Cohen confesses rigging the polls for Trump

New York, Jan 18 (IANS) US President Donald Trump's former personal attorney Michael Cohen has said that he paid the head of a small technology company thousands in 2015 to rig online polls at "the direction of and for the sole benefit of" Trump.

Cohen was responding on Thursday to a report in The Wall Street Journal that he paid John Gauger, the owner of RedFinch Solutions LLC, between $12,000 and $13,000 for activities related to the President's campaign, including "trying unsuccessfully to manipulate two online polls in Trump's favour" and creating a Twitter account called "@WomenForCohen" that "praised (Cohen's) looks and character, and promoted his appearances and statements boosting" Trump's candidacy, reports CNN.

In making the claim, Gauger told the Journal that he was not fully paid for the work, though the daily said Cohen was reimbursed $50,000 -- the amount the two originally agreed on for Gauger's services -- by the Trump Organization.

Gauger, according to the daily, also received a boxing glove "worn by a Brazilian mixed-martial arts fighter" along with the cash payment.

Later Thursday in a statement to CNN, Cohen said his actions were "at the direction of and for the sole benefit of Donald Trump. I truly regret my blind loyalty to a man who doesn't deserve it".

Cohen has publicly broken with Trump since cooperating with special counsel Robert Mueller's ongoing probe into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election.

He is expected to testify before the House Oversight Committee on February 7 and is prepared to discuss topics related to hush money payments and aspects of the Trump Organization, including the roles of the President and his children.

Cohen has already pleaded guilty and was sentenced in December to three years in prison on multiple charges, including two campaign finance crimes tied to illicit payments made to silence women during the presidential campaign.