Et tu, Michael Cohen?
Loyalty has long been a core value for President Donald Trump. But he's learning the hard way that in politics, it doesn't always last.
Cohen, the president's former personal attorney, this week implicated the president in a stunning plea deal. Days later, word surfaced that David Pecker, a longtime Trump friend and media boss, also was cooperating with prosecutors.
Taking the Cohen news as a personal betrayal, Trump criticized his longtime fixer for "flipping," saying on "Fox and Friends" that such double-crossers "make up things" to get reduced prison time and become "a national hero."
The defection of Cohen, who had once grandly declared he would "take a bullet" for the president, was deeply troubling to Trump. And the lawyer is just one in a series of former Trump loyalists who have distanced themselves from the president, intent on saving themselves in a series of nasty legal and political battles. The growing list includes Pecker, former White House staffer Omarosa Manigault Newman and former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn.
Pecker, a Trump confidant and chief executive of the company that publishes the National Enquirer, was granted immunity by federal prosecutors in exchange for providing information in the criminal investigation into hush payments made by Cohen on Trump's behalf before the 2016 election, media outlets reported Thursday.
A senior White House official said the president was undoubtedly frustrated and surprised by the latest developments, particularly campaign finance-related charges against Cohen, as evidenced by Trump's tweets and public statements. But the official disputed the notion that the president was visibly upset over the news. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe internal discussions, said Trump carried out his normal complement of meetings Thursday and bantered as usual with staff and lawmakers who were at the White House.
The official said Trump and his aides have grown accustomed to being smacked with bad news when they look up at the television — and their reactions are more muted than when Trump first took office.
But Manigault Newman, a former contestant on "The Apprentice," outraged the president last week with the release of a tell-all book and series of secretly recorded audiotapes, as she accused Trump of being racist and suffering from a mental decline.
Trump is still stung by the decision of Flynn, his first national security adviser, to plead guilty to lying to the FBI last year about his contacts with a Russian official in exchange for cooperating with authorities in the probe led by special counsel Robert Mueller.
And he was irate when former strategist Steve Bannon was quoted in Michael Wolff's book, "Fire and Fury," as saying it was "treasonous" for Donald Trump Jr. and others to meet during the 2016 campaign with a Russian attorney who claimed to have incriminating information about Hillary Clinton.
Yet no other administration figure has caused Trump more agitation than Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who infuriated the president by recusing himself from the Mueller investigation. Trump re-ignited his feud with the former Alabama senator Thursday by complaining in the Fox interview that Sessions "never took control of the Justice Department."
"He took the job and then he said I'm going to recuse myself. I said, 'What kind of a man is this?' And by the way, he was on the campaign. You know the only reason I gave him the job because I felt loyalty, he was an original supporter," Trump said.
Sessions responded that he and his department "will not be improperly influenced by political considerations," adding to tension over his decision to recuse himself. People close to the president said they were not aware of any immediate plans to dismiss Sessions, at least before the midterm elections.
Throughout his time in office, Trump has demanded dramatic shows of fealty.
When then-FBI Director James Comey met with Trump early in the administration, he said the president asked him if he wanted to stay in his role and declared: "I need loyalty. I expect loyalty." Trump fired Comey months later.
During an early Cabinet meeting, Trump's team appeared to compete to praise the president the most. Then-Chief of Staff Reince Priebus stated, "We thank you for the opportunity and blessing to serve your agenda."
Before entering politics, Trump ran his business with a close circle of advisers, including his children, and during his campaign he leaned heavily on a handful of aides. He has long viewed loyalty as paramount.
Trump has openly mused about the need for another Roy Cohn, the larger-than-life New York attorney who guided the future president in New York's media and real estate landscape during the 1970s. But for someone who insisted on ironclad loyalty, those types of friendships have only gone so far in Washington.
Trump has groused privately that his top attorney in the Mueller probe, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, was in Scotland for a golf vacation when the Cohen and Manafort news broke.
Trump told "Fox and Friends" that for "30, 40 years I've been watching flippers. Everything's wonderful and then they get 10 years in jail and they — they flip on whoever the next highest one is, or as high as you can go."
The president said the decision by those under legal scrutiny to cooperate with prosecutors "almost ought to be illegal."
"They go from 10 years to they're a national hero," he said. "They have a statue erected in their honor. It's not a fair thing."
Associated Press writers Zeke Miller and Jill Colvin contributed to this report.
ASHEVILLE, N.C. (AP) — Historical document appraiser and collector Seth Kaller spreads a broad sheet of paper across a desk. It's in good enough condition that he can handle it, carefully, with clean, bare hands. There are just a few creases and tiny discolorations, even though it's just a few weeks shy of 237 years old and has spent who knows how long inside a filing cabinet in North Carolina.
At the top of the first page are familiar words but in regular type instead of the sweeping Gothic script we're used to seeing: “WE, the People ..."
And the people will get a chance to bid for this copy of the U.S. Constitution — the only of its type thought to be in private hands — at a sale by Brunk Auctions on Sept. 28 in Asheville, North Carolina.
The minimum bid for the auction is $1 million. There is no minimum price that must be reached.
This copy was printed after the Constitutional Convention approved the proposed framework of the nation's government in 1787 and it was ratified by the Congress of the ineffective first American government under the Articles of Confederation.
It's one of about 100 copies printed by the secretary of that Congress, Charles Thomson. Just eight are known to still exist and the other seven are publicly owned.
Thomson likely signed two copies for each of the original 13 states, essentially certifying them. They were sent to special ratifying conventions, where representatives, all white and male, wrangled for months before accepting the structure of the United States government that continues today.
“This is the point of connection between the government and the people. The Preamble — ‘we the people' — this is the moment the government is asking the people to empower them,” auctioneer Andrew Brunk said.
What happened to the document up for auction between Thomson's signature and 2022 isn't known.
Two years ago, a property was being cleared out in Edenton in eastern North Carolina that was once owned by Samuel Johnston. He was the governor of North Carolina from 1787 to 1789 and he oversaw the state convention during his last year in office that ratified the Constitution.
The copy was found inside a squat, two-drawer metal filing cabinet with a can of stain on top, in a long-neglected room piled high with old chairs and a dusty book case, before the old Johnston house was preserved. The document was a broad sheet that could be folded one time like a book.
“I get calls every week from people who think they have a Declaration of Independence or a Gettysburg Address and most of the time it is just a replica, but every so often something important gets found,” said Kaller, who appraises, buys and sells historic documents.
“This is a whole other level of importance,” he added.
Along with the Constitution on the broad sheet printed front and back is a letter from George Washington asking for ratification. He acknowledged there will have to be compromise and that rights the states enjoyed will have to be given up for the nation's long-term health.
“To secure all rights of independent sovereignty to each and yet provide for the interest and safety for all — individuals entering into society must give up a share of liberty to preserve the rest,” wrote the man who would become the first U.S. president.
Brunk isn't sure what the document might go for because there is so little to compare it to. The last time a copy of the Constitution like this sold was for $400 in 1891. In 2021, Sotheby's of New York sold one of only 13 remaining copies of the Constitution printed for the Continental Congress and delegates to the Constitutional Convention for $43.2 million, a record for a book or document.
But that document was mostly for internal use and debate by the Founding Fathers. The copy being sold later this month was one meant to be sent to people all around the country to review and decide if that’s how they wanted to be governed, connecting the writers of the Constitution to the people in the states who would provide its power and legitimacy.
The auction listing doesn't identify the seller, saying its part of a collection that is in private hands.
Other items up for auction in Asheville including a 1776 first draft of the Articles of Confederation and a 1788 Journal of the Convention of North Carolina at Hillsborough where representatives spent two weeks debating if ratifying the Constitution would put too much power with the nation instead of the states.
CORRECTS NAME TO BRUNK AUCTIONS - An 1787 copy of the U.S. Constitution that will be put up for auction on Sept. 28, 2024 is shown at Brunk Auctions in Asheville, N.C., on Thursday, Sept. 5. (AP Photo/Jeffrey Collins)
CORRECTS NAME TO BRUNK AUCTIONS -Auctioneer Andrew Brunk talks about a 1787 copy of the U.S. Constitution that will be put up for auction on Sept. 28, 2024 at Brunk Auctions in Asheville, N.C., on Thursday, Sept. 5. (AP Photo/Jeffrey Collins)
CORRECTS NAME TO BRUNK AUCTIONS - Auctioneer Andrew Brunk, left, and historian Seth Kaller, right show off a 1787 copy of the U.S. Constitution that will be put up for auction on Sept. 28, 2024 at Brunk Auctions in Asheville, N.C., on Thursday, Sept. 5. (AP Photo/Jeffrey Collins)
A 1787 copy of the U.S. Constitution that will be put up for auction on Sept. 28 at Bruck Auctions in Asheville, N.C., is seen in this photo. (Brunk Auctions via AP)
CORRECTS NAME TO BRUNK AUCTIONS - An 1787 copy of the U.S. Constitution that will be put up for auction on Sept. 28, 2024, is shown at Brunk Auctions in Asheville, North Carolina, on Thursday, Sept. 5. (AP Photo/Jeffrey Collins)
CORRECTS NAME TO BRUNK AUCTIONS - Historian Seth Kaller shows off a 1787 copy of the U.S. Constitution that will be put up for auction on Sept. 28, 2024 at Brunk Auctions in Asheville, N.C., on Thursday, Sept. 5. (AP Photo/Jeffrey Collins)
A 1787 copy of the U.S. Constitution that will be put up for auction on Sept. 28 at Bruck Auctions in Asheville, North Carolina, was found inside this filing cabinet in Edenton, N.C. (Brunk Auctions via AP)
CORRECTS NAME TO BRUNK AUCTIONS - Part of an 1787 copy of the U.S. Constitution that will be put up for auction on Sept. 28, 2024 is shown at Brunk Auctions in Asheville, North Carolina, on Thursday, Sept. 5. (AP Photo/Jeffrey Collins)
