--- ---  # President Trump Was Asked About Pardoning His Lawyer. He Called It a 'Stupid Question' by [Ryan Teague Beckwith](https://time.com/author/ryan-teague-beckwith/) ## Ryan Teague Beckwith Apr 24, 2018 3:10 PM UTC  Michael Cohen, personal lawyer for President-elect Donald Trump, gets into an elevator at Trump Tower, Dec 12, 2016 in New York City. Michael Cohen, personal lawyer for President-elect Donald Trump, gets into an elevator at Trump Tower, Dec 12, 2016 in New York City.Drew Angerer—Getty Images by [Ryan Teague Beckwith](https://time.com/author/ryan-teague-beckwith/) ## Ryan Teague Beckwith Apr 24, 2018 3:10 PM UTC President Donald Trump refused to answer whether he would pardon his personal attorney, calling it a “stupid question.” Sitting with French President Emmanuel Macron at the White House on Tuesday, Trump was asked if he would consider pardoning Michael Cohen, whose home and offices were raided by federal prosecutors earlier this month. “Thank you very much,” he said. “Stupid question. Go ahead, anybody else please?” Cohen has not yet been charged with any crimes, although the President can [preemptively pardon people](https://www.justsecurity.org/43308/presidential-pardon-scenarios/) even if they have not yet been charged with a crime, as President Gerald Ford famously did for former President Richard Nixon. Immediately after the Cohen raid, Trump responded angrily, calling it “a disgrace” and [“an attack on our country.”](http://time.com/5233992/a-disgrace-trump-reacts-to-fbis-raid-on-his-personal-lawyer-michael-cohens-office/) He later complained on Twitter that [“attorney-client privilege is dead!”](https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/10/politics/trump-cohen-raid-tweet-response/index.html) Over the weekend he also harshly criticized a New York _Times_ report on Cohen, arguing that reporters were trying to “destroy” his relationship with Trump [“in the hope that he will ‘flip.'”](https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/987679848284999680) White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders would not rule out a pardon during a recent press briefing, calling it a [“hypothetical situation.”](https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/politics/white-house-doesnt-rule-out-michael-cohen-pardon/2018/04/23/6ba88d18-4724-11e8-8082-105a446d19b8%5Fvideo.html?utm%5Fterm=.5c02841a4202) Donald Trump Called Michael Cohen Pardon a 'Stupid Question' ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5252419/president-trump-michael-cohen-pardon/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5252419/president-trump-michael-cohen-pardon/"},"headline":"President Trump Was Asked About Pardoning His Lawyer. He Called It a 'Stupid Question'","datePublished":"2018-04-24T15:10:04.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T20:04:15.009Z","description":"President Donald Trump refused to answer whether he would pardon his personal attorney, calling it a \"stupid question.\"","url":"https://time.com/5252419/president-trump-michael-cohen-pardon/","keywords":["Donald Trump","White House","onetime","michael cohen"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt0f420e505bc83d77/69892da5656a3f9cffbd4240/michael-cohen-criminal-investigation.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Ryan Teague Beckwith","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/ryan-teague-beckwith/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt0f420e505bc83d77/69892da5656a3f9cffbd4240/michael-cohen-criminal-investigation.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"President-Elect Donald Trump Holds Meetings At Trump Tower","caption":"President-Elect Donald Trump Holds Meetings At Trump Tower","creditText":"Drew Angerer—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/donald-trump/","name":"Donald Trump"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5252419/president-trump-michael-cohen-pardon/","name":"President Trump Was Asked About Pardoning His Lawyer. He Called It a 'Stupid Question'"}}]}] ```