Trump's Stupid Lawsuit Of The Week: Michael Cohen Stole My Hush Money!

A lolsplainer!

Does Donald Trump have a quota of crap lawsuits he has to hit every month? Maybe a billionaire poker game, where his pals say, "Look, Donnie, we know you're always strapped for cash. How 'bout this month you sue ... let's say, the Pulitzer Committee." And then after he loses another hand, they agree to let him pay it off by filing the idiotic clownsuit in Okeechobee County court?

It's as rational an explanation as any, right? Why else would Trump sue Bob Woodward , in Florida? Or New York Attorney General Letitia James , again in Florida? Or Hillary Clinton, her BFF James Comey, plus half of DC , once again Florida? Or CNN , which defamed him by saying he lied about a stolen election, in, you guessed it, Florida?

This month's wager resulted (ALLEGEDLY) in Trump filing a breach of contract complaint against his former lawyer/fixer Michael Cohen. Cohen lives in New York, and Trump lives in Palm Beach, so naturally the case was docketed in Miami. Presumably Trump wanted to be darn sure that he didn't end up in front of Judge Donald Middlebrooks, who sits in Palm Beach and just slapped a million dollars in sanctions on his lawyers in that insane RICO suit against Clinton et al . He also delivered a hugely damaging opinion which described Trump's "continuing pattern of misuse of the court" in language that is guaranteed to be quoted by every party with whom he winds up in court.

Trump's two previous attempts to get in front of Judge Aileen Cannon by filing in Fort Pierce, where that loon is the only federal jurist in town, both backfired: The Clinton case got bounced to Judge Middlebrooks, and the Eleventh Circuit spectacularly dropkicked Judge Cannon's attempt to do Trump a solid by disrupting the investigation of his document theft.

Trump's theories of jurisdiction and venue are bizarre. He claims that the case is appropriately brought in Florida because you can download Cohen's podcast and listen to his book there. Which is not how any of this works. Similarly, you can't yadda yadda yadda jurisdiction by saying "Upon information and belief, Defendant traveled to Miami, Florida to engage in services for the Plaintiff." Either he did, or he didn't ... and if he didn't, you don't get to avail yourself of the hospitality of the court in Miami.

In any event, this case was doomed no matter where it landed. Trump claims breach of contract, although no contract is attached, and breach of a confidentiality agreement, also not attached. (Cohen says he never signed any such document.) Trump goes on to claim that Cohen violated his fiduciary duty, in support of which he cites to multiple provisions of New York Rules of Professional Conduct for lawyers. But those rules create no private right of action, and anyway Cohen was disbarred years ago.

Trump's injuries are of the wee fee fees variety, and you can't sue somebody for calling you a "racist" and hosting people like Elie Honig and Norm Eisen on his podcast to make mean words about you.

Well, correction, if you've got $402 and a lawyer willing to sign it, you can sue anyone you want . But you — and your lawyer — do run the risk of Rule 11 sanctions if you file something egregiously stupid that wastes the court's time and drags the defendant into court in a jurisdiction where he's not amenable to service.

But that may not even be the dumbest thing about this suit. Because in his effort to slime Cohen, Trump appears to be conceding the truth of allegations in the indictment filed by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.

To wit, check out Count Five, Conversion (which is basically lawtalk for stealing):

By his own account, Defendant “lied” about the amount of money he was owed in reimbursement for an expense he made on Plaintiff’s behalf, instead “load[ing] up” and “sneakily upping [his] bonus” in order to “counter screw[]” Plaintiff.

Defendant admits that the cost of the expenditure was $13,000 but he “lied” and represented that his expenditure was $50,000. [...]

Indeed, Defendant was only authorized to collect the amount of the expenditure, plus such additional money as the Trump Organization officials found sufficient to “gross[] up . . . to make up for taxes” on the original expenditure.

Accounting for the “gross[ing] up” process authorized by the Trump Organization to reimburse Defendant, Defendant fraudulently misrepresented the amount owed to him for reimbursement and converted $74,000 in funds to which he was not entitled.

Remember that funny time back in 2015 when Michael paid an IT guy from Liberty University to rig a couple of online presidential polls for Trump? And then instead of paying him the promised $50,000, Cohen gave him $13,000 plus a boxing glove supposedly worn by a Brazilian MMA fighter? But Cohen told Trump he was out the full $50,000, so instead of getting a $26,000 reimbursement (i.e. $13,000 for the outlay, plus $13,000 to cover his tax liability), he got paid $100,000.

Trump is currently charged with 34 counts of making a false business record which labeled that $100,000, plus the money paid to Stormy Daniels, as a legal retainer. And here he is admitting exactly that in a legal document! Bigly Genius!

Moreover, there is no universe where an online candidate poll is not a campaign expense, in contrast to the Stormy Daniels hush money payment, which Trump could colorably argue was done to protect his family and unrelated to his presidential run.

Just ... WTF???

Trump was probably hoping to end up on the docket of one of his many appointees in the Miami division. Although, this case is so patently stupid, it wouldn't have mattered. But in the event, he wound up in front of Judge Darrin Gayles, the first openly gay, Black federal judge. And you don't have to fire up the Google machine to figure out that Trump didn't appoint that guy!

Happy Friday!

[ Trump v. Cohen , Docket via Court Listener]

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