President Donald Trump said Tuesday he is not worried about being impeached and added the "people would revolt" if that were to happen.
In an Oval Office interview with Reuters, Trump said payments made by his former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen to two women who claimed to have affairs with him did not violate campaign finance laws.
"It’s hard to impeach somebody who hasn’t done anything wrong and who’s created the greatest economy in the history of our country," Trump said. "I’m not concerned, no. I think that the people would revolt if that happened."
Cohen has pleaded guilty to multiple felonies, including lying to Congress, bank fraud and campaign finance violations. The latter charge is related to payments he said he made to Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal at Trump's direction with the intent of silencing them before the 2016 election.
Trump has denied the affairs, although Trump and the White House have continually changed stories about whether Cohen was reimbursed for the payment to Daniels and whether Trump had knowledge of them. In April, Trump said he didn't know about the $130,000 payment to Daniels.
"Michael Cohen is a lawyer. I assume he would know what he’s doing," Trump told Reuters on Tuesday.
"Number one, it wasn't a campaign contribution," Trump added. "If it were, it's only civil, and even if it's only civil, there was no violation based on what we did. OK?"
EXCLUSIVE - @realDonaldTrump says he relied on Michael Cohen, who should have known what to do about payments to women. "Number one, it wasn't a campaign contribution. If it were, it's only civil, and even if it's only civil, there was no violation based on what we did. OK?"
— Jeff Mason (@jeffmason1) December 12, 2018
House Democrats are feeling pressure from their supporters to impeach Trump when they take control of the chamber next month. Rep.-elect Ilhan Omar (D., Minn.) said this week that Democrats were "getting closer every day" to feeling they should initiate impeachment proceedings.
Only two U.S. presidents have ever been impeached: Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton. Both were acquitted of their charges in the U.S. Senate. Richard Nixon faced certain impeachment and removal from office in 1974 over the Watergate scandal but resigned before that happened.