Donald Trump Jr In Prosecutors’ Crosshairs, Likely ‘Executive-2’ In Michael Cohen Charges, ‘Politico’ Reports
When prosecutors filed a document detailing their charges against former Donald Trump lawyer Michael Cohen in the Southern District of New York federal court, as reported by the Washington Post they identified a Trump Organization executive, named only as “Executive-2,” who signed off on payments to Cohen that included the $130,000 in “hush money” paid to adult film actress Stormy Daniels to keep her quiet about a sexual encounter with Trump.
With Cohen pleading guilty to a felony campaign finance violation in connection with that payment to Daniels — and with the payments to Cohen apparently disguised as bogus “legal expenses”in the Trump Organization’s bookkeeping, according to a Business Insider report — “Executive-2” is likely now a target of the SDNY prosecutors and will almost certainly be indicted, a former federal prosecutor says.
But who is “Executive-2?”
According to that former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti, writing on Wednesday for Politico, there are very few candidates who fit the description of Executive-2 — and the leading candidate in Trump’s oldest son, Donald Trump Jr.
The payments to Cohen, prosecutors say, came from the elder Trump’s own trust fund, which means a trustee would have been required to sign off on the payments. Trump Jr. is the sole trustee, according to a Trump Organization document. But Trump’s other adult son, Eric Trump, is listed as “Chairman of the Advisory Board of the Trust.” In other words, Eric Trump is the other candidate to be Executive-2.
The SDNY prosecutors also singled out an “Executive-1” in the document. It was Executive-1 who needed the authorization from Executive-2 to make the payments to Cohen from Trump’s trust and is believed to be the Trump Organization’s longtime chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg. Weisselberg has worked for the Trump family since the early 1970s when he was employed by Trump’s father, New York real estate tycoon Fred C. Trump. But Weisselberg was granted immunity from prosecution in August, as Bloomberg News reported, in exchange for providing information on Trump’s finances.
In October, Wall Street Journal reported that Trump in February of this year ordered his son Eric to work with Cohen to prevent Daniels from speaking publicly about her sexual encounter with Trump, but whether Eric Trump was involved in the 2016 efforts to silence Daniels remains unclear.
But that lack of clarity may soon change if Mariotti’s prediction is correct. “The ultimate target of the New York federal criminal investigation may be the Trump Organization official dubbed ‘Executive-2,’ he wrote in the Politico article.
The New York State Attorney General’s office may also soon investigate potentially illegal acts by Trump’s business, as the Inquisitr reported, which would likely include the payments to Cohen.
