Trump 'enjoys bending people to his will' — and he 'shredded' Michael Cohen: biographer

Donald Trump's biographer believes the former president's predilection for "bending people to his will" was made plain Monday when Michael Cohen testified in his criminal hush money trial.

Trump has pleaded not guilty to 34 felony counts that he falsified business records to conceal hush money paid ahead of the 2016 presidential election, denying both criminal activity and affairs with adult film star Stormy Daniels and Playboy model Karen McDougal.

On Monday, Cohen told the jury about his life as part of the Trump "family," a characterization challenged Monday evening by biographer Tim O'Brien during an interview on MSNBC.

"I think he's deeply mistaken if he thought he was a member of the family because there's just such little loyalty in Trump world to anyone," O'Brien said. "Most of it's a one-way street. It travels away from Donald Trump to probably only a couple of his children."

Read Also: Michael Cohen: Trump mastered the art of the dodge to avoid accountability — until now

When host Nicolle Wallace asked which children, O'Brien named Ivanka but argued Trump isn't "authentically that paternally attached to most of his children."

"He's had a very troubled relationship with Don Jr. historically," O'Brien recalled. "You know, in the business world there's absolutely nothing familial about the way Donald Trump rolls, or in the political world. It's transactional. It's narcissistically based. It's what he can draw out of it."

The biographer said that Trump "enjoys bending people to his will. He has radar for people who are easily corrupted. His universe is populated by all of these satellites who revolve around him solely because they want to be in this halo."

O'Brien argued anyone who wants to get close to Trump has "bad judgment to begin with. And Michael Cohen had epically bad judgment in so many ways."

Cohen told O'Brien once that he was "duped' because he so desperately "wanted to be in that world," the biographer said. He believed the hype about Trump being "the epitome of a successful businessman."

"And to anyone in the political world who's a veteran of policy-making he's also considered a cartoon character," O'Brien said.

"So, I think it was inevitable that when the time came for Cohen to be shredded, Trump shredded him, and it happened basically after he won the election," O'Brien continued. Trump "cuts his bonus, he doesn't give him a job in Washington, and he starts to push him out to sea."

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