fact that he’s a liar, I can’t tell you what he’s lying about.”