Dershowitz: ‘The President Is Entitled to Pay Hush Money to Anyone He Wants During a Campaign’

EXCERPT:

DERSHOWITZ: "No, no. What Judge Ellis said is, when you put pressure on somebody like Cohen, there is an incentive to embellish the story and make it better. He’s now facing four years. If he comes up with strong evidence against the President, that will be reduced to two years or three or one year. So there is the risk. That’s what judge Ellis said, a risk of perjury. I have no idea whether Cohen is telling the truth or not. But the interesting thing is, if Cohen is telling the truth, it is a catch-22 for the prosecution. Let me lay this out for 60 seconds. Here is the issue. The President is entitled to pay hush money to anyone he wants during a campaign. There are no restrictions on what a candidate can contribute to his own campaign. So if, in fact, the President directed Cohen to do it as his lawyer and was going to compensate him for it, the President committed no crime. If Cohen did it on his own, then Cohen committed the crime."