Allen Weisselberg has indeed agreed to testify
When it was revealed earlier this week that Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg had agreed to plead guilty without entering into a formal cooperation deal, we pointed out that such a deal wasn’t necessary. By pleading guilty to his crimes, Weisselberg was (knowingly) forfeiting his Fifth Amendment protections when it comes to those crimes. So if Weisselberg is asked to testify about anyone else’s role in those specific crimes, he’ll be legally required to do so. If he refused to testify, he’d be guilty of obstruction, resulting in a longer prison sentence and negating his reason for pleading guilty to begin with.
Sure enough, Rolling Stone is now reporting that Allen Weisselberg has indeed agreed to testify about his crimes. This means that he’ll be called as a witness when the Trump Organization itself, which was criminally indicted alongside Weisselberg, is put on trial. It also means that Weisselberg will have to testify if individuals such as Donald Trump end up criminally charged.
Again, this is not a blanket cooperation deal. Weisselberg is pleading guilty to a specific set of financial crimes in relation to cooking the books, and he’s only legally required to testify about his co-conspirators roles in those specific crimes. If Weisselberg also saw Trump rob a 7-Eleven, for instance, he wouldn’t be obligated to testify about that.
But the point – which we spelled out days ago – is that Allen Weisselberg did not manage to finagle a short prison sentence with nothing in return. He’s now legally obligated to testify, and today’s new reporting makes clear that he’s specifically acknowledged this legal obligation to prosecutors.
New York Attorney General Letitia James is now at the tail end of her civil probe into the Trump Organization, but has yet to announce her findings and penalties. Given the timing, we were wondering if James pushed the Manhattan DA into pleading Weisselberg out, so that Weisselberg will be legally obligated to testify in her civil probe. We’ll soon find out. It also adds intrigue to the scenario in which James could bring the criminal charges against Donald Trump that the DA didn’t – and she could use Weisselberg’s testimony as a basis for those charges. Stay tuned. Weisselberg’s guilty plea appears to be the beginning of a story, not the end of one.
