NEW YORK _ Federal investigators logged the phone calls of President Donald Trump's personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, in the weeks before they raided his Manhattan home, office and hotel room, according to a report Thursday.
At least one phone call between Cohen and the White House was noted, NBC News reported.
It's unclear what information was uncovered during the log of phone calls known as a "pen register," or who exactly Cohen may have been talking to at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
NBC News initially reported the feds had a wiretapped Cohen.
Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who recently joined Trump's legal team and has been on a media blitz over the past 24 hours, argued that reports of a phone tap were bogus.
"We don't believe it's true. I keep hearing different stories from different sources," he told the New York Daily News "We think it's going to turn out to be untrue because it would be totally illegal. You can't wiretap a lawyer, let alone the president's lawyer."
Federal prosecutors have already revealed they obtained "covert" search warrants on multiple email accounts belonging to Cohen, according court filings.
But evidence of a wiretap was not immediately clear in the heavily redacted documents related to the raid.
Former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti, now a partner at Thompson Coburn LLP, noted that the bar for wiretapping a suspect is high, even more so when the target is a lawyer.
"Obtaining a wiretap on an attorney is so highly unusual that in my nine years as a federal prosecutor I can't recall anyone obtaining one on a working lawyer," he told the Daily News. "This is a very unusual situation. It would have had to be vetted at the highest level of the DOJ. It's the attorney of the president of the United States of America."
Prosecutors would have had to prove to a judge that they believed Cohen was using his phone to engage in criminal activity.
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Thursday that she could not "verify the validity" of the NBC report.
"I would refer you to the president's outside counsel about any concerns of wiretapping," Sanders said.
During the briefing, Sanders said she was unsure of when Trump and Cohen last spoke, and said she is "not aware of specific" matters where Cohen is representing the president.
The Department of Justice declined to comment.
Trump publicly fumed in the weeks after the raid of his longtime "fixer," saying the FBI "broke in" and calling it "a witch hunt" and "an attack on our country."
The Feds seized reams of documents, several cellphones and computer hard drives in their search.
Investigators were reportedly targeting information on a campaign-era payout Cohen made to porn star Stormy Daniels in an attempt to squash her alleged 2006 fling with the future president.
Trump for the first time admitted Thursday morning that he reimbursed Cohen for the $130,000 he used to keep the adult film star from going public.
The admission directly contradicts what the president told reporters less than a month ago, when he denied knowledge of the payments.
"You'll have to ask Michael Cohen. Michael is my attorney. You'll have to ask Michael," he told reporters on Air Force One in April.
Sanders told reporters Thursday that "this was information the president didn't know at the time but eventually learned ... we give the very best information we have at the time."
It has also been reported that Giuliani warned Trump that Cohen was likely to flip on him.
Trump pushed back against reports that Cohen _ who has worked for Trump and his related business for more than a decade _ might "flip" by coughing up details of his personal business dealings.
Investigators are also eyeing a reported payment of $150,000 from American Media Inc., publishers of the National Enquirer, to Playboy model Karen McDougal, who also allegedly had an affair with Trump.
Cohen, who was known to tape his own conversations, and the president have argued in court that much of the material collected in the raid should be protected by attorney-client privilege.
Cohen's motive for becoming a Trump turncoat would be avoiding punishment from a government probe of his finances.
"Most people will flip if the Government lets them out of trouble," even if "it means lying or making up stories," the President tweeted from his West Palm Beach, Fla., golf club two weeks ago. "Sorry, I don't see Michael doing that despite the horrible Witch Hunt and the dishonest media!"
Daniels' attorney, Michael Avenatti noted during an appearance on MSNBC that he believes federal investigators also intercepted Cohen's text messages, in addition to phone calls.
"My understanding is, they were also wiretapping text messages, communications for the weeks leading up to the FBI raids," he said. "I also think that ultimately it will be disclosed that during these wiretaps, the FBI learned of means by which Michael Cohen and others were going to potentially destroy evidence or documentation."
