Michael Cohen, the former personal lawyer and fixer for President Donald Trump, has postponed his planned appearance Tuesday before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence because of “post-surgery medical needs,” Cohen’s attorney Lanny Davis said Monday.
Davis said committee, which accepted Cohen’s request for a delay, will announce a “future date” for Cohen’s appearance. The Senate Intelligence panel had no comment on Davis’ statement.
Cohen, 52, recently had shoulder surgery.
He is due to begin serving a three-year prison sentence on March 6 for lying to Congress, campaign finance violations and financial crimes.
Cohen is currently scheduled to testify at the House Intelligence Committee on Feb. 28. That House appearance was originally scheduled for last Friday, but committee chairman Adam Schiff, D-Calif., said Cohen’s closed-door testimony would be delayed “in the interests of the investigation.”
Cohen originally had been scheduled to testify publicly last Friday before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
But Cohen on Jan. 23 postponed that appearance indefinitely because of concerns about his family’s safety, Davis said at that time. Davis cited alleged “threats” made by Trump and the president’s current lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, who had both made comments about Cohen’s father-in-law. Trump later said of Cohen, “I would say he’s been threatened by the truth.”
A day after that postponement was announced, U.S. Marshals served a subpoena on Cohen to appear Tuesday at the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.
In his guilty pleas last year, Cohen admitted to making false statements to Congress about when an aborted plan to build a Trump Tower in Moscow actually ended, and about the extent of Trump’s involvement in that project.
Trump was more deeply involved in the effort, which was dropped months after Cohen originally claimed, according to his plea deal.
Cohen also admitted facilitating hush-money payments in 2016 to porn star Stormy Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal to keep them silent about their alleged affairs with Trump a decade earlier.
Cohen said that he did so at the direction of Trump to keep the women’s stories from affecting the presidential election in 2016.
Trump has denied any wrongdoing, and also denies having sex with either woman.
Cohen has cooperated with special counsel Robert Mueller’s ongoing investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election, and possible collusion by the Trump campaign in that interference.
