Michael Cohen Postpones Capitol Hill Testimony, Cites Family's Safety Issue; A Rare Message From President Trump; Judge Orders Manafort to Appear in Court Friday.
DON LEMON, CNN HOST: This is CNN TONIGHT. I'm Don Lemon. We have some big developments in the Russia investigation. So, we're going to spend this entire hour ahead digging deep into all things Russia. As President Trump's former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen postponing his testimony before Congress, which was set for next month citing, what he calls, threats against his family by the president and Rudy Giuliani. A source telling CNN Cohen's wife and father-in-law feel threatened by public comments from Trump and Giuliani. So, let's listen to some of them.</s>DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Did he make a deal to keep his wife who supposedly, maybe I'm wrong, but you can check it? Did he keep -- make a deal to keep his wife out of trouble? He should give information maybe on his father-in-law because that's the one that people want to look at. Because where does that money -- that's the money in the family.</s>JEANINE PIRRO, FOX NEWS HOST: What's in his father-in-law's name?</s>TRUMP: I don't know but you'll find out and you look into it because nobody knows what's going on over there.</s>JAKE TAPPER, CNN HOST: So, it was OK to go after the father-in-law? RUDY Giuliani,</s>PRESIDENT TRUMP'S ATTORNEY: Of course, it is if the father-in-law is a criminal. He comes from the Ukraine. The reason that's important is he may have ties to something called organized crime. When somebody testifies against your client you go out and you look at what's wrong with them.</s>LEMON: Wow. So, does all of that amount to a form of witness tampering? Our legal experts are going to debate that. And tonight, the chairman of the House oversight committee is vowing that Cohen will testify and weighing whether it will take a subpoena to force him to do just that. And then there's Paul Manafort. President Trump's former campaign chairman, his lawyers disputing the allegation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller that Manafort lied to federal prosecutors, the federal judge ordering him to appear in court on Friday. There's lots to discuss. So, let's get right to Michael Cohen, the Michael Cohen news. Shimon Prokupecz joins us. Shimon, hello to you.</s>SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CRIME AND JUSTICE REPORTER: Hi.</s>LEMON: So, Cohen announce that he's postponing his congressional testimony, ongoing threats against his family by the president and Giuliani, he says. This postponement took Capitol Hill by surprise, didn't it?</s>PROKUPECZ: Yes, it certainly did. Look, Don, everyone was looking forward really to this day. Certainly, there were members of Congress that were looking to this day. They wanted to finally hear from Michael Cohen. It was going to be a big day. And certainly no one expected it to go this way. And when you hear why Michael Cohen decided finally to say, you know what, maybe I shouldn't do this, the idea that perhaps he felt threatened certainly is concerning many. And what the president has done since Michael Cohen had announced that he was going to go ahead before members of Congress, go out in public and say what he wanted to say, you can see that the president and Rudy Giuliani started this campaign of attacking him. And really, they went where it really would hurt him because Michael Cohen, you know, when we have talked to him certainly and people close to him, he's always been very concerned about his family. And what you saw is the president specifically targeting his father-in-law, talking about his wife. In one tweet recently brought up his father raising the issue that perhaps Michael Cohen cooperated to save his father -- father-in-law and then saying lying to reduce his jail time. Watch father-in-law. Again, intimating there that perhaps Michael Cohen was doing this to save his father-in-law. The president today reacting to the news by Michael Cohen after Michael Cohen agreed not to testify. And here's what the president said.</s>TRUMP: I would say he's been threatened by the truth. He's only been threatened by the truth. And he doesn't want to tell the truth from me or other of his clients.</s>PROKUPECZ: And you know, Don, there are many people who feel that what the president the campaign that he undertook and certainly his attorney Rudy Giuliani in his latest comments from Sunday, they were successful here in what they tried to do here. But it could be that they may still be able to hear from Michael Cohen. You know, as you said, he will likely be subpoenaed and. We'll see what happens from there. But you know, members of Congress they don't have a whole lot of time. He's set to start jail, his prison sentence in March.</s>LEMON: He knows so much about the father-in-law but when ask what's his name, I don't know.</s>PROKUPECZ: Yes.</s>LEMON: What does that tell you? Tactic. That tells you the tactic. But listen, I got more to talk about. So, also legal news today about President Trump former campaign manager, Paul Manafort that I mentioned in the open here. Disputing Mueller's accusations that he lied. What's he saying?</s>PROKUPECZ: Yes. So, his lawyers are saying what you would expect him saying that. He just used confused when he was interviewed by the lawyers when the special counsel's office, by the FBI agents. He wasn't certain about things that they were asking, but you know, they're arguing that he was not lying. The special counsel's office when they filed their motion that they had about 180 pieces of evidence, documents that they submitted to detail and just, you know, how Paul Manafort was lying. His attorneys are saying, no, you know, he was confused. He didn't remember certain thing, but the idea that he was lying, that did not happen in this case.</s>LEMON: Yes. So, can you clear this up for me. Paul Manafort did not want to appear in court on Friday, but the judge is telling him what now?</s>PROKUPECZ: The judge is making him come in. We've seen Paul Manafort ask the judge previously and she's granted this motion to him. They've asked that he not appear in court because of the travel time. Essentially, you know, they argue that it's too complicated. He has to get up early in the morning -- early -- early in the morning to be transported to the D.C. courthouse. He doesn't like to do that. And if he doesn't have to appear, if it's not necessary for him to appear they rather he not go there. And quite honestly, just that he doesn't want to really wake up so early and come to court. Well, the judge today said, you know what, I've let you do this way too many times. This is way too important. You need to be here on Friday and so she's making him appear. Now the other thing that's interesting is that he's asked that he not appear in his prison uniform, this jail uniform. That we're waiting to hear if the judge is going to allow him to appear in his suit. She has previously allowed him to appear in a suit. We'll see what she decides about Friday.</s>LEMON: This is such a circus. All of it. Shimon, thank you. I don't know how you keep it all together in your head.</s>PROKUPECZ: I don't know why.</s>LEMON: Thank you, Shimon. Neither do I, none of us. Thank you, Shimon. I want to bring in now Matthew Rosenberg, also Max Boot, the author of "The Corrosion of Conservatism: Why I Left the Right." Good evening, gents. So, let me -- I'm going to start with you, Max. OK. So, he's concerned about what Giuliani and Trump is saying. He's concerned for his family about that. I mean, it sound -- but doesn't it sound like if you're concerned about this, isn't that a textbook mob tactic? What else would you be worried about besides someone retaliating in some possibly physical way? I don't know.</s>MAX BOOT, CNN GLOBAL AFFAIRS ANALYST: Don, I come back to section 1512 of the U.S. Criminal Code which says that whoever knowingly uses intimidation with intent to influence the like, or prevent the testimony of any person in an official proceeding shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both. That is the definition of witness tampering and that seems to be what Donald Trump is doing when he's threatening Michael Cohen's father-in- law, whose name, as you pointed out, he doesn't even know. It's Fima Shusterman, by the way. But he is threatening Michael Cohen's father- in-law and he's also threatening Michael Cohen saying he's a rat that he should be going to jail for much longer period of time. And by the way, on the flip side of it, he's also praising Roger Stone for not cooperating with the independent special counsel, special counsel. He's saying that Roger Stone has guts, which again is witness tampering and the president whose duty under the Constitution is to take care that the laws be faithfully executed should not be encouraging people not to cooperate with federal prosecutors. That is a violation of his basic duty under the Constitution as well as it seems on the face of it, I would say of these witness tampering statutes.</s>LEMON: But what is this, Matthew? I mean, is this, is this Russia? Like, why would Michael Cohen be afraid of -- in America, sunlight is the best disinfectant. Don't you think that what on earth would he be afraid of? Shouldn't Congress and the American people hear why he is afraid to testify in front of Congress? Wouldn't that be the best way to thwart any sort of retaliation from anyone is to get it out there so that every single person knows about it and then what are they going to do? What's the president going to do?</s>MATTHEW ROSENBERG, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: You're absolutely right. That's surely, that's the case I've made the sources were trying to get to go on the record. I mean, look, you know, let's step back for a minute here. Remember, we're dealing with a series of people who all seem to be caught in overlapping lies with one another who are busy. The president is calling his former lawyer a liar. I mean, this was his former lawyer for year so if this guy is a liar why would he a lawyer. There's so much going on here. I think for Cohen, you know, he said a lot of things the last few years. And what he's saying now doesn't really comport what he's said when Trump was first elected. He knows that he's going to sit down. Republicans like Jim Jordan and others are giving him incredibly hard time. I mean, the Republicans on the committee telegraph that. I think Jim Jordan said today, you know, if he comes, we're ready, you know. They were ready to kind of call him out on every kind of contradiction, contrary statement he's made. And I think if you're Cohen you've got to worry that you're also going to contradict yourself and get caught in potentially, you know, that stating some in the Congress fire that could bring more charges. You know, there are just a whole lot of issues.</s>LEMON: Well, the other thing, Max, maybe there's a there - there. I don't -- I don't -- I really -- I can't understand it because all right, let me ask this. Because CNN previously reported that prosecutors in New York threaten Michael Cohen with more accounts that could have implicated his wife, reported that his taxi business was closely linked to family members including his father-in-law. Given that he does -- given all of that do you think that he has a legitimate reason to be worried about Trump's threats instead of -- instead of retaliation maybe in the physical way that it will retaliate against the family and did into their business and then maybe find something that is actually not on the up and up.</s>BOOT: Well, I mean, if you're mired in that middle of the criminal justice system as Michael Cohen is, I mean, there are obvious reasons why you should be concerned about the president of the United States.</s>LEMON: OK. Hold right there.</s>BOOT: Yes.</s>LEMON: They already know that. They already know what Michael Cohen is involved with. They already know that his family is involved with, but they know that already. Maybe it's -- I don't know, maybe coming to light. Is that the fear? And then the other thing is using I'm concerned about my family's safety. Is that a cover?</s>BOOT: Well, it's hard for me to get inside Michael Cohen's mind and figure out what he's worried about, whether he is genuinely worried or as what suggested that this maybe just a cover for the fact that he doesn't want to testify. And I'm sure that Special Counsel Mueller is probably not thrilled about him testifying. But I was just going to say that regardless of Michael Cohen's state of mind, if you're somebody who isn't trapped in the link system, you need to be concerned when the president of the United States who is the chief law enforcement officer of the United States, the man that the attorney general answers to when he is making threats against you, he has the capacity to carry out those threats. Now whether that will actually happen or not is an open question. But remember, there's now an acting attorney general who is basically a political hack for Donald Trump. And so, you know, I don't know that he can necessarily file charges or take legal retaliation against Michael Cohen, but it's not crazy for Michael Cohen to be concerned about those consequences.</s>LEMON: Do you think that -- OK. Again, those are just hypotheticals because everyone is trying to wrap their heads and like why would he be --</s>BOOT: Right.</s>LEMON: -- concerned about that. All right. Listen. Republicans say that they were told that Cohen's attorney that he couldn't testify about anything currently under investigation. The question is, Matthew, how valuable was his testimony or is his testimony anyway?</s>ROSENBERG: I mean, that's the other question. I think it's a good one too. So, there's a lot of things that are under investigation. He's spent 70 hours with prosecutors in the special counsel's office, the Southern District of New York. Presumably a lot of questions are going to come about thing that he was not told not to discuss. But I think for the Democrats this was going to be the kind of the marquee for their -- many investigations that are probably unfolding over the next two years into the Trump presidency whether it relates to Russia, relates to the stuff Cohen is involved with paying hush money to the president's former mistresses. You know, I also want to make it clear that even if Cohen had things to be afraid of in terms of what he might say, the fact that the president of the United States and his lawyer are getting up and suggesting that there's something to be found here that there could be legal jeopardy for him, you know, is, I think anybody would be reasonably afraid in that situation.</s>LEMON: But do you think that this president is that dangerous and the people around him that someone would be worried about telling the truth or their truth about it? Do you think?</s>ROSENBERG: I think when somebody makes a lot of threats, whether you're a political opponent that he threatens to -- that he keeps saying needs to be investigated.</s>LEMON: I think that's huge then.</s>ROSENBERG: Or from a lawyer you should probably believe what they are saying.</s>LEMON: Yes.</s>ROSENBERG: That people, take people at their word.</s>LEMON: Yes. I was just going to say that is huge if that is indeed the case. Stick with me, everyone, much more to talk about when we come back.