Trump won't leave office peacefully, his former lawyer Cohen claims in upcoming book

Michael Cohen's memoir about U.S. President Donald Trump will be released Sept. 8 by Skyhorse Publishing, which confirmed the news Thursday to The Associated Press.

The book is called Disloyal: The True Story of the Former Personal Attorney to President Donald J. Trump.

"Disloyal is the most devastating business and political horror story of the century," according to a Skyhorse statement shared with the AP.

"It is a story that you haven't read in newspapers, or on social media, or watched on television. These are accounts that only someone who worked for Trump around the clock for a decade — not a few months or even a couple of years — could know."

Earlier in the day, Cohen had released the book's foreword, writing of his estranged former boss, "He wouldn't mind if I was dead."

Currently on home confinement

In the foreword, dated in March, Cohen writes he's "certain that Trump knows he will face prison time if he leaves office," pointing to legal problems that continue to swirl around the president, including an apparent investigation into Trump Organization tax claims.

"Trump will never leave office peacefully," Cohen writes. "The types of scandals that have surfaced in recent months will only continue to emerge with greater and greater levels of treachery and deceit. If Trump wins another four years, these scandals will prove to only be the tip of the iceberg."

Cohen is completing the last two years of a three-year prison sentence at home after pleading guilty to campaign finance charges and lying to Congress. He was released from prison in May amid coronavirus fears, only to be returned in July after making it known that he planned to publish Disloyal.

As with testimony he gave to Congress before heading to prison, Cohen writes in the book that Trump was interested in pursuing a hotel project in Moscow well into the 2016 presidential campaign despite denying ties to Russia.

"I know because I personally ran that deal and kept Trump and his children closely informed of all updates, even as the candidate blatantly lied to the American people," says Cohen.

Since becoming president, Cohen says, Trump has "become the worst version of himself."

The U.S. government dropped its effort to silence Cohen late last month after an agreement was reached between government lawyers and Cohen lawyer Danya Perry that lifted a ban on Cohen speaking publicly.

Cohen's charges stemmed from his efforts to arrange payouts during the 2016 presidential race to keep the porn actress Stormy Daniels and model Karen McDougal from speaking out about their alleged extramarital affairs with Trump, who has denied the affairs. He has said that Trump directed him to make the payments.

Skyhorse has a history of taking on books by controversial public figures, including a memoir this spring by Woody Allen that had been dropped by Hachette Book Group.