A federal judge ordered hundreds of pages of search warrants related to the FBI's raid on Michael Cohen's home, offices, and hotel to be released. As reporters comb through them, many facts are emerging.
Among them, the bank account Cohen used for the hush money payment to Stormy Daniels "received substantial payments from foreign sources," the FBI said, according to reports in the Daily Mail and Courthouse News.
Courthouse News' Adam Klasfeld offered more details, including a screenshot of part of the search warrant, on Twitter:
The FBI says that Cohen opened his Essential Consultants account at First Republic before the month before the 2016 presidential election.
The account "received substantial payments from foreign sources," the FBI says.
What follows is redacted. pic.twitter.com/JS6bJ82BZf
— Adam Klasfeld (@KlasfeldReports) March 19, 2019
"The FBI suspected that Michael Cohen secretly worked on behalf of a foreign government for nearly a year before agents raided his home and office," Klasfeld reports at Courthouse News. He adds that the just-released search warrants show "the federal inquiry into Cohen had been going on since July 2017 — far longer than had previously been known."
The Daily Mail adds that the "U.S. Attorney's office in Manhattan said there was probable cause to believe Cohen was involved in a scheme to defraud 'multiple banks' and to make an illegal campaign contribution to Trump."