Lawyers for Cohen asked a federal judge in NY on Friday not to sentence him to prison.
Minutes later, Trump praised his 2016 presidential campaign adviser Roger Stone as someone who would "never testify against him", claiming that showed the former aide had "guts".
Cohen has twice pleaded guilty in federal court in Manhattan to a litany of crimes, and he has volunteered information to the special counsel and other agencies investigating Trump and his inner circle.
"You mean he can do all of the awful, unrelated to Trump, things having to do with fraud, big loans, Taxis, etc., and not serve a long prison term?" he said.
NEW YORK-Of all of U.S. President Donald Trump's former associates who have come under scrutiny in the special counsel's Russian Federation investigation, his former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, has undertaken perhaps the most surprising and risky legal strategy.
More news: This radio station is banning 'Baby, It's Cold Outside.' Here's whyMueller promised that he would drop a detailed report on Flynn's cooperation with the special counsel a year after Flynn pleading guilty to lying about his contact with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak. Cohen, who once said he would "take a bullet" for Donald Trump, was for years Trump's do-it-all fixer who had a hand in several shady deals.
"Those who said the president's warm and complimentary tweet constitutes witness tampering should be reminded that I have never been contacted by any investigative body and therefore, by definition, this can not be true", Stone told the Daily Caller's Saagar Enjeti.
Russiagate is "really a witch hunt" and those witches "don't exist", President Vladimir Putin's spokesman said as he met with MGIMO University students in Moscow.
It is unusual for a U.S. president or any senior government official to comment on court proceedings. Trump has regularly opined on sensitive judicial proceedings from the special counsel case to federal appeals court rulings. Trump tweeted on Monday morning. Most notably, Trump's former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, aggressively fought the investigation and is now facing the possibility of a lengthy prison sentence after his cooperation agreement recently fell apart over allegations that he had lied to investigators. "So, he's lying about a project that everybody knew about", Trump said from the South Lawn of the White House. In his court statement, Cohen said that he lied "out of loyalty" to the president. Meanwhile, George Conway, White House Counselor Kellyanne Conway's husband, suggested this tweet is example of witness tampering.
The two laws Mr. Conway referred to regarded influencing jurors and witness tampering, respectively. "He's the head of the executive branch".
