Sean Hannity issued an immediate denial after U.S. President Donald Trump‘s longtime personal lawyer Michael Cohen revealed that the Fox News host was a client of his in court Monday.
Hannity, who is well known to advocate for Trump through thick and thin, immediately denied that he was a client of Cohen’s on Twitter, saying, “I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective.”
Cohen is in court attempting to limit which records and electronic devices federal investigators can examine. The items were seized when federal investigators raided his offices on April 9.
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Cohen initially announced that he represented Trump as well as Elliot Broidy, a Trump fundraiser who resigned from the Republican National Committee on Friday after it was revealed that he paid US$1.6 million to a Playboy Playmate with whom he had an extramarital affair.
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But Cohen’s attorneys initially would not reveal the name of a third client, saying that the person did not wish to have their name revealed.
“It almost goes without saying, unfortunately, that none of Mr. Cohen’s clients want to be associated with the government raid on his home and law office, or want to be affiliated in any way with the proceedings here and the attendant media coverage,” wrote Cohen’s lawyers, Todd Harrison and Stephen Ryan.
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U.S. District Judge Kimba Wood demanded the name.
“I understand he doesn’t want his name out there, but that’s not enough under the law,” she said.
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Stormy Daniels was in the courtroom as a spectator to the proceedings. The porn star has launched a separate civil legal fight over US$130,000 she received in a 2016 agreement arranged by Cohen to stop her from discussing a sexual encounter she says she had with Trump a decade earlier.
Hannity addressed the controversy twice during his television show Monday night, brushing off criticism from lawyer Alan Dershowitz who told him, “you should have disclosed your relationship with Cohen when you talked about him on the show.”
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Hannity replied that the relationship was minimal and that he had a right to privacy. “It had to do with real estate and nothing political,” Hannity told Dershowitz.
He gave a lengthier explanation at the end of his show, saying Cohen “never represented me in any legal matter.” He called Cohen a great attorney, but said none of their discussions ever included a third party and were centred on real estate.
*With files from The Associated Press
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