Michael Cohen’s Lawyer Lanny Davis Airs Trump's ‘Cash’ Tape

Michael Cohen’s lawyer Lanny Davis released a 2016 recording of President Donald Trump where he says “Pay with cash” in a conversation with Cohen as a possible payment method to buy the rights to the story of Playboy model Karen McDougal about her alleged yearlong affair with the president.

Davis argued that the recording, which was aired on CNN’s “Cuomo Prime Time” on Tuesday night, proved that Cohen, who is currently under federal investigation, tried to handle the payment legally while Trump wanted to pay in cash.

“The truth is that when Donald Trump said 'cash,' which Rudy Giuliani [Trumps attorney] knows that only drug dealers and mobsters talk about cash, it was, you heard Michael Cohen ... say what? 'No, no, no, no,'" he said on the show.

The recording of the conversation, which is muffled, comes after reports that talked about the existence of the tape emerged last week.

In the audio, Cohen can be heard discussing plans to open up a company. "I need to open up a company for the transfer of all of that info regarding our friend David," which could be a reference to American Media Inc. CEO and Chairman, David Pecker.

"What financing?” Trump says, interrupting Cohen. Cohen then explains they’ll have to pay, to which Trump can be heard saying, “Pay with cash.” Cohen replies "no," but the next bit of the audio is unclear.

"What is this about? This is about honesty versus false disparagement of Michael Cohen. Why is Giuliani out falsely disparaging Michael Cohen -- because they fear him," Davis said on the show. "What do they fear, Chris? Why am I representing him? They fear that he has the truth about Donald Trump. He will someday speak the truth about Donald Trump.”

He appealed to the viewers to listen to the tape and see for themselves if the president was telling the truth when he had said he didn’t use the word “cash” and accused Cohen of doing the same.

“Cohen has been disparaged. Cohen has been insulted and called all sorts of things by people around Donald Trump,” he said.

However, Trump’s attorney Rudy Giuliani said the President in the video is actually saying “don’t pay with cash,” the Associated Press reported. Earlier, he had acknowledged that the recorded discussion was connected to buying the story rights. Giuliani also said Trump was disappointed that his own lawyer recorded him, according to CBS News.

"Whoever is telling Davis that cash in that conversation refers to green currency is lying to him," Alan Futerfas, a lawyer for the Trump Organization told CNN. "There's no transaction done in green currency. It doesn't happen. The whole deal never happened. If it was going to happen, it would be a payment to a large company that would obviously be accompanied by an agreement of sale. Those documents would be prepared by lawyers on both sides."

He said the word cash in the conversation referred to how the deal would be financed.

"The word cash came up in the context of the distinction between financing, which is referenced, and no financing, which means a full payment, a total one-time payment. That's the context in which the word cash is used. Anyone who knows anything about the company or how the President does business knows there is no green cash. Everything is documented. Every penny is documented," he said.

Federal prosecutors had obtained 12 audio recordings during FBI raids on Cohen's home and office earlier this year. The tape released by Davis was one among them. In the recording, Trump and Cohen can be heard talking about other potential legal issues also. They talked about a New York Times request to unseal divorce records from Trump’s first wife Ivana.

Investigators are also looking into a payment of $130,000 made by Cohen to adult film actress Stormy Daniels, shortly before the presidential elections. Daniels also claimed this year that she had a one-night affair with Trump in 2006.

Earlier this year, The New Yorker reported that the "married man" that McDougal had an affair in 2016 was none other than Trump. On Nov. 4, 2016, four days before the U.S. presidential elections, American Media Inc, the publisher of National Enquirer run by Trump's friend David Pecker, made a payment of $150,000 to McDougal for exclusive rights of her story. However, the story was never published, which many alleged was a “catch and kill” technique.