How much closer are we to Donald Trump being impeached?
President Trump denies any wrongdoing, but impeachment has just taken a large step closer to becoming a reality.
Thursday 23 August 2018 13:44, UK
President Trump spent the day defending a "brave" convicted felon and claiming that Michael Cohen's finance violations aren't illegal.
It is another episode in the so-called "post-truth era"- where a president claims the truth is not the truth and says apparent crimes are not in fact crimes.
He started the day with a snarky tweet against his long time lawyer, writing: "If anyone is looking for a good lawyer, I would strongly suggest that you don't retain the services of Michael Cohen!"
He went on to show support for Paul Manafort, praising him for not striking a plea deal and claiming President Obama had a "big campaign finance violation and it was easily settled".
Obama's 2008 campaign paid one of the largest fines of any presidential campaign for failing to give adequate notice of around 1,300 campaign contributions totalling more than $1.8m.
That is, though, something very different to paying off women he's accused of having an affair with.
Mr Cohen insists he broke the law under Mr Trump's direction. He will, though, need to provide more evidence to give that claim any real concrete legitimacy.
Special counsel Robert Mueller's team has also apparently agreed to abide by the justice department's rule that no sitting president should be indicted.
There is currently a legal debate over that, but what is arguably more worrying for the White House is the possibility that the president might be impeached.
With Cohen's explosive allegations, that went from a distant theoretical to a close-up possibility.
Corey Lewandowski. Trump's former campaign manager, who referred to Cohen as a "rogue character" and a "serial lair", conceded to me that Tuesday was a "bad day" for the White House.
When I asked about whether he was concerned about Democrats pushing for impeachment proceedings if they won the House in November, he said voters have a choice to focus on impeachment, or on national security and strong employment figures and the president's successes. His hope is clearly that they focus on the last three.
Any road to impeachment is long and complicated and Trump's opponents have long jumped the gun in discussing it.
Even those closest to the president, though, are sounding markedly more nervous. No one can escape the fact the president's former lawyer is accusing him of a felony.
That is stunning. But in a divided nation where there is still feverish enthusiasm for Trump among his core supporters, it is not yet clear what political ramifications these latest revelations will have.
A loyalist has flipped and to many he lacks credibility. The White House insists Donald Trump did not do anything wrong.
The jeopardy hanging over everything is that no one knows what more Cohen may be willing to spill and the investigation the president likes to call a "witch hunt" has just been given new impetus.