Michael Cohen’s appearance before the Senate intelligence committee will be pushed back because he’s recovering from surgery, Cohen’s lawyer Lanny Davis said.“The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence has accepted Mr. Cohen’s request for postponement of tomorrow’s hearing due to post-surgery medical needs,” Davis said in a statement to VICE News. “A future date will be announced by the Committee.”The delay marks the third postponement in Cohen’s much-anticipated string of congressional appearances, which were all set for the first half of February before getting pushed back. Cohen had been due to appear before the Senate panel tomorrow in response to a subpoena sent by the committee in late January.All three have been postponed for seemingly different reasons, and Cohen’s still-mysterious surgical operation marks a new one.A closed-door session before the House Intelligence Committee, due to take place last Friday, was pushed back three weeks until Feb. 28 “in the interests of the investigation,” House Intel Committee chairman Rep. Adam Schiff said last week, without explaining further.Another public event before the House Oversight Committee, originally set for Feb. 7, was postponed indefinitely in late January over what Davis called “threats against his [Cohen’s] family from President Trump.”Trump and his lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, had spent the preceding days arguing on cable television and Twitter that Cohen’s father-in-law should himself be investigated. Giuliani asserted, without giving evidence, that Fima Shusterman “may have ties to something called organized crime.”The subpoena for Tuesday’s appearance before the Senate panel was sent to Cohen months after Senators had asked more politely for him to please appear again before their committee, according to Senate intel chairman Richard Burr (R-N.C.).“Mr. Cohen has had in his possession for months a letter requesting return visits to the Committee,” Burr said in a statement in late November.Cohen is set to begin a three-year prison sentence in early March, stemming partly from his lies to Congress. Being incarcerated will make booking Cohen on Capitol Hill more difficult, but not impossible, legal experts and congressional staffers have said.Cover: Michael Cohen arrives at his home in New York with his left arm in a sling supported by a pillow Friday, Jan. 18, 2019. Democrats are vowing to investigate whether President Donald Trump directed Cohen, his personal attorney, to lie to Congress about a Moscow real estate project, calling that possibility a "concern of the greatest magnitude." (AP Photo/Kevin Hagen)
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