Donald Trump's former personal attorney Michael Cohen, who spent years calling the president a "racist," a "predator," and a "fraud", appeared on Trump's own radio show this week, called him "boss," and is now actively pursuing a presidential pardon for his federal crimes.

The 15-minute segment aired Thursday night on Trump's WABC-77 radio program and featured Cohen, 59, slipping back into the role of loyal lieutenant as though the intervening years of criminal testimony, prison time, and public denunciations had never happened. Cohen reminisced about analyzing polls at Trump's side and even suggested the president hold a press conference to showcase his accomplishments, the New York Post reported.

The spectacle would be remarkable enough on its own. But Cohen is not simply making a social call. He has sent a formal pardon application to the Justice Department by FedEx and told CNN's Jake Tapper he plans to phone the department to follow up, because no one there has acknowledged receiving it.

Cohen's record: $4 million hidden from the IRS, bank fraud, and hush money

Cohen's crimes are not minor paperwork violations. He pleaded guilty in 2018 to eight federal counts, including concealing $4 million in income from the IRS and lying to a bank to obtain a $500,000 loan. He also admitted to a campaign finance violation tied to $280,000 in hush money payments to two women during the 2016 presidential election. He served prison time for those offenses.

After his guilty plea, Cohen turned on Trump publicly and aggressively. He spent years branding the president a racist, a predator, and a fraud. He became a fixture on cable news panels hostile to the administration. And in 2024, he served as the star witness in Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's prosecution of Trump over hush money payments, a case that ended with Trump's conviction on 34 felony counts.

Presidential pardons have become a charged political question in recent years. The Senate unanimously opposed a potential pardon for FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried, and debates over clemency decisions have drawn sharp scrutiny from both parties.

Now Cohen wants the very man he helped convict to wipe his record clean.

'Boss, you remember when I was by your side?'

The radio interview itself was a study in reinvention. Cohen addressed the president with a deference that would have been unthinkable during his years as a prosecution witness and anti-Trump media personality.

Cohen told Trump during the broadcast:

"Boss, you remember when I was by your side? I literally used to analyze the polls."

He went further, pitching himself as a strategic asset once again:

"Maybe what we should do is then have a press conference and literally put out all of the accomplishments."

Trump, for his part, acknowledged Cohen's reversal. The president told Cohen he respected the decision to walk back prior statements.

"I respect the fact that you recanted everything you said, and that's a big thing that you did."

The broader pardon landscape has produced its own controversies. Hunter Biden publicly defended the pardon his father issued him, arguing it shielded the Biden family from political consequences, a move that drew widespread criticism from the right.

Cohen now says Bragg and James 'pressured and coerced' him

Cohen's path back toward Trump's orbit began earlier this year, when he started aligning himself with the president's long-standing claim that Democratic prosecutors had waged a politically motivated campaign against him. In January 2026, Cohen said publicly that he felt "pressured and coerced" to act against Trump by Bragg and New York Attorney General Letitia James.

That claim is worth pausing on. Cohen did not simply testify; he was the prosecution's central witness in a case Democrats celebrated as historic accountability. If Cohen now says his testimony was the product of coercion by two of the most prominent Democratic prosecutors in the country, the implications cut directly at the legitimacy of the 34-count conviction itself.

Cohen has not, based on available reporting, filed a formal complaint against Bragg or James. And neither prosecutor has responded publicly to his accusation in the material at hand. But the allegation aligns with what Trump and his supporters said from the start: that the Manhattan prosecution was a political operation dressed up as law enforcement.

The administration has used its pardon authority on a range of cases. Trump recently pardoned 11 individuals convicted of Clean Air Act violations over vehicle modifications, and reports have indicated the White House has privately weighed clemency for other high-profile figures.

A FedEx receipt but no answer from the Justice Department

Cohen told CNN's Jake Tapper that his pardon application is sitting somewhere inside the Justice Department with no confirmation that anyone has opened it. His account was specific, he sent the paperwork by FedEx, kept the receipt, and has heard nothing back.

Cohen described his next step in the CNN interview:

"I have not received an acknowledgement that they have the application, which is on my to-do list, which I intend to call tomorrow to find out what happened because I did send it by FedEx, so I do have a receipt."

Whether the Justice Department has processed the application, lost it, or simply not responded remains unclear. And whether Trump himself has any intention of granting a pardon to the man who helped convict him is an open question the radio interview did not answer. Trump praised Cohen's recantation but made no commitment.

Pardon decisions have carried political fallout across party lines. Minnesota Governor Tim Walz faced pointed questions after the Trump administration deported a convicted child sex offender Walz had helped pardon, a reminder that clemency choices follow the officials who make them.

From fixer to felon to supplicant

Cohen's arc is difficult to overstate. He was Trump's self-described "fixer", the personal attorney who handled sensitive matters and boasted about his closeness to the boss. Then he became the government's weapon against Trump, pleading guilty to federal crimes and testifying in the most politically charged prosecution of a former president in American history. He called Trump every name available on cable television.

Now he is back on the radio, calling Trump "boss" again, suggesting press conferences, and chasing a pardon by FedEx. The man who hid $4 million from the IRS, defrauded a bank, and arranged hush money payments wants the president he betrayed to make it all disappear.

Cohen's transformation tells you less about Cohen than it does about the prosecution that made him its star witness. If the key player in the case against Trump now says he was coerced, and is willing to grovel on national radio for a pardon, what does that say about the case itself?

When your star witness ends up begging the defendant for mercy, the verdict starts to look like the problem.