Michael Cohen 'hit the reset button' -- and no longer 'taking a bullet' for Trump: report

Michael Cohen is sending out a warning signal to President Donald Trump after Rudy Giuliani challenged him to "tell the truth."

Two sources familiar with Cohen's thinking said the president's longtime attorney and "fixer" has "hit the reset button" and was committed to speaking the "real truth," reported CNN.

Giuliani appeared on Sunday morning talk shows, where the president's legal adviser urged Cohen to "tell the truth" about Russian election interference and the Trump Tower meeting with Donald Trump Jr. and Russian agents.

"I do not expect that Michael Cohen is going to lie," Giuliani said on CNN's "State of the Union." "I think he's going to tell the truth, as best he can, given his recollection, and if he does that, we're home-free."

Giuliani followed up on his remarks Monday morning in a text to CNN reporters.

"The truth will set you free," Giuliani texted. "The President did nothing wrong with Michael Cohen. Everything has been a dead-end because there is nothing there."

Cohen's attorney, however, urged the president and his lawyers to buckle up.

“Did Rudy Giuliani really say on Sunday shows that Michael Cohen should cooperate with prosecutors and tell the truth?” tweeted Cohen attorney Lanny Davis. “Seriously? Is that Trump and Giuliani definition of ‘truth’? Trump/Giuliani next to the word ‘truth’ = oxymoron.”

“Stay tuned,” Davis added.

Cohen gave an interview two weeks ago to ABC's George Stephanopoulos, which CNN's sources said was intended to highlight two areas he wanted to distinguish himself from the president.

"Why did (Cohen) say I respect the FBI?" one source said. "Who has said the FBI is a corrupt institution? The president."

Cohen also told ABC that he believes the intelligence assessment that Russia interfered in the 2016 election to help Trump.

"If you link them all together, you can see that Cohen is not anyone's punching bag," one source said. "He is exercising his discretion to send a direct message between the eyes to the President of the United States."

That source added that the interview was Cohen's "July 4th moment" and showed he was "no longer taking a bullet for you (Trump), no longer a flunky."