Giuliani: 'Collusion is not a crime,' hacking is the real crime and Trump 'didn't hack'

Screenshot/CNN

Rudy Giuliani.

• President Donald Trump's personal attorney Rudy Giuliani said Monday that "collusion is not a crime."
• He also said "the hacking is the real crime" and Trump "didn't pay" the Russians "for hacking."

President Donald Trump's personal attorney Rudy Giuliani said in a pair of Monday morning interviews that he was at a loss for how colluding with the Russians would be categorized as a crime. Instead, he shifted the conversation by noting that the president did not "pay them for hacking," which he said was the real offense.

Speaking with the "Fox and Friends" morning show, Giuliani said he has "been sitting here looking in the federal code trying to find collusion as a crime."

"Collusion is not a crime," he said, adding the the president is "absolutely innocent."

Then in a discussion with CNN's "New Day," Giuliani said if you "start analyzing the crime, the hacking is the crime."

"The president didn't hack," Giuliani said. "He didn't pay them for hacking. If you got the hacked information from the Russians here at CNN and you played it, would you be in jeopardy of going to jail? Of course not."

Giuliani's comments came a day after Trump attacked the special counsel Robert Mueller, who is tasked with investigating Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, on Twitter. Trump said there was "No Collusion!" and added that Mueller's "rigged witch hunt" was "an illegal Scam!"

The remarks also followed CNN's Thursday report that Trump's former longtime lawyer Michael Cohen is willing to tell Mueller that Trump approved the controversial June 2016 Trump Tower meeting between Russians and top Trump campaign officials, which would contradict past denials from Trump.

Cohen is under criminal investigation and recently released an audio tape he made in September 2016 in which he and Trump discussed buying the rights to the story of a former Playboy model.

Jonathan Ernst/Reuters

Michael Cohen and Donald Trump.

According to CNN, Cohen alleges he was present along with others when Trump was informed of the Russians' offer  that the president signed off on the idea to meet with them. CNN's sources said Cohen does not have hard evidence to back up his claims. Cohen last year testified to two congressional committees on Russian election interference and did not say that Trump had advance knowledge of the meeting, a source told CNN.

After that report, Giuliani spent days blasting Cohen's credibility, saying "he's lied all his life." On Friday, Trump tweeted he "did NOT know of the meeting with my son, Don jr."

During his Monday interviews, Giuliani continued to question Cohen's credibility and said the president "did not participate" in the meeting with the Russians.

Giuliani told CNN he was "happy to tell" Mueller that Trump "wasn't at the meeting." Giuliani added that other individuals who could corroborate Cohen's account would not do so, charging that Cohen is making these claims now because he feels the criminal investigation closing in on him.

On Giuliani's claim that collusion is not a crime, Fordham University law professor Jed Shugerman wrote in Slate that while Trump approving of the meeting would not be in and of itself incriminating, subsequent conduct could point to a conspiracy to defraud the US or obstruction of justice. Any such conduct could be prosecuted, he wrote.