A source close to Donald Trump has revealed that the former president filed a lawsuit on Wednesday against his ex-attorney, Michael Cohen, demanding more than $500 million in damages.
“This is an action arising from [Cohen’s] multiple breaches of fiduciary duty, unjust enrichment, conversion and breaches of contract by virtue of [Cohen’s] past service as [Trump’s] employee and attorney,” the lawsuit first obtained by Fox News reads.
The 30-page legal filing submitted to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida accuses Cohen of breaching attorney-client privilege and unjustly enriching himself at Trump’s expense.
The lawsuit points to Cohen’s “public statements, including the publication of two books, a podcast series, and innumerable mainstream media appearances,” which demonstrated “malicious intent” for entirely “self-serving ends.”
“Such continuous and escalating improper conduct by [Cohen] has reached a proverbial crescendo and has left [Trump] with no alternative but to seek legal redress through this action,” the lawsuit states, adding that Trump has “suffered vast reputational harm as a direct result of [Cohen’s] breaches.”
The news comes barely a week after the former president appeared in court in New York City last Tuesday to be arraigned on fraudulent business charges brought by Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg.
The 34 felony counts stem from hush-money payments Trump made to Stormy Daniels, an adult entertainment actress, in the lead up to the 2016 presidential election to conceal an alleged affair.
The indictment, released after Trump’s court appearance, alleges that Trump “hid damaging information from the voting public during the 2016 presidential election,” and that he “orchestrated a scheme with others” to influence the election “by identifying and purchasing negative information about him to suppress its publication.”
Cohen, then Trump’s personal attorney, made the controversial payment to Daniels and was later reimbursed by the former president. Cohen testified in early March before a Manhattan grand jury investigating the hush-money payment.
Consequently, the former president’s attorney has turned into a key state witness in Bragg’s case against Trump. In early 2023, Cohen and the Manhattan district attorney’s office reached a detente which saw him visit their office at least seven times to collaborate with state attorneys, the New York Times reported.
However, the source told Fox News Digital that the lawsuit “has nothing to do with the Manhattan DA’s lawless and fact-less case and is a totally separate matter.”
In August 2018, while Trump was in the White House, Cohen pleaded guilty to eight counts of violating campaign-finance laws before the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York.
Three months later, Cohen pled guilty to lying before Congress against the backdrop of Special Counsel Robert Mueller investigating alleged Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.
Cohen later explained that his “blind loyalty” to Trump “led [him] to take a path of darkness instead of light.”
Trump, who initially denied any knowledge of the payments to Daniels, later defended it as “a simple private transaction” and accused Cohen of lying to secure a lighter sentence.
“Michael Cohen is lying and he’s trying to get a reduced sentence for things that have nothing to do with me,” the president told reporters outside the White House at the time.