A former accountant in the Trump Organization dropped a bombshell during her testimony at Donald Trump’s hush-money trial Monday. According to witness Deborah Tarasoff, Trump “personally signed” the checks to his former fixer and attorney Michael Cohen.
The prosecution asked Tarasoff about numerous business documents showing payments to Cohen, who coordinated the payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels that are the core of the hush-money case.
Pictures of voided checks were shown to the court, including one $70,000 check signed by the ex-Trump Organization chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg and Donald’s son Eric Trump.
According to The Guardian, Tasaroff told the court that prior to 2017, these kinds of payments came from the Donald J Trump Revocable Trust, but after that, they came personally from the then-newly elected president.
In one instance, Tasaroff confirmed that Cohen was paid $35,000 from Trump’s personal account for one month’s invoice, like the earlier trust-based payments. Afterwards, she was asked about a $35,000 check to Cohen from June 2017, and confirmed that the signature came from the former president. She did the same with a check from the following month.
Tasaroff also testified that after 2015, Trump or one of his adult sons had to sign off on every invoice over $10,000. When Tasaroff created the checks, Trump would either personally sign the check or write “void.”
“If he didn’t want to sign it, he didn’t sign it,” she said, according to CNN.
Earlier on Monday, the court heard testimony from Jeffrey McConney, the former corporate controller at the Trump Organization, confirming handwritten notes about payments to Cohen coming from discussions with Weisselberg. Those payments seemed to provide damning proof of tax fraud in the Trump Organization’s reimbursement of Trump’s ex-lawyer and fixer.
All Monday’s testimony goes to show, prosecutors hope, that Trump had direct involvement in repayments to Cohen, even after being elected president, and thus made payments to Daniels to cover up his affair with her prior to the 2017 election. Trump faces 34 felony charges for allegedly falsifying business records with the intent to further an underlying crime. He has pleaded not guilty, and the court has yet to hear testimony from Daniels or Cohen.
