MANHATTAN (CN) – At an explosive court hearing where it was revealed that a secret client of Michael Cohen’s beside President Donald Trump is none other than conservative pundit Sean Hannity, a federal judge refused to put a restraining order Monday on the files that prosecutors seized last week from the embattled lawyer.
“I have faith in the Southern District U.S. Attorney’s Office that their integrity is unimpeachable,” U.S. District Judge Kimba Wood said in court.
Hannity’s name arose this afternoon after attorneys for Cohen alerted the court in a brief that the FBI’s raid of Cohen’s home, hotel and office implicates privileged materials from three clients: Trump, the unnamed individual now revealed to be Hannity and Elliott Broidy, the recently jettisoned deputy finance chair of the Republican National Committee.
At around 2:50 p.m., Judge Wood firmly directed Cohen's lawyers to disclose the third client's name, having dismissed their argument that the client had personally asked to be protected from embarrassment.
Wood refused to let Cohen keep the client's name secret.
"I understand that he doesn't want his name out there, but that's not enough under the law," she said.
Stephen Ryan of McDermott, Will & Emery reluctantly but quickly answered that the client was Fox News personality Sean Hannity, eliciting a mix of gasps of surprise from some seats and a near-hooting, deep chuckling from others.
Well before Hannity’s name was uttered, Monday had been shaping up to be a media sensation. The hearing already pitted federal prosecutors against two teams of Trump’s attorneys, but a courtroom appearance by an alleged presidential mistress layered additional buzz.
Throngs of reporters, photographers and videographers waited in anticipation for porn actress Stormy Daniels, whose Los Angeles-based attorney Michael Avenatti promised his client’s attendance on a live CNN broadcast this past weekend.
For all of the tabloid-fueled suspense at her arrival, Daniels made a muted entrance to match her pink-lavender skirt suit with a black shirt under the jacket. She filed discreetly through the side entrance of the courthouse, before her attorney Avenatti quietly escorted her into the back row of the courtroom.
After the roughly two-hour hearing ended, Daniels told reporters that Cohen’s time for reckoning had come.
“For years, Mr. Cohen has acted like he is above the law,” she said.
Daniels contends that Trump’s associates bullied her into signing a $130,000 settlement so that she would not speak about their fling before the 2016 election.
Avenatti said at a press conference Monday afternoon that the revelation about Hannity gave a glimpse into the power of Cohen’s inner circle.
“One thing I will say is this, I said last Friday and this weekend that Michael Cohen was radioactive and that anybody that was associated with him in the last 20 to 30 years should be very, very concerned,” Avenatti told reporters.
“Anyone that has any contact with this man in the last 20 years should be very concerned what secrets of theirs are in these documents,” he added later.
Cohen's other client, Broidy, stepped down from the RNC Friday after confirming that Cohen helped him negotiate a $1.6 million payment to a Playboy playmate who said that Broidy impregnated her.