"Lawyers don't normally do talk shows," Stephen Colbert told Michael Avenatti on Wednesday's Late Show, pointing out that Avenatti has appeared on CNN about 60 times since taking Stormy Daniels as a client. "That's it?" Avenatti joked. Colbert asked if constantly appearing on TV was part of his legal strategy, and Avenatti didn't disagree. "This is not your normal case, and it's not your normal defendant," he said. "I mean, you're dealing with a defendant that's very undisciplined, can be easily baited into making mistakes, and I think we've been very, very successful in doing just that."
Avenatti said he's confident that he and Daniels will beat Trump in court and doesn't think the president will serve out his term. "I have never seen anyone pander to an audience like you just did," Colbert laughed. Avenatti unveiled a new document, the receipt for $130,000 from Cohen's LLC to Daniels' former attorney. The important detail, he said, is that the transfer was from a California bank, putting Cohen potentially in the Trump-pardon-free crosshairs of California Attorney General Xavier Becerra.
Colbert asked about the National Enquirer salvo fired at Cohen, and Avenatti said "there's no question that they've started the character assassination now on Michael Cohen because it's clear to them that he's going to flip on the president, and they're nervous about what me might say so they want to undercut his credibility." And Colbert circled back to Avenatti's theory that Trump will step down: "What makes you think he'll resign? He is nothing if not shameless, so what is it that would make him step down? He'll fight tooth-and-nail to the end." Cohen "knows where all kinds of bodies are buried, there's no question about that," Avenatti said, "and I don't think the president is going to be able to withstand the heat at the end of the day, I just don't." Watch below. Peter Weber
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