Trump’s relationship with Giuliani gets rocky The president tells reporters that his new lawyer will ‘get his facts straight’ after revealing Trump repaid Michael Cohen for the Stormy Daniels deal.

President Donald Trump on Friday distanced himself from Rudy Giuliani’s explanation of a hush-money payment longtime Trump lawyer Michael Cohen made to porn star Stormy Daniels, saying Giuliani will “get his facts straight" and that “he just started a day ago.”

Giuliani, the former New York major who recently joined Trump’s outside legal team, set off a furor when he revealed on Fox News late Wednesday that Trump had repaid Cohen for the $130,000 hush deal — a move that appeared to contradict Trump’s prior denial of any such payment.


While Giuliani claimed that Trump was not aware of the repayment because Cohen had authority to act independently, the revelation still set off a fresh controversy and Giuliani’s extensive interviews could have introduced new legal headaches for the president.

“Rudy is a great guy, but he just started a day ago,” the president said while addressing reporters outside the White House. “But he really has his heart into it. He’s working hard. He’s learning the subject matter.”

Trump added: “He'll get his facts straight."

In a statement issued later on Friday "intended to clarify" his prior remarks, Giuliani said his comments about the timing of the payment "were not describing my understanding of the President’s knowledge, but instead, my understanding of these matters." The lawyer went on to argue the payment to Daniels "was made to resolve a personal and false allegation in order to protect the President’s family" and did not constitute a campaign finance violation.

The president and his aides have repeatedly denied allegations from Daniels that she had a sexual encounter with the president in 2006, and have said that Trump was not aware of the payment that Cohen — who is now under federal investigation — made to Daniels in the month before the 2016 election.

Trump in April had answered “No” when asked by a reporter on Air Force One, “Mr. President, did you know about the $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels?"

When asked why Cohen made the payment if there was no truth to Daniels’ allegations, Trump replied, “Well, you’ll have to ask Michael Cohen. Michael is my attorney. And you’ll have to ask Michael Cohen."

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Giuliani appeared to stun Fox News host Sean Hannity when he stated that Trump had repaid Cohen and said that he was disclosing the information with the president’s blessing in order to remove speculation that the payment could constitute a campaign finance violation because it was not disclosed.

But Giuliani complicated that argument when he made comments in a later interview that implied there was a political motivation behind the payment.

“Imagine if that came out on Oct. 15, 2016, in the middle of the, you know, last debate with Hillary Clinton,” Giuliani said. “Cohen didn’t even ask. Cohen made it go away. He did his job.”

Speaking later to reporters on the tarmac at Joint Base Andrews on Friday, the president appeared to allude to Giuliani's remarks earlier this week.

"When he made certain statements, he just started yesterday,” Trump said. The president added that Giuliani will be issuing a "statement," though he did not specify what it would address.

Trump also seemed to say that Giuliani had misspoken. “He wasn't totally familiar with everything,” Trump said.

After Giuliani’s media blitz, Trump on Thursday detailed the payment on social media, tweeting that Cohen, “received a monthly retainer, not from the campaign and having nothing to do with the campaign, from which he entered into, through reimbursement, a private contract between two parties, known as a non-disclosure agreement.” The White House later said Trump did not have knowledge of the hush agreement at the time.

Facing pushback from reporters on Friday about his conflicting statements, Trump denied shifting his stance on the Stormy payment and allegations while lashing out at the press for "bringing up that kind of crap."

“We’re not changing any stories," Trump said just outside Air Force One prior to departing to speak at the National Rifle Association's annual convention. "All I’m telling you is that this country is right now running so smooth and to be bringing up that kind of crap, and to be bringing up witch hunts all the time, that’s all you want to talk about."

Trump’s remarks came less than a month after Giuliani joined the president’s legal team in April to assist in handling the federal probe into Russian election interference and potential ties to the Trump campaign.

Giuliani told NBC News Thursday night that “you're not going to see daylight between the president and me." But the daylight was on display come Friday, as the president minimized the extent to which Giuliani was aware of Cohen’s dealings with Daniels.

During the pair of wide-ranging exchanges with reporters prior to his departure for Texas, Trump also slammed the "witch hunt" Russia probe while expressing a willingness to sit down with special counsel Robert Mueller — under the right conditions.

The president said he would "love to" to meet with Mueller, who is investigating the Russian influence campaign in 2016, if he felt he would be treated fairly.

He added he would potentially do so even over objections from his legal team. "If I thought it was fair, I would override my lawyers,” he said.

As Trump challenged Mueller's team en route to Dallas, a federal judge questioned the special counsel in court over his prosecution of the president's former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, who was indicted on financial charges relating to Mueller's Russia probe mandate.

U.S. District Court Judge T.S. Ellis argued Friday that Mueller's team seemed to be pursuing the case in order to "tighten the screws" on Manafort, in hopes he will testify against others, including the president.

"I don't see what relation this indictment has with what the special counsel is authorized to investigate," Ellis said during a hearing in Virginia. "You don't really care about Mr. Manafort's bank fraud. ... What you really care about is what information Mr. Manafort could give you that would reflect on Mr. Trump or lead to his prosecution or impeachment."