AT&T admits hiring Donald Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen was a ‘big mistake’ but says its actions were ‘entirely legitimate’

AT&T’s top executive said Friday it was a “big mistake” to hire a Donald Trump’s personal lawyer as a consultant after the presidential election, but maintained that the telecom giant’s actions were legal and “entirely legitimate”.

Randall Stephenson, AT&T’s chairman and chief executive, also told employees in a message that the company’s policy chief Bob Quinn would be retiring following the disclosures of payments to lawyer Michael Cohen, the focus of a series of investigations.

“There is no other way to say it – AT&T hiring Michael Cohen as a political consultant was a big mistake,” Stephenson said.

“To be clear, everything we did was done according to the law and entirely legitimate. But the fact is, our past association with Cohen was a serious misjudgment. In this instance, our Washington DC team’s vetting process clearly failed, and I take responsibility for that.”

“Our company has been in the headlines for all the wrong reasons these last few days and our reputation has been damaged,” Stephenson said.