Federal prosecutors have closed their campaign finance investigation into Trump personal attorney Michael Cohen, a new court order reveals.
According to a Wednesday ruling from Manhattan federal Judge William H. Pauley III, “the Government now represents that it has concluded the aspects of its investigation that justified the continued sealing of the portions of the Materials relating to Cohen’s campaign finance violations.”
Pauley ordered that the government release documents from the investigation, including search warrant materials, with limited redactions.
“The campaign finance violations discussed in the Materials are a matter of
national importance,” the order reads. “Now that the Government’s investigation into those violations has concluded, it is time that every American has an opportunity to scrutinize the Materials.”
Pauley wrote that the government informed him of the news in a Monday status report.
CNN reported on Friday that federal prosecutors were winding down their investigation of the Trump Organization without charging any executives.
That probe had looked at whether to charge Trump Org officials who agreed to reimburse Cohen for hush money payments he made to Stormy Daniels — a possible campaign finance violation that, Cohen testified, occurred at the direction of President Trump.
Pauley ordered that the documents, which will include the government’s Monday status report notifying the judge that it had ended the probe, be released on Thursday at 11 am.
The government had sought to protect certain third parties in the case, but Pauley said they could only redact the identities of law enforcement and people engaged in unrelated business with Cohen.
The request for release came as a group of media organizations moved to unseal copies of search warrants and applications, affidavits, and other supporting information relating to the April 2018 FBI raids on Cohen’s apartment, hotel room, and office.
Those raids uncovered other information that’s led to separate investigations. FBI agents reportedly found a recording of a phone call between Cohen and a Trump inaugural committee vendor, which spawned the ongoing federal criminal probe into the President’s inauguration.
Read Judge Pauley’s decision here:
