Donald Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani is fuming over the release of audiotapes by Trump’s former attorney, Michael Cohen. The audio, obtained by CNN, is of a conversation between Trump and Cohen, where the two of them discuss the best way to silence former Playboy model Karen McDougal who claimed to have had an affair with the president.

Giuliani told ABC News on Saturday that he has registered his discontent with Cohen’s lawyers. “We have complained that he’s violated the attorney-client privilege, publicly and privately,” Giuliani said, adding that he believes Cohen is in “grave danger of being disbarred.”

But Lanny Davis, the longtime Washington attorney now representing Cohen, told HuffPost on Saturday that Giuliani “seems to be confused.” Giuliani “expressly waived attorney-client privilege last week and repeatedly and inaccurately—as proven by the tape—talked and talked about the recording, forfeiting all confidentiality,” Davis said.

Of particular potential concern to the Trump team are Giuliani’s earlier statements in praise of Cohen’s credibility. “I have no concerns that Michael Cohen is going to do anything but tell the truth, and if he does, as I said, there’s no suggestion that anything happened,” Giuliani said on ABC News on July 8. Just 18 days later, Giuliani said this on CNN: “This guy is a proven liar. A year ago, when I wasn’t his lawyer, people in your profession told me this guy will flip because he is an inherent, pathological liar.” Meanwhile, on Trump’s Twitter feed, Cohen has switched from a man “who I always liked and respected” to someone “who is trying to make up stories.”

The Trump team’s turnabout on Cohen’s character may have justified Davis’s decision to release the audiotape. At the time of its release, the general legal consensus was that, if the strategy was to indicate to prosecutors investigating Cohen that the attorney was willing to cooperate against Trump, Cohen would have been better served by making such overtures in private. But forcing the issue into the public sphere has sent Giuliani and Trump into a flip-flopping frenzy, suggesting that the risky bet may have paid some dividends.

Jay Goldberg, another former member of Trump’s legal staff, told CNN that he felt from the start Giuliani would not be the appropriate choice for this job, and that he even told Trump not to hire him. “I didn’t think Giuliani knew how to handle a case from the defense perspective,” Goldberg said. “He was a longtime prosecutor and he didn’t know how to set a case up for the possible impeachment of a witness such as Cohen.”

“I knew as soon as Giuliani spoke, that he was damaging Trump’s case immeasurably,” Goldberg said. “It ranks near 100, in terms of damage.”

Cohen, meanwhile, has performed a near perfect heel-turn since being released from Trump’s service, and sources close to Cohen claim he has teased a “treasure trove” of dirt on the president. “There’s a lot more to come,” one person familiar with Cohen told my colleague Emily Jane Fox. “There’s a lot. You’re with someone for 10 years, you don’t think there’s a lot? The Trump Organization is a big business, and nobody in that place made a decision without his knowledge.”

Davis told the Hive last week that he would have preferred to “not discuss any legal issues that might be a part of the investigation process,” but felt compelled to do something “because President Trump and Rudy Giuliani chose to lie and attack.”

“I am laying down a marker,” Davis said. Put another way, Cohen’s team put out some bait, and the White House couldn’t help itself.