[Brianna Keilar, Cnn Anchor:] I'm Brianna Keilar, live from CNN's Washington headquarters. We have breaking news. President Trump's former attorney, friend and fixer, Michael Cohen, will spend the next three years in prison. This even after he flipped on the president and cooperated with Special Counsel Robert Mueller. The sentencing happened off camera, but our reporters were inside taking down every word that was said and essentially Cohen and his attorney through his president of the United States under the bus. Cohen saying at one point, quote, recently the president tweeted a statement calling me week, and it was correct, but for a much different reason than he was implying. It was because time and time again I felt it was my duty to cover up his dirty deeds. CNN reporter Kara Scannell is outside of the courthouse. Take us inside of that courtroom, Kara, where you were. How did this play out? And even after cooperating, why did Michael Cohen still get three years?
[Kara Scannell, Cnn Reporter:] Well, Brianna, it was a very emotional day inside the courtroom here. And, you know, one of the issues that the judge said when he was putting laying out this sentence, he told Cohen that, you know, that the crimes that he committed and the seriousness of these offenses, and, you know, the sentence should be amplified because of that. And so he said, you know, it was really important to give him a sentence that reflected the seriousness of these crimes, as well as reflect the importance of obeying the law. So the judge took a fairly stern tone here, despite after hearing from the special counsel's office saying that Cohen had been helpful to them, you know, cooperative, and providing them information that was core to their mission, which is, of course, investigating Russia's interference with the election. But the scene today was really focusing literally on Michael Cohen. And he took the podium to address the court, to ask for leniency. He was very emotional when he spoke about the shame and the pain that he brought to his family. His family members. The courtroom on that side of the courtroom was packed with his father who was there, his mother, his daughter, his son, his wife, several other cousins, family members, in-laws. It was very emotional, especially after he was handed down that sentence. But there are a couple of quotes that, you know, we want to read from what Cohen had said in court today. And one of them was that he said, this may seem hard to believe but today is one of the most meaningful days of my life. I have been living in a personal and mental incarceration ever since the day that I expected the offer to work for a real estate mogul whose business acumen that I deeply admired. And, Brianna, of course he's referring to President Trump. And then he continued on with that and he said, you know, that I take full responsibility for each act that I pled guilty to, the personal ones to me and those involving the president of the United States. Now, Michael Cohen was sentenced to three years in prison. He's paying over $1 million in restitution. He will face he pled guilty, of course, to these nine counts of tax evasion, making a false statement to a bank, campaign finance violation relating to those payments to Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal, and lying to Congress about how long he continued to negotiate a potential building of Trump Tower in Moscow as that as the presidential campaign wore on. So the judge today saying, you know, these were serious offenses, sentencing him to three years in prison, over a million dollars in restitution and fines, and Michael Cohen will report to prison on March 6th. Brianna.
[Keilar:] And, Kara, something that his lawyer said that stands out to me was, as he was pleading for leniency for his client, he likened the investigation into Russian meddling in the election to Watergate, trying to argue that the significance of Michael Cohen's cooperation was like cooperating in the Watergate investigation.
[Scannell:] Absolutely. And he was saying, you know, this took so much courage on Michael Cohen's part. He could have just towed the line. He even made a reference, that was a bit of a blind reference, to Paul Manafort, someone who's cooperating but not really cooperating and double dealing, as he put it, you know, as the allegation that Manafort, even after cooperating, was continuing to talk to the administration. So, you know, he really was playing that card and saying this is the most significant time the most significant crime and Cohen's cooperation is very significant at this very important time in history that we have not seen since Watergate, Brianna.
[Keilar:] Kara Scannell, thank you so much for that report. Here with me now, Jack Quinn, he's a former White House counsel under President Clinton, former federal prosecutor Laura Coates, and CNN chief political analyst Gloria Borger. Help us understand, Gloria, how significant this is, what happened today.
[Gloria Borger, Cnn Chief Political Analyst:] This is really significant, particularly if you're the president of the United States and you are watching this play out. What you said earlier, that Michael Cohen ran the president over, he did. And I think what's really important here now is that he said he intends to continue to cooperate. So this is just the beginning of the story. This is not the this is not the end of the story. And one thing that Michael Cohen said in court that struck me was he said he's committed to ensuring that history will not remember me as the villain of this story. The implication being there is someone else.
[Keilar:] That he believes the implication pretty is who he believes the villain is, being the president.
[Borger:] Yes. Yes.
