The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused an appeal from Michael Cohen, who wanted to revive a lawsuit against former President Donald Trump.
Cohen was once know as Trump’s fixer, and he has accused his former boss of retaliating against him for promoting his tell-all book, Disloyal: A Memoir: The True Story of the Former Personal Attorney to President Donald J. Trump.
In 2020, Cohen was serving a three-year sentence on charges related to the work he had done for Trump. While on release to home confinement due to the COVID-19 pandemic, he said probation officials wanted him to sign an agreement that required him to avoid speaking with the media or posting on social media. According to court records, he was ordered back to prison and placed in solitary confinement for 16 days after he wanted changes to the agreement.
A federal judge released Cohen from solitary confinement, saying he had been jailed in retaliation for the tell-all book. Cohen later sued Trump, former Attorney General William Barr and other officials.
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A New York judge tossed the lawsuit, saying the law does not provide a damages remedy under such circumstances. Cohen then asked the Supreme Court to revive the lawsuit against Trump, but the high court rejected the appeal on Monday and did not detail their reasoning in a brief order.
In July, Cohen told Newsweek while he was in the process of filing his petition to the Supreme Court that “no president should ever be permitted to weaponize the Department of Justice through a willing and complicit attorney general to have a citizen unconstitutionally remanded to prison—solitary confinement—because they refused to waive their First Amendment right.”
He reiterated this stance in the petition he filed to the Supreme Court.
“The possibility that the federal government has the power to retaliate against critics with imprisonment, without any consequence for or check against the officials engaged in such retaliation, is a chilling prospect,” Cohen’s petition to the high court read. “This Court should not turn its eyes away from this profound breach of the contract between a government of limited powers and a free citizenry.”
On Monday, Trump attorney Alina Habba reacted to the news of the Supreme Court rejecting the appeal. In a statement to Fox News Digital, Habba said, “Michael Cohen has exhausted every avenue of his pathetic attempt to drag my client into court time and time again.”
She added, “As expected, the Supreme Court has correctly denied Michael Cohen’s petition, and he must finally abandon his frivolous and desperate claims.”
This article includes reporting from The Associated Press.