Michael Cohen, a key witness in former President Trump’s hush money trial, said his family was doxxed after Trump was convicted of all 34 felony counts in the case.
Cohen, a former fixer for Trump, sought in his trial testimony to tie his former boss to documents at the heart of the case — in which prosecutors argued the then-2016 presidential nominee falsified business records related to reimbursements made to Cohen, who paid porn actor Stormy Daniels to stay quiet about an alleged 2006 affair with Trump.
Following Thursday’s historic conviction, phone numbers and addresses for Cohen’s wife and children were posted Monday on a site that has been used to target other figures involved in Trump’s sprawling legal battles, said Advance Democracy, a nonprofit research group, according to NBC News.
In a statement to The Hill, Cohen said it’s sad that the doxxing occurred.
“What sad times we are living through when people resort to this type of doxxing stupidity to redress their grievances,” Cohen’s statement said.
Judge Juan Merchan, the New York judge overseeing the hush money case, ordered in March for the identities of the jury to be kept secret because there was a likelihood of bribery, jury tampering or physical injury and harassment.
Trump himself was barred from talking about the jury, court staff and prosecutors under a gag order meant to protect them from harassment and intimidation.
NBC News reported that Trump supporters tried to dox jurors last week after the conviction.
Days before the guilty verdict was handed down, Michael Fanone, a former Washington, D.C., police officer who was badly injured in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, spoke about Trump being “an authoritarian.” Hours later, SWAT team officers showed up at his mother’s door in Virginia.
In a statement to NBC News, Daniel J. Jones, the president of Advance Democracy, said the organization’s researchers are “regularly scanning” for threats and instigations of political violence.
“During our most recent scan, we identified personal details online — doxxing — for Michael Cohen, his wife, and his children,” Jones said. “The individual who shared the information online, on a site known for doxxing, likely had an intent to harm Cohen — providing these personal details on the Cohen family in the context of calling Cohen a ‘lying bastard’ and identifying him as someone who ‘betrayed Trump,’ presumably for testifying for the prosecution in former President Trump’s NY criminal trial.”