[Keilar:] He also said, Laura, he cooperated because he believed that, I guess if he didn't, or just one of the reasons that he was cooperating was because the president otherwise might get rid of the investigation?
[Laura Coates, Cnn Legal Analyst:] Well, I think that he, in all respects, as a cooperator, according to the Southern District of New York, is that he was a day late and a dollar short. The timing of this is extremely important, Brianna. Remember, he didn't start cooperating until after he'd been charged with multiple felony offenses in New York.
[Keilar:] So you don't and the point being you don't take that at face value. You say you cooperated to save your own skin.
[Coates:] Well, yes, and that's why you would cooperate, frankly. And there is a little bit of altruism to that, but normally you're cooperating because you're self-interested in some way. Doesn't mean that you're not credible or you're not telling the truth any longer, but you are certainly self-interested. What happened with Michael Cohen that I think the judge was eluding to is the notion that, look, the fact that you've already pled guilty and are later cooperating is not going to somehow be a retroactive act of lenience towards you. You did the right thing now, but at the time you did the wrong thing. And, again, he was not a full cooperator in the sense of, I'll tell you everything, even about uncharged criminal conduct. He was being a confirmer. I will confirm to you that you have it right with respect to what you already know. But if you want to be a cooperator, you have to tell the prosecutors what they have not charged and about other people as well.
[Keilar:] What did you think, Jack, about what today and just what recent filings that we've seen pertaining to Michael Cohen signal to other people who may be targets of the Mueller investigation or are thinking perhaps of cooperating?
[Jack Quinn, Cnn Legal Analyst:] I think that's a critically important point. I mean, and, first of all, Michael Cohen, he didn't get complete leniency. On the other hand, he was facing considerably more time than he got. So he got a break. And he got that break in significant part because special counsel Mueller filed a memo outlining very significant ways in which he can be helpful to the Mueller investigation, including, for example, being able to speak to what Mueller called matters core to the investigation, namely the connection between Russia and the Trump campaign that Cohen has gleaned from his conversations with company executives. That is to say Trump company executives. And we all know who might be in that category. Most of them are named Trump. Anyway, Mueller detailed several other areas where Cohen can provide some unique and critically important investigations and he has more time to get that sentence driven down further.
[Keilar:] I wonder, Laura, the judge agreed to recommend Otisville Prison, which is in upstate New York, the idea being then he's not so far away from his family, right? This would be critical if he were spending looking at spending three years in prison that you would have visitation from people, that it would be more convenient for them to get to you. There are other things that went into this consideration of being lenient to Michael Cohen.
[Coates:] Well, not just the idea that the family can get to him, but he's going to be a continued cooperator.
[Borger:] Yes.
[Coates:] You to
[Borger:] Yes, there you know, there is. And I was told by a source close to Cohen that he's really dug in on cooperating. I mean he said it in court today. He hasn't told his whole story and he wants to tell his whole story. As I was talking about before, he doesn't want to be the villain of this story. He's committed his crimes and he understands that. But there's going to be a lot more talking going on. I think the problem that he had is that he really only decided to fess up after it became clear to him that he wasn't going to get a pardon from Donald Trump. And Pam Brown and I did that story. At first he thought he was going to get pardoned by the president. Then it became clear to him that he wasn't. And then he turned in another turned in another direction. And I think that was noted or implied today. And but now, going forward, I think Cohen is committed, committed, I think we can say, to telling what he knows about what Jack was talking about, which is Trump Org and everything he knows about the businesses.
[Quinn:] He's critical to the link between Trump, the business empire
[Borger:] Yes.
[Quinn:] And Trump the political empire. And drawing those two together is something that Mueller is, if not trying to do, he's incredibly interested in knowing whether these were one enterprise, you know, all together. The other thing, by the way, which Mueller has intimated he can provide valuable information on, he talks in his sentencing memo about Cohen having circulated his false testimony in this calendar year to other people in the White House.
[Keilar:] Which is critical
[Quinn:] Which might mean that there were people involved in a conspiracy with him to provide perjured testimony.
[Keilar:] And no doubt that will be something that he will have an opportunity to tell investigators. If you all could stand by for me, I really appreciate the conversation. We have much more of our special coverage. I'll be speaking live with a Democratic member of the House Judiciary Committee on the president's admissions on payments to hush money payments to women he allegedly had affairs with. Now, Theresa May is in a fight for her political life. Her own party holds a vote of no confidence against her, the British prime minister. We are live in London. And protests right now erupting in Michigan as Republicans move to weaken the power of incoming Democrats. We'll be taking you there live.