Back in the Hotel Room
As I sat in the DOJ’s windowless room being grilled about the Trump Organization, the questions intensified. I was also keenly aware as the questioning dragged on of how much this was costing me in legal fees, to defend myself for having done no wrong.
Mueller’s team was very interested in Felix Sater. What do I know about him? Where had I met him? How often had I met with him?
I told the investigators about the first and last time I saw Felix Sater, at my initial meeting with Michael Cohen. There wasn’t much to tell. But I could tell they didn’t believe me. Which made me wonder: Was I forgetting something? But I knew I would have remembered if I’d seen Felix Sater again.
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What I wanted Mueller’s team to understand was that all I ever wanted was to do great things for Georgia. I had proposed a series of business opportunities to Donald Trump, Michael, and the Trump Organization—and not only had nothing come of them, but my partners and I went to great expense and suffered great losses because these deals were scuttled. I had become friendly with Michael Cohen and we had exchanged text messages, had rare dinners.
On occasion, as is often the case between friends, he’d asked me for help with innocuous things, like when his daughter wanted to get into a party thrown by Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich. Even though I was unable to help. Yet, here I was, having to defend myself about what, exactly? About “doing favors for Michael Cohen”?
Finally, after nearly four hours of interrogation, it was over and I was a free man again. I felt relieved that at least that part was behind me, although I had no idea what the prosecutors’ impression of me was. Were they persuaded, or had I left them even more suspicious?
I decided to go back to the hotel and dive even deeper into my past and present on the wake of my grand jury appearance where I was going to be placed in the hot seat and under oath. Not an easy task, I assumed. The most worrisome thing about the grand jury is the severe consequences it could have if you wobble or blink. You could lose your freedom even if you’re innocent, and I admit that was pretty scary to me.
Beyond the Small Door
When I got to my hotel room I started pacing back and forth. The idea of being under oath and interrogated by the Mueller team in front of the grand jury made me restless.
I obsessed about remembering nearly every event that transpired in my past, in Georgia, Russia. I was ready to scrutinize my family connections, business associations, and business partners. I had a lot of homework to do before the next morning.
The next morning, I was drained from examining my past and present, playing devil’s advocate to find the potential traps Mueller’s team could have set. I put my suit and tie on and, after having a gallon of coffee to stay awake, I went downstairs to face my next and biggest challenge: the grand jury proceedings.
I was waiting outside my hotel when a government car came for me. An SUV. This time the driver, the agent, was a man. He was cold, steely. No chitchat. He opened the door. I got in. And then he locked the doors.
We drove in silence, and I was brought in through the tunnel again. I was slated as first to appear before the grand jury that day (others—I didn’t know who—were going to appear later that day).
This time everyone seemed more serious. They looked at me like someone who had done something wrong. Or at least that’s the way it felt to me.
Other witnesses may have been seated elsewhere in the building. All I know is that I was taken directly to the grand jury room on a path where we encountered no one else.
They led us to a room, but it wasn’t the grand jury room. It was a small waiting room. I sat there with my lawyers, also in silence. There was nothing more to say. And there was the not-so-paranoid concern that we were being listened to and watched. Nonetheless, my attorneys reminded me that they would be outside the grand jury room if I had any questions or needed a break. They were not allowed inside.
An agent appeared for me and then led me down a long corridor. We were walking and walking until we came to a secure mirrored little door that I thought would lead to another corridor.
Instead I opened the door and suddenly found myself in front of some twenty-five people in a somewhat shabby, rundown auditorium (that strangely enough reminded me of the former Soviet Union).
Nervous, Not Intimidated
Passing through the door that the FBI agent opened for me, I found myself suddenly in the grand jury room. There was no common denominator to the jurors: they were old and youngish, well dressed and not, of a variety of races and ethnicities—a collection of reasonably average United States citizens.
I was led to a seat and before I really got my bearings, I was asked to raise my hand and was sworn in to tell the truth.
And then the questioning began…
Standing before me was Jeannie Rhee, the same prosecutor from the day before. Her questions were numerous and they came at me rapidly.
There were way more questions than I expected. And her questions seemed trying to make a point for which I was not prepared: the possibility that I was a conduit between Russia and Trump.
The prosecutors were aggressive, at one minute telling me, “You understand you’re under oath here, to tell the truth and only the truth and everything you say will be recorded.” They told me that “anything you say you can’t recollect or that’s not accurate can be used against you,” and that “perjury is a serious crime for which you can be charged and prosecuted, and for which there is sure to be jail time.”
I am not someone who is intimidated easily. However, I have to confess that just hearing that made me understandably anxious. I knew I had done nothing wrong. And I fully intended to tell the truth.
So, you may wonder, what was I worried about? Unless you’ve had the experience, it’s hard to understand. But realizing that you are talking about events and conversations that took place over more than a decade, and that you could have forgotten something or recalled something inaccurately—all completely human foibles and faults—for which you might be charged with a crime and go to prison, seemed, at that moment, an imminent danger.
I don’t falter under pressure. But I was definitely sitting in the hot seat. The full weight and importance of the Mueller hearings hit me. It wasn’t just that US officials were investigating me, it was that they were doing so in a probe about the president of the United States.
As I was questioned before the grand jury, I was conscious that the assembled grand jury members had been listening to many people testify—people who were, at least in my opinion, far more connected to the probe than I. The fear crept in that every word I said was being compared with those of all the other witnesses, and that any discrepancy or misimpression I gave, or any fact I offered up that contradicted someone else’s testimony—even if just my impression or recollection—could be reason to charge me with perjury. That was a scary thought.
The pressure was such that a little voice in my head started saying, “Maybe the jurors and the government attorneys know something I don’t.”
Otherwise, why are they all sitting here, and why are they spending the time to question me?
All this nervousness, doubt, concern, and anxiety took hold. At that point, I suddenly found myself stuttering. I was thinking over—really overthinking—each question.
When you are in the grand jury room and look out at all the persons gathered there, it no longer matters if the investigation is, as President Trump called it, “a witch hunt,” or a legitimate inquiry into the wrongdoings of a president or his associates. It is suddenly very real. And very serious. All I could think about was that I was going to be questioned by a highly experienced investigative and prosecutorial team.
Depending on what they asked and what I answered, I was at risk of going from a peripheral figure to a target of the investigation. In that way, my fate was in their hands.