Michael Cohen called former President Trump’s complaints about potentially missing his son’s high school graduation due to his presence at the New York criminal hush money trial “comical.”
“I find it not just comical, right but I find it I find it insulting that that’s the big issue,” Cohen said on the MeidasTouch “Political Beatdown” podcast, noting that he had to miss major life events while he was serving time in prison.
Trump has taken aim at Judge Juan Merchan in recent days, suggesting that the New York judge might not allow him to attend his son Barron’s high school graduation in May. Merchan has delayed his decision on the matter but has not outright denied granting the former president the ability to attend the event.
Merchan did deny a request by Trump to be in Washington, D.C. next week for Supreme Court oral arguments involving a matter of president immunity that Trump is claiming in other federal criminal cases.
Trump is required to attend the entirety of his trial unless he gets special permission from the judge to skip under New York state law.
Cohen, who said he was “not aware” Trump attended any of his children’s graduations, said he will not feel sorry for him if he misses Barron’s graduation.
“I missed …. my 25th anniversary and my wife’s 50th birthday, because I was in Otisville in part because of things that I had done at the direction of and for the benefit of Donald Trump,” he said.
“So before I start shedding a tear for him, for Baron and I’m sure Melania is extremely excited he’s not going to be there,” Cohen said. “Rest assured … I’m not losing any sleep, nor am I going to shed a tear that Trump can’t go to Barron’s graduation.”
Cohen’s suggestion that Trump did not attend the graduations of his other children has been disputed online. Law 360 reporter Frank Runyen said on social media platform X that Trump attended Eric Trump’s high school graduation ceremony in 2002.
“How do I know? I was there. We were classmates at The Hill School,” Runyen added.
Cohen, Trump’s former fixer and personal lawyer, is expected to be a major witness in the trial that kicked off on Monday. Trump is charged with 34 counts of falsifying business records connected to reimbursements to Cohen for paying porn actress Stormy Daniels $130,000 ahead of the 2016 election.
The payment was to get her to stay quiet about an alleged affair Trump had with her in 2006 that the former president has denied.
The Hill has reached out to Trump’s campaign for comment.
Tyler Mitchell