President Donald Trump said Wednesday he would consider a pardon for Michael Cohen, his former fixer whose testimony helped convict Trump in the 2024 New York hush-money case — and who has more recently said he “felt pressured and coerced,” Reuters reported.

Asked by reporters whether he would consider a pardon for Cohen, who is seeking one, Trump said: “If everything is checking out, it’s something I would consider.” He added, “I appreciate that at least he came out, although late, he came out and rectified the situation,” according to Reuters.

In a longer gaggle account from Mediaite, Trump spoke at Joint Base Andrews and said he had “never been asked that question,” then: “Well he did, he recanted. … What they put him through was incredible, if you want to know the truth. Nobody’s asked me about a pardon. Well, if everything is checking out, it’s something I would consider, yeah. I mean, what they did to Michael Cohen was a disgrace.” He claimed prosecutors “forced him to say things that he didn’t want to say and that he didn’t believe.”

Cohen was sentenced in 2018 to three years in prison — and served more than a year — for a $130,000 hush payment to Stormy Daniels before the 2016 election and for other crimes including tax fraud and lying to Congress, Reuters noted. Trump was convicted in 2024 on 34 counts of falsifying business records tied to that payment; he denies the Daniels encounter and is appealing.

Cohen’s own account is messier than Trump’s victory lap. Mediaite noted Cohen wrote on Substack that he felt pressured during the trial, then told Mediaite founder Dan Abrams in February that his testimony was still “truthful and accurate” — that “pressured and coerced” described his personal feeling, not that the facts he gave were false. Trump recently appeared on Cohen’s radio show and last week thanked him on Truth Social for “step[ping] forward,” Mediaite reported.

Dated Wednesday, Sept. 9, 2026: Trump says a Cohen pardon is on the table if “everything is checking out.” A presidential pardon would not erase the state conviction; it would rewrite the federal chapter of a witness Trump once called a liar and now calls brave.

Sources