The Heritage Foundation's case for why John Edwards was guilty of illegal campaign contributions
would apply to Michael Cohen's payment of $130K to Stormy Daniels.
John Edwards was indicted and put to trial. Michael Cohen should be, too.
https://www.heritage.org/crime-and-justice/commentary/why-john-edwards-guilty
Misinformed critics of the government’s prosecution claim that such gifts of funds are not covered by campaign-finance law. But federal law limits the amount that a donor can contribute to a federal candidate. That amount was $2,300 in 2008, when Edwards was a candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination. The law defines “contribution” to include a gift or “deposit of money or anything of value made by any person for the purpose of influencing any election for Federal office.”
Most important, FEC regulations state that the payment of a personal expense by any person other than the candidate is considered a contribution to the candidate, unless the payment would have been made irrespective of the candidacy. As the FEC said in a prior advisory opinion, the key question is, “Would the third party pay the expense if the candidate was not running for Federal office?”
The testimony of government witnesses makes it pretty clear that the payments by these donors would not have been made if Edwards had not been running for office. Edwards is a multimillionaire; he could easily have afforded to make the payments (including legally obligated child support) out of his personal funds. But such personal payments would have blown up his candidacy and made it impossible to hide what he clearly wanted to keep hidden. The payments by his maxed-out campaign contributors were clearly intended to “influence” the 2008 presidential election by keeping Edwards in the race and protecting his reputation.
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Trump has lost Mrs. Greenspan as a defender . Cohen will be next in the Barrel.
