Former Trump attorney Michael Cohen was hit with a criminal referral for violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) by Rep. Mark Meadows (R-NC) following a heated exchange during Cohen's Wednesday testimony in front of the House Oversight Committee.
Meadows pressed Cohen over his apparent failure to list contracts with foreign companies that paid him for access to the Trump administration, including Novartis,
which paid Cohen $1.2 million to act as a consultant on the Trump administration, as well as
$150,000 from South Korea's Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI) and a payment from Kazakhstan BTA bank.
Cohen claimed that since the
Meadows: "I'm going to back to the question I asked before with regards to your false statement that you submitted to Congress. On here it was very clear that it asks for contracts with foreign entities over the last two years.
Have you had any foreign contracts with foreign entities whether it's Novartis or the Korean Airline or Kazakhstan BTA bank? Your testimony earlier said that you had contracts with them. In fact, you went into detail."
Cohen: "They are not government agencies, they are privately and publicly traded companies."
Meadows: "Did you have foreign contracts over the last two years?"
Cohen: "Foreign contracts?"
Meadows: "Contracts with foreign entities?"
Cohen: "
Yes."
Shortly after the exchange, Meadows tweeted: "I just entered a referral for criminal investigation of Michael Cohen, who violated the Foreign Agents Registration Act by illegally lobbying on behalf of foreign entities without registering," adding "Cohen talks about "blind loyalty." His real blind loyalty? It's to the almighty dollar."
